Payal Kapadia’s Writing Was Very Poetic: Kani Kusruti on 'All We Imagine As Light'

India has had a stellar run at Cannes’ 24. Among the many laurels that Indians brought home this year is All We Imagine As Light, directed by the FTII alumni Payal Kapadia, which won the prestigious Grand Prix Award at the festival. The film received an 8-minute standing ovation, the joyous reverberation of which was felt across India, perhaps louder in the state of Kerala because Kapadia’s film revolves around the lives of two Malayali nurses living in Mumbai. 

Kani Kusruti plays Prabha, whose life turns chaotic after receiving a gift from her estranged husband. Divya Prabha plays Anu who is constantly in search of a place to be intimate with her boyfriend. In a conversation with Film Companion, Kani says she found the film’s script to be very poetic. “It was in 2015 that Payal initially reached out to me to send the first draft of the script. At that time, she had just joined FTII and had not done any work before. Of course, the final draft today is more crisp and eloquent but even back then, I found the script to be very poetic.”

It got her curious as to why the filmmaker, who mostly lived in Mumbai, wanted to do a film based on two nurses from Kerala, with the film primarily being in Malayalam. However, the team worked together to authentically depict the lives of nurses. The actress says, “Payal had shown me a real-life nurse and I initially thought she wanted me to have a similar body language. But she so dearly warned me not to do that. She wanted me to just observe and understand the actions of the nurse to further develop the character. We also had some workshops conducted by nurses on how they work, how they use the apparatuses, etc.”

Kani further adds that Payal is generally receptive to ideas, which organically progresses with stringent rehearsals. “It was a relentless process. We used to rehearse many times with amateur costumes at an abstract setup of the location. Even when we weren't shooting, we didn't take rest at the hotel. There is no free day." It helped that the filmmaker invited the entire cast and crew to be actively involved in discussions, Kusruti adds. "It becomes a very collaborative process. Everyone got so familiar with the process that on the shooting day, it just felt like we were doing another rehearsal but at the actual location."

The film became the first Indian film to be selected for the main competition after the Malayalam movie Swaham directed by Shaji N Karun in 1994.