Indian film All We Imagine As Light wins Grand Prix award at Cannes 2024

Express At Cannes: Payal Kapadia’s All We Imagine As Light is a meditative soliloquy on loneliness and connection

Also written by Payal Kapadia, All We Imagine As Light follows the lives of two nurses from Kerala — Prabha (Kani Kusruti) and Anu (Divyaprabha) – colleagues at a Mumbai hospital and roommates. When Prabha receives an unexpected gift from her estranged husband, her regular life is disrupted. In the space-crunched city, her younger roommate Anu struggles to find a spot to be intimate with her boyfriend. When they take a trip to a coastal town, their lives undergo a change.

All We Imagine As Light was Payal Kapadia’s third time at Cannes after her short Afternoon Clouds featured in the Cinefondation section in 2017 and A Night of Knowing Nothing won the Oeil d’Or (Golden Eye) Award for Best Documentary Film there in 2021.

 

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Talking about All We Imagine As Light in an earlier interview with The Indian Express, Payal Kapadia said, “The story is about the city and the people who come to work in Mumbai. They have families back home. But they find new families in friends and colleagues in the city… As I grew older, I have started relying more on friendships. They are my support system too.”

Exclusive | Payal Kapadia on her All We Imagine As Light making it to Cannes Competition: ‘Indian films’ ethos are not well understood in the West’

The 77th edition of Cannes film festival was quite eventful for India. Apart from Shyam Benegal’s Manthan getting a special screening at the festival after almost 48 years of its release and several celebrities and influencers turning heads on the red carpet, on Saturday, it was announced that Anasuya Sengupta, who hails from Kolkata, won the Un Certain Regard Prize for Best Actress for her performance in The Shameless. 

The other winners of Cannes 2024 are

Palme d’Or: Anora

Director: Miguel Gomes, Grand Tour

Actor: Jesse Plemons, Kinds of Kindness

Best Actresses: The Ensemble of Emilia Pérez

Jury Prize: Emilia Pérez

Special Award (Prix Spécial): Mohammad Rasoulof, The Seed of the Sacred Fig

Screenplay: Coralie Fargeat, The Substance

OTHER PRIZES

Camera d’Or: Armand, Halfdan Ullman Tondel

Camera d’Or Special Mention: Mongrel, Chiang Wei Liang, You Qiao Yin

Short Film Palme d’Or: The Man Who Could Not Remain Silent, Nebojša Slijepčević

Short Film Special Mention: Bad for a Moment, Daniel Soares

Golden Eye Documentary Prize: Ernest Cole: Lost and Found and The Brink of Dreams

Queer Palm: Three Kilometers to the End of the World

Palme Dog: Kodi, Palm Dog

FIPRESCI Award (Competition): The Seed of the Sacred Fig, Mohammad Rasoulof

FIPRESCI Award (Un Certain Regard): The Story of Souleymane, Boris Lojkine

FIPRESCI Award (Parallel Sections): Desert of Namibia, Yoko Yamanaka

UN CERTAIN REGARD

Un Certain Regard Award: Black Dog, Guan Hu

Jury Prize: The Story of Souleymane, Boris Lojkine

Best Director Prize: The Damned, Roberto Minervini; On Becoming a Guinea Fowl, Rungano Nyoni

Performance Awards: The Shameless, Anasuya Sengupta; The Story of Souleymane, Abou Sangare

Youth Prize: Holy Cow! (Vingt Dieux), Louise Courvoisier

Special Mention: Norah, Tawfik Alzaidi

DIRECTORS’ FORTNIGHT

Europa Cinemas Label: The Other Way Around, Jonás Trueba

Society of Dramatic Authors and Composers Prize: This Life of Mine, Sophie Fillières

Audience Choice Award: Universal Language, Matthew Rankin

CRITICS’ WEEK

Grand Prize: Simon of the Mountain, Federico Luis

French Touch Prize: Blue Sun Palace, Constance Tsang

GAN Foundation Award for Distribution: Jour2Fête, Julie Keeps Quiet

Louis Roederer Foundation Rising Star Award: Ricardo Teodoro, Baby

Leitz Cine Discovery Prize (short film): Guil Sela, Montsouris Park