"Amu" is the story of Kaju, a 21-year-old Indian-American woman who returns to India to visit her family. The film takes a dark turn as Kaju stumbles across secrets and lies from her past. A horrifying genocide that took place twenty years ago turns out to hold the key to her mysterious origins. How was Kaju’s family involved in the killings? What happened and why? Who were the culprits? Who benefited? Will Kaju have the courage to pursue the truth no matter the cost?
"With the persistence of the frenzied, she turned her first-hand experience into a cinematic oeuvre that lends dignity to loss. Evoking the shocking memory of genocide and the rot of a state-abetted or state-tolerated play of violence, Shonali skilfully shoulders the burden of telling a difficult and risky tale. The horror of Partition has so overshadowed the national imagination of tragedy that it seems pointless to mourn the loss of five or ten thousand people. Natural disasters such as the tsunami move us infinitely more. Shonali challenges the defeatist perception and the cultivated ambivalence through her probing film. That this film is her first makes its production values and acting skill even more surprising... Shonali brings the Sikh slaughters closer to home in a way that nine central governments and an equal number of inquiry commissions have failed to do." Neera Kuckreja Sohoni
Production: Jonai Production (New Delhi)
Screenplay: Shonali Bose
Producer: Shonali Bose
Cinematographer: Lourdes Ambrose
Composer: Nandlal Nayak
Sound and sound design: Resul Pookutty
Cast: Konkona Sensharma, Brinda Karat, Ankur Khanna, Chaiti Ghosh, Aparna Roy
Format/screen ratio: 35mm, 1:1.85, Color
Running time: 98 min., 24 frames/sec.
Languages: English, Hindi, Bengali
