‘Mizaru’ by Alumnus Sudarshan Suresh ’18 Screens at Dharamshala International Film Festival

Mizaru, a short film written, directed and edited by alumnus Sudarshan Suresh '18, screened as part of the Dharamshala International Film Festival 2020. It ran in the Shorts section of the 9th edition of the festival from October 29 to November 4. 

Filmed in one fluid, virtuoso take, Mizaru begins with a young couple making out in a suburban Mumbai park. Their fumbling is soon interrupted by the arrival of a boy selling balloons, followed by his supervisors who—in their role as the ‘moral police’—abuse the couple while waiting for the genuine police to arrive. In a piece of deft choreography, the camera proceeds to widen our view and take in the rest of the park’s inhabitants.

Mizaru was produced with funds from Columbia’s Katharina Otto-Bernstein production grant, and won the Best Film Award at Columbia University Film Festival in 2019.

Sudarshan Suresh is an Indian screenwriter and director from Kolkata. His previous films, Absent, Memories of the Sea, and The Rabbit, have screened and won awards at numerous international film festivals, including Aspen, Palm Springs, Atlanta, and New Orleans. He was the recipient of the Directors Guild of America Student Filmmaker Award. His thesis film Mizaru received the Katharina Otto-Bernstein Production Grant and won him the Best Film Award at Columbia University Film Festival in 2019.

In its 9th edition, Dharamshala International Film Festival (DIFF) has become one of India’s leading independent film festivals and draws audiences from across the country and further afield.