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Journalism of Courage
The Stein Auditorium at India Habitat Centre can seat 600 people and it was full at the premiere of Atul Sabharwal’s Berlin at the 16th Habitat Film Festival (HFF) on May 3. An unusual choice of title for a movie set in the ’90s Delhi. The movie gets its title from the Berlin Café, a major location in the story. The name could also be a reference to the historical event coinciding with the timeline of the story — the collapse of the Berlin Wall.
Speech and hearing-impaired Ashok is arrested for murder as Delhi gets ready for the visit of Russian President Boris Yeltsin. Government employee Sondhi (Rahul Bose) hires sign language interpreter Pushkin (Aparshakti Khurana) to speak with Ashok (Ishwak Singh). The enigmatic circumstances surrounding Ashok are linked to the Berlin Café in Delhi. Both Aparshakti Khurana and Ishwak Singh had to train for six months to learn sign language. Berlin is Atul’s third feature and was first premiered at the Mumbai Film Festival in 2023.
Amidst the bustling energy of the full auditorium, the presence of director Atul Sabharwal and actor Ishwak Singh added an extra layer of excitement and anticipation among the audience. Sabharwal shared that he was inspired by his childhood, which was spent in an Army cantonment school and the lanes of Delhi and Agra. He said he was highly inspired by the feel of TV adaptations of works of John le Carre and Alan J. Pakula’s All the President’s Men.
One of the most striking aspects of the movie is its portrayal of the pain and loneliness experienced by deaf and speech-impaired individuals — a theme that resonates with profound poignancy today. The film explores the character of Ashok, the deaf and speech-impaired character trying to prove to himself that he can be as intelligent and sharp as trained spies. While talking about Berlin, Ishwak Singh, who will be next seen in Pataal Lok 2, said, “Berlin itself packs up a punch, so I am not looking left and right”.
On being questioned about the lack of female characters in the film, the director revealed that the storyline just came out that way and that keeping fewer female characters was not an intentional choice. In fact, casting for that one female character was the most challenging task. The film was praised by the audience for its costumes, locations and sound design. “Delhi’s local green and yellow buses had to be recreated and toed from Mumbai to recreate the ’90s,” he said. In conversation with the audience, Sabharwal was asked about the unique aspect of a spy film. “Suspense is about holding back, not revealing too much and patiently letting the viewers figure out,” he said.
Talking about his first experience as producer of a feature film, he said he was lucky enough to have full control of this project. And he thanked Zee Studios for giving him the creative liberty to make directorial decisions without any pressure.
