Director
SIDHARTH SRINIVASAN
Writer
Sidharth Srinivasan
Cast
Avantika Akerkar, Kanak Bhardwaj, Sudhanva Deshpande, Noble Luke, Anuradha Majumdar, Navjot Randhawa
Cinematographer
Lakshman Anand, Karan Thapliyal
Sound Designer
Debangshu Roy
Composer
Jim Williams
Editor
Rwikjit Roy
contact
Reel Illusion Films
After the August 26 screening, join us at 11:00pm for a live Q&A with Writer/Director Sidharth Srinivasan, Producer Amrit Srinivasan, Actors Navjot Randhawa, Noble Luke, Avantika Akerkar and Sudhanva Deshpande
“KRIYA, like my past work, was born out of an acutely personal reaction to what was happening in my country, where Hindu fundamentalism and chauvinistic religious persecution were ripping India apart.”
Writer/Director Sidharth Srinivasan
While working a club set, DJ Neel (Noble Luke) encounters the ravishing Sitara (MEHSAMPUR’s Navjot Randhawa) and is utterly transfixed by her. They go back to her home and he’s immediately met by the furthest scenario that ever could have crossed his mind – a grieving family in a ritualistic space, gathered around her father’s dying body. As India’s patriarchal death customs dictate that a male offspring read a parent’s last rites – and no such son exists in Sitara’s family – enormous pressure is put on a very surprised Neel to perform the act. It isn’t the strangest thing that he will encounter in this household. As night crosses over into day, it soon becomes evident that Sitara’s family is afflicted by an ancestral curse. One that Neel is now very much a part of.
New Delhi filmmaker Sidharth Srinivasan’s first horror work (and first narrative feature in a decade, following SOUL OF SAND, an acclaimed selection at TIFF and Rotterdam), KRIYA comes at the viewer with seductive allure and a uniquely venomous bite. It’s an aesthetically beautiful film, mystically atmospheric and imbued with a creeping unease that casts an uncommon spell. It’s also startlingly transgressive. While the film is vibrant with stark imagery and an amusingly dark sense of humour, KRIYA is very much a work of confrontational art. One that subverts Hindu ritual traditions and shrieks against its debasement of women in clever and compelling ways. Co-Produced by Andy Starke (IN FABRIC) and Pete Tombs (FREE FIRE), with an unforgettable score by Jim Williams (POSSESSOR, RAW), KRIYA is a strange and wondrous nightmare odyssey of ritual magic. It demands to be met on its own terms and rewards the curious with unexpected charms. Light a candle and prepare yourself. – Mitch Davis
Showings
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