Gadi, a Marathi-language psychological thriller presented by filmmaker Anurag Kashyap, will premiere at the Dharamshala International Film Festival (DIFF) later this month.
Produced by Ranjan Singh, Kashyap, and Rajendra Pingal, the film marks the feature debut