Hariva Nadige Maiyella Kaalu | ಹರಿವ ನದಿಗೆ ಮೈಯೆಲ್ಲಾ ಕಾಲು

What stories do footsteps tell? 

Spend your Friday evening unwinding with a Kannada film screening, followed by a discussion with the filmmaker Babu Eshwar Prasad. Inspired by 12th century Kannada poet Allama Prabhu’s vachana, the title ‘Hariva Nadige Maiyella Kaalu’ (A Running River is all Legs) encapsulates the theme of this film which focuses on the idea of motion and walking. The film is a meditation on the act of walking through the lives of three principal characters: Kumar, a photojournalist disenchanted with his regular job, visits different places seeking new sources of inspiration; Neelu, a salesgirl in a shoe shop with a set routine, is only interested in watching people walk; and Amaresha, an elderly prisoner, alleviates his feelings of confinement by walking to imagined places within his cell.

The camera follows the gaze of the characters, trained to different directions, in some cases the ground and in others the sky, experiencing how they relate to the world around them, the minute details they observe, and their sense of time and place. Moving between dream and reality, the film is an exploration of the inner and outer landscapes they encounter.

This screening is in conjunction with the exhibition, We don’t end at our edges.

Cast: Shrunga BV, M N Swamy, Menaka Neotia, Mohamed Rizvan. Dop B R Viswanath. Editing: M N Swamy

Images courtesy: Moving Focus Pictures.