A Spoonful of Cinema: In Conversation With the Makers of ‘Last Film Show’

Writer-director Pan Nalin’s Gujarati-language film, Last Film Show (Chhello Show), tells the story of Samay (Bhavin Rabari), a school-going, cinema-obsessed son of a tea seller. 

Set in 2010 in Saurashtra, Gujarat, the film follows Samay, who is part of a gang of six boys – all non-actors cast from local communities. They go to school, and in between helping their families with errands, they play on the rail track.

Samay, whose hair is long, matted and who is mostly without a shirt, sneaks into a local theatre one day and befriends the projectionist, Fazal (played by Bhavesh Shrimali). To watch a film, he offers his mother’s lovingly prepared tiffin. Fazal, who lives with an Amitabh Bachchan hangover and cribs about his wife’s cooking, is happy to oblige. 

As this becomes a daily affair, Samay starts understanding how film projection works and returns home to recruit his friends in his own experiments that involve stolen film reels, an abandoned house, a worn-out white sheet, a light bulb and an orchestra of tin cans, stones and lots of cute ingenuity.

Intertwined with this is the story of the death of single-screen cinema halls and celluloid films in India.

The film, which tips its hat to the Italian classic film Cinema Paradiso, celebrates cinema but also marks the end of an era of cinema with an apocalyptic scene when the projector is broken and celluloid film reels are melted to make cheap spoons and bangles.

Last Film Show is not morose. It’s a sweet, adorable film with touching performances from all, including Baa (Richa Meena who plays Samay’s mother), Bapuji (Dipen Raval who plays Samay’s father), and the kids, one of whom, Rahul Koli, succumbed to leukemia last month. He was 15 years old.

The film is playing in select theatres and has been picked as India’s Oscar entry in a year when the competition is tough. 

Rolling Stone India spoke with writer-director Pan Nalin, Siddharth Roy Kapur of Roy Kapur Films (the film’s distributor in India) and Dheer Momaya of Jugaad Motion Picture (co-producer) about the making of Last Film Show and its Oscar journey.

Rolling Stone: Hi. I’m not sure how to negotiate a conversation with three people… Shall I begin with Pan Nalin? Is that okay? 

Siddharth Roy Kapur: Yes. 

RS: So how much of you [Pan Nalin] is there in the film?

Pan Nalin: I would say, quite a lot. The film is inspired from my own childhood and my childhood friend who was a projectionist, but it’s set in 2010-11 because that was the time when cinema halls were going through a massive transition… Most of the incidents you see in the film are loosely inspired from my own childhood. And not just that, I ended up shooting in the same villages, same meter gauge train line, and the same cinema hall where I saw my first movie.

RS: Oh, really? What was the name of that cinema hall?

Pan Nalin: It was called Kalapi, which in the movie is called Galaxy. Kalapi was a very famous Gujarati poet and the cinema was named after him. That cinema hall had been shut since 20 to 25 years and was being used as a warehouse. We refurbished it to shoot the movie.

RS: In the movie you have a long sequence set in a factory where film reels are turned into bangles. Why did you include that? 

Pan Nalin: For me, the projector, film reels and bangles, the transformation and recycling, comes from our spiritual tradition and belief… how everything just keeps being reborn, which is also how our Central Trinity is designed – generator, operator, destroyer. Somebody has to create, somebody has to operate, someone has to destroy. 

[But] I didn’t want to be pretentious or philosophical about it. So, in a way, I took a little lyrical license because [otherwise] it’s a really violent climax. But unlike in a normal action movie, here the battle is being fought in the minds of those watching the film, the conflict is within when they see what they loved is being turned heartlessly into spoons and katoris.

RS: Ya, the spoons… When I was watching the sequence, I was intrigued by how the scene turns. You think, we are never going to see these films ever again, and the spoons are really depressing. But then the bangles! That’s what I wanted to understand… 

Pan Nalin: Yeah, coming back to bangles. I didn’t want to leave [the audience] with that depression and the idea with the bangles is that the film [reel] is born into something even more beautiful. And bangles have all those colors which are a cinematographer’s palette… Every director, when they make a movie, has their color palette… If Francis Ford Coppola is making Godfather, he sits with his cinematographer and they do what is called color grading, and it has a pattern. 

So, when we were going into that bangles sequence, they were kind of a metaphor and representation of something beautiful which is going to continue, but in a different form… As something that is an extension of women’s beauty. So, for me, I can’t say, ‘Oh, this is the end, let’s cry over it.’ No, it’s a beautiful change, let’s embrace it.

RS: Can I draw Siddharth into the conversation? How did you come on board and why this film?

