Exactly a month before the world premiere of Abhinandan Banerjee‘s “The Cloud & the Man” in the First Feature competition of PÖFF, it was announced that the U.S. sales agent Outsider Pictures had boarded it. After its screening in Tallinn, it is safe to say that the film has a good chance of winning further international audiences, if not in physical theaters outside the film festivals, than most certainly on diverse VOD platforms.
Banerjee's debut is a remarkably well-written and executed film which stands out for its unique representation of loneliness with little words invested. Black & white photography, in recent years over-used in just about any film that hints at ‘art', makes perfect sense in “The Cloud & The Man”. The world of its main protagonist, the middle-aged Manikbabu (Chandan Sen) is literally colourless, and his days unfold in exactly the same rhythm: desk job with a mountain of paperwork, brief joyless lunch breaks with colleagues and tending to his old, bed-ridden father (Nemai Ghosh). Our main hero is voiceless most of the time. Barely anyone speaks to him, and even if they do, it's not for the sake of a good conversation. His landlord (Arun Guha Thakurta) appears every now and then with different type of requests under the pressure of his wife, and there is a scamster with a plan who plays his friend for a very short period of time until he gets what he wants.
Manikbabu is a loner, a man who is trapped in his daily routine, and this perpetual mobile of small activities that his life is made of finds its ideal representation in Anup Singh's gently contrasted black and white images. One could say that life seen through his eyes is in countless shades of grey.
There is a very charming genre element in the film that bridges reality and fantasy in an unusual manner. “The other” sees the earthly in bright colours, the Earthling is incapable of escaping the drabness of his own world. Banerjee creates an atmosphere full of intentional contradictions which are there to remind you that the only thing black & white in the movie is its photography, and that, like in real life, nothing can be simply classified as ultimately wrong or right.
“The Cloud and The Man” is a film distinctive in style. Although it burns slow like a candle, it doesn't become monotonous. The visual takes over the spoken word, and that also makes perfect sense: Regarding its cinematograhic style, “The Cloud & The Man” is not particularly rooted in the Indian filmmaking tradition. It is not just the universality of the story about loneliness and how to come to terms with it that makes it stick out, it is also about the setting which is reduced to the intimate world and perception of one man. The plot could have been easily set up anywhere else in the world because it is based one one significant bond only.
Manikbabu finds an unlikely friend up in the sky that no one except him can see, and he is met with strange looks for carrying the umbrella around. It's the hottest summer that Calcutta has ever seen, dry as the desert, unpleasant, and one could almost believe that Manikbabu is hallucinating about the cloud above his head in hope for some rain for his rooftop garden.
The chatty cloud (not that we would know what it says, because only Manikbabu can hear it) appears after a number of ‘signs' coming the man's way: a real estate company's billboard offering life with the clouds, or the lyrics of Sukumar Roy's nonsensical poetry he is so fond of. This unexpected materialization of his dream to bond with just anyone willing to hear his voice makes him feel alive for the first time in a long while.
“The Cloud & The Man” reminds us how much a bit of genuine care for someone can change one's life for a better.
