Payal Kapadia reacts to All We Imagine As Light not being India’s Oscar pick: ‘I am happy for Laapataa Ladies’

Filmmaker Payal Kapadia’s All We Imagine As Light gained global attention overnight, when it bagged the Grand Prix at Cannes 2024. Ahead of its official release worldwide, Payal sat down for a conversation with film critic Shubhra Gupta after the film’s first screening in Delhi at Express Film Club by SCREEN, on November 8.

After much hype around her film being expected to be sent as India’s official entry for Oscars 2025, it was actually Kiran Rao’s Laapataa Ladies that got selected for The Academy Awards. When asked if there was any disappointment regarding the same, Payal said, “With this film, everything that we have gotten beyond making this film has been a bonus. So, whatever comes our way, we are just so happy that its there. The film that they chose is a very nice film and I enjoyed watching it very much. Its a director whose previous work also I loved so much, I have always admired her work. For me, it was like, ‘Its so nice’.”

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The filmmaker also mentioned that she is very new to this world and is learning on the go. “I am learning about this whole Oscar thing now, it is all very new to me. I am like, ‘Oh, this is how it works’.”

Is she expecting a miracle for All We Imagine As Light ahead of its release in the country? “The release in the US is on November 15, let’s see what happens. Once the release happens and we see what the response is, that is when I think the distributors will take that call because there is a lot of work to be done,” she remarked.

Scheduled to hit the theatres on November 22 in India, All We Imagine As Light stars Kani Kusruti and Divya Prabha as two Malayali nurses, Prabha and Anu respectively, and Chhaya Kadam as Parvaty, thea cook. The movie narrates the story of the three migrant women living in Mumbai and their inter-generational friendship.