Neeraj Ghaywan, who has directed two lovely short films (Shor and Epiphany) and has also been an assistant director on Anurag Kashyap's Gangs of Wasseypur, shows remarkable command as director in his debut feature, the achingly beautiful Masaan (it translates to crematorium).
In this film that won two awards at this year's Cannes film festival, Ghaywan and co-writer Varun Grover create two distinct worlds and exploit its dramatic potential to the fullest by pitting them against each another.
Both these realities are far removed from the other - one is inhabited by the Facebook/YouTube surfing youth that has slowly broken away from the tradition-honouring texture of Banaras, while the town's established order still hinges on to societal constructs and archaic moralities the way a loved one would hold on to a memento left by the departed.
Devi, a character studiedly played by the ever-so-competent Richa Chadda is an educated young woman, eager to have sex with her boyfriend who is a college student.
Very subtly, Neeraj tells us that she watches porn as she preps herself for an exciting encounter with her young lover at a local motel. However, an evening of supposed passion quickly turns into an event of startling horror as an unsolicited cop 'busts' their private session. While the guy chickens out under pressure, Devi is labelled a slut and to "save her honour" a policeman starts extorting money from her God-fearing, law-abiding father, the always-reliable Sanjay Mishra, who shows such traumatic vulnerability, it's hard not to empathize with his state of helplessness.
With this one incident, Ghaywan takes you through the delicate relationship between a father and his daughter, both of whom are ridden with guilt and anguish and grappling with loss. It's their inability to cope up and the desire to get out where the filmmaker quietly intrudes and comes out with an astute understanding of human behavior.
In a parallel track is debutant Vicky Kaushal, who plays Deepak Kumar, a character belonging to the Dom community, who live by the Ghats and burn the dead to survive in the Eternal City. He falls in love with an upper-caste girl and what follows is one of the most soulful and poetically-rich love stories one has seen.
An aspiring civil engineer, Deepak's romance with Shweta Tripathi's Shaalu starts on social media but unfolds with the innocence reminiscent of a bygone era. It's a beautiful contrast and much like first-love, it is uncontainable and exciting.
They meet in-between festivals, bunk college trips for a private rendezvous by the river bank. She reads out poetry he can't fully understand, he smiles with an honesty that perhaps triggers the poetess in her.
In Shaalu, Deepak sees an escape. For him, she encapsulates a life full of love and possibilities, a different reality away from the dark nights he spends lighting corpses. When she promises to elope with him, a boat ride with his best friend seems dull as hell while engineering books ignite with the prospects of a brighter future. She makes him believe in having belief while he is the manifestation of her romantic idealism.
However, make no mistake, Masaan is a film populated with extremely lonely and broken people. They are seeking a sense of completeness which is snatched away from them just when they are half a breath away from achieving it.
From Sanjay Mishra's character whose moral fibre slowly starts eroding to Richa Chadda's level-headed (Small town, small thoughts, she spiritedly quips) Devi who finds closure only by letting go of the memento left behind by her lover to the resolute Shweta Tripathi , every character shines in this seminal drama.
Vicky Kaushal wins you over with his innocence while Pankaj Tripathi sinks his teeth in what is one of the most memorable characters in the movies this year.
All these scenes, poetically shot by DoP Avinash Arun, are punctuated by Dushyant Kumat's unforgettable poem:
"Tu Kisi Rail Si Guzarti Hain, Main Kisi Pool Sa Thartharata Hoon."
This is the rare case when songs don't interject but drive the narrative forward.
On the whole, Masaan is a haunting portrait of delicate interpersonal relationships with the fast-changing town of Banaras as a metaphor. Here, everything collides and then settles down. Moralities are questioned, faith is shaken, love breaks and tears people apart and hope, like it does always, heals.
Just like a burning funeral pyre, this film is difficult to watch. But sometimes what is difficult is also essential.