Siddharth: So, Dheer and us had been discussing working on something together for a while and he told us that he’s made a film that he would like to show us. We saw it and the film had a very profound impact on me and my whole team. And we said, we’d love to be associated with it, in whichever way possible. The idea really was to come on board to be able to take the film to as wide an audience across the country as possible, which is what we are trying to do.

RS: And when was this? When did you watch the film?

Siddharth: This must have been what… When was it, Dheer, do you remember?

Dheer: It was last year, more than a year ago.

RS: When was the film shot?

Pan Nalin: We finished shooting just before the pandemic, March 2020. We literally finished shooting and the world went into a mega lockdown.

RS: What about the talk in some quarters about the selection of this film for the Oscars?

Siddharth: I’ve been associated now with many films that have been India’s selection to the Academy Awards. And honestly, there’s a cloud over every film every year… We are a passionate people and film people are even more passionate, [so] you have very vigorous debates about something that is definitely a subjective decision… And that happens not just in India, but around the world.  

RS: Taking off from what you just said, you’ve been a part of a lot of Oscar campaigns when you were with UTV, I think five films which were India’s entry to the Oscars…

Siddharth: Six, I believe, yeah.

RS: So once you get this official nomination, is that it? Or is this when the work actually begins?

Siddharth: That’s definitely not it. We’ve always tried to put our best foot forward. But the thing is, you need to get as many members of the Academy to watch your film as possible. With this film the benefit is that we’ve got Samuel Goldwyn Films, which is the U.S. distributor, and Orange Studio, the sales agents of the film who are based out of Europe and have done this very successfully in the past. Dheer can speak about that a little bit more, but we will definitely be leaning on their expertise to guide us to take the campaign forward.  

The attempt really is to get as many members of the Academy to watch the film as possible, which in the past was hard because you had to physically get them to a screening room, or get a print sent to wherever in the world they were. Now, of course, everything is digital. So the idea really is to nudge them to do the less onerous task of opening up a screen and watching the film digitally…  

RS: And how many jury members are there who will be deciding on this category?

Dheer: It depends on how many Academy members sign up to be in the International Committee. I don’t think there’s a limit to it. 

And once you’re a in the International Committee, you have to watch 15 films before you can vote for one… It’s a completely random process. There’s no way to know how many there will be eventually… [And] the problem with getting Academy members to sign up for a show is that most of them are working professionals who are either busy on shoots, pre-production or post…

RS: In all competitions, one has to keep an eye on fellow competitors. In this one, where your competition is with the best films from across the world, including Pakistan’s Joyland, do you keep an eye on what the competition is, what they are doing?

Pan Nalin: That’s not really going to help our cause. I mean, ultimately, it’s [about] the Academy members and the mood they are in, and majority of Academy members are American citizens working in the mainstream film, television industries… There are also members in the U.K., France, Italy and other countries. So I think it depends on what frame of mind they are in when they are watching movies. 

Sometimes we have seen that they are attracted to movies that are cause-driven, sometimes they are attracted to movies which have cinematic brilliance, sometimes they are politically motivated and want to address an issue… Climate change, gun control, education…  

RS: As you were saying, the jury is mostly American, and Bollywood films or films from India have a certain reputation, that there will be song, dance. Do you think that is a hindrance to breaking into Oscar lineage? Will it help that you are based in America, and your storytelling, gaze is different from that of Bollywood?

Pan Nalin: First of all, I’m based wherever there are co-producers. My last movie was with New Zealand, this one was an official I&B ministry co-production with France.

Second, I don’t think it can help you whether you are based in the U.S. or anywhere else. As far as the Academy is concerned, it doesn’t matter… Ultimately it’s the movie which has to stand out. 

Yes, it is true what you said, we have a diverse industry… Tamil, Telugu Malayalam, Kannada, Hindi, and then there are regional films. And we often forget that it’s the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, okay, and for them to deal with a country like India is complex. I don’t think there is any other country on the planet as complicated as India… It’s almost like asking the European Union to only choose one film… 

The people who are in the Academy are born and brought up on a very different cinematic grammar of Western ways of making movies, which is influenced by European styles of filmmaking, and then further enriched by the American traditions. So, yes, that plays a very strong part… If you’re making a supernatural horror movie, and if your heroine bursts out singing a song, it will be very hard for them to digest, [adds in a mock-surprised voice] ‘It’s supposed to be scary, why are they singing a song?’ [Laughs]. I think those cultural differences are there. And countries like Japan and South Korea have an upper hand because their cinematic language is still closer to the way the Western world is making cinema and within that they’re able to create something new…  

RS: What I meant was, because of the fact that you have lived abroad, your lens is different, your narrative style is different… It is not very Bollywood, Tamil, Telugu… I meant, will that help?

Siddharth: I do believe it will. I think it’s hard for Nalin to say that himself, but I do think that the way in which he’s told the story, so rooted and authentic but still in a language and cinematic grammar that is easy for anyone in the West to understand it…

RS: And the film does remind you of Cinema Paradiso… Also, in the beginning of the film, you [Pan] thank a lot of directors, and then they are mentioned at the end as well.

Pan Nalin: True

RS: Was that a kind of a nod to the Oscars jury?

Pan Nalin: Hahahaha. No, not at all. I had no idea when I was making the movie that it was going to go to the Oscars… I write a story to reach the audience, and I wish there was a way to nod [at] the Oscar jury… But for me, making a film about cinema was probably the first and last chance to pay a subtle, or not-so-subtle, tribute to quite a few filmmakers whose cinema has inspired me… I mean, where do you have a subject or storyline where you can say Tarkovsky, Godard, or Francis Ford Coppola, Spielberg, Tarantino. Here, suddenly, the bangles liberated me and I could say whatever I felt like. Hahaha… So I said go for it, [let’s have the] whole dictionary of directors who shot on celluloid… 

RS: So what is the next step, when does the real [Oscars] work begin?  

Dheer: The real work for us has already begun. We had a brief moment of celebration when we were selected, but our partners, both Samuel Goldwyn Films and Orange Studio, like Sid was saying, have won multiple Oscars for films like The Artist and The Father. Samuel Goldwyn, in fact, won an international feature Oscar for Another Round two years ago. They also had a nomination last year with Lunana, a Bhutanese film. So the prep with them has been put into motion. In fact, we had discussions earlier, about what the next steps would be if we were to be selected [as India’s Oscar entry]. Now we’ll be going to LA, setting up base there and doing as many screenings as possible, doing a bit of publicity to get the title into the voters’, the Academy’s mind. 

RS: And ordering a tux?

Hahahaha [all laugh]. 

RS: Thank you. I’m kind of done with my questions. Is there anything else you want to say about the film?

Siddharth: No, I think you’ve pretty much covered it all. 

Dheer: The only thing we should add is that we really want people to go and experience this film in the cinema because it is, at the end of the day, an invitation to have a shared communal viewing of cinema that all of us grew up on… It’s a film for people who love food, it’s a film for people who love films…

RS: Ya, thanks so much. I completely forgot the food. Oh, my God, the food! 

Pan Nalin: Hahaha.

RS: So why the food? Was it your mom? You? 

Pan Nalin: Yeah, my mom was a great cook. Everyone in my family has been a great cook, and my brother sort of inherited her cooking skills. He’s the one who has cooked all the dishes which you see in the film… 

For me, food was a very integral part of the story as Samay has to swap his lunchbox with Fazal, the projectionist, to watch films. And food and films have always been great cultural metaphors as well. It is believed that rich cinematic cultures came out of the countries where there was a rich eating tradition, whether it’s Italy, France, Japan, India, Mexico…

RS: And the choice to be vegetarian – was that how it was?

Pan Nalin: Yeah, that’s how it was… In Kathiawad, I would say, 70 to 80 percent of the population is vegetarian even now… Sometimes you would have to literally drive 30 to 40 kilometers to find some non-vegetarian food.

RS: And the richness, I mean… They [Samay’s family] are not prosperous, but there’s richness to the food. I was completely seduced by the food scenes, but I also wondered how come they are eating such fancy food…  

Pan Nalin: Hahaha. It’s fancy food for you, it is not at all fancy for the people who are eating there. You may go, ‘Oh my god, pasta is fancy food,’ but not for poor people in Sicily. Everything that’s used [in the film] is stuff which is grown around the house, whether it’s eggplant or the leaf, patra. It’s freely available. You don’t even have to buy it.

RS: What I meant was that usually, when we see poor characters in films, we don’t see them enjoying delicious meals. We see them eating sookhi roti, one pyaaz…

Pan Nalin: That’s a myth… Just try going to Kutch and Kathiawad villages and you will be blown away by the food they eat. Bhavin, who plays Samay, was showing me on video what they are eating. They are a family of six who live in one room with two cows and one buffalo, and he had this whole elaborate radish, spring onion, garlic and chili paste next to purified butter, with bajre ki roti and jaggery – a meal like that will sell in New York City as organic bio food for $400.

RS: And that tiffin box… The love with which it is packed and the symphony of packing it…

Siddharth: Absolutely.

Pan Nalin: That’s also a very Gujarati and very Indian thing. We all have experiences of our mothers and family insisting on carrying food. Even now, when I land at the airport, my brother will send a parcel at the airport with roti and bhakri and say, ‘Don’t eat outside.’ Now his [Dheer’s] mother has sent this whole big tiffin and said, ‘Don’t eat outside.’ So whatever you do, you can’t take food out of mothers.