'Bombay Rose' my ode to people living with unfulfilled dreams: Gitanjali Rao

Gitanjali Rao says with "Bombay Rose", her colourful animation feature that has been winning hearts in international film festival circuits, she wanted to explore story of regular people whose dreams are swept away in a corner. Rao believes Mumbai is me of immigrants who are building, cleaning and running city but never feel at home. "Everybody in Bombay has left some place, come here and are trying to survive. A lot of stories have been told about people who make it big. But re are thousands who are t able to achieve that and y're essentially ones who are running city, building it, cleaning it and yet y're ones who are marginalised or swept away in a corner.

"This is unfair, but this is how city is. I felt that beauty was t in people who are successful, but in those who are trying to survive huge difficulties with small successes every day," Rao told PTI in an interview. film, which has toured festivals like Venice, Toronto, London and Busan before its India premiere at Mumbai Film Festival, features beautiful hand-painted frames that have been turned into animation.

core story of "Bombay Rose", which Rao has directed, written, edited and designed, is about Kamala, a flower-seller who moonlights as a bar dancer and Salim, a cinema-loving Kashmiri immigrant with dreams to make it big in city. y both are struggling to make ends meet but are drawn to each or. Rao said she me deliberate choice to t just only focus on characters' struggles but also on "special" moments that y encounter in ir lives.

"thing grand ever happens to any of my characters but whatever is happening is very special and it still keeps people engd. At same time, I also want people to t turn ir faces away from realities that se people live with every day and that does happen to people in Bombay." "Bombay Rose" also has Ms D'Souza, an elderly woman who reminisces about her past to live through her present.

"All my films are about dreams. Dreams can be past as it really happened. Dreams can also be an imagined world where you wish you h been. So, for me, old woman is actually reliving her past life which was glorious. "When you're in your 60s and 70s and have lived a full life, you can have stalgia. Every old person I encounter are living in that world. I have travelled with my mor a lot. She's always reliving beautiful times of her life. So after a certain , you're reliving your life."

Rao has me "Bombay Rose" in such a way that it also reflects on how city's secular fabric was torn apart in '90s. "For me, personally, things changed after 1992 when Babri Masjid fell. I was about 17 or 18 and in college. Until n, ne of us even knew who was Hindu, Muslim or Christian. Bombay was a very cosmopolitan city n. "What happened after 90 days, suddenly re was a breach in a place like Bombay. Suddenly or community became very, very b. And se were tremors were felt almost daily. So to me, it was, in a sense, death of a beautiful part of Bombay."

Besides events of 1992, filmmaker also focused on present and how state and those in authority failed city and its people. " present is actually 2005, which was when se dance bars were being shut down. I re about how se women were pushed into prostitution, actually by state. It was same with children. y're t allowed to work if y're less than 14 but y're put into juvenile homes, which make criminals out of m. So you question state, which is making se laws without any support system."

Rao has weaved se different thres into storyline in such a way that rar than having a melancholy tone, film comes across as a surreal piece of art. "Bombay Rose", Rao said, is also a tribute to her favourite filmmakers like Pedro Almodovar, Guru Dutt, Mira Nair and especially Wong Kar-Wai, whose 2000 romance drama "In Mood for Love" influenced me. "It is a total tribute to In Mood for Love'. I find it so poetic that it stay with you inside always. re was music, colours, paintings, slow motion shots. re is just this one look between this man and woman and it speaks volumes. Also fact that y almost never even touch each or.

"In 'Bombay Rose', I took this to ar level where forget touching, y don't even speak with each or. It is only in end when you kw that y are t going to be toger, everything happens." movie was closing film at just-concluded Dharamshala International Film Festival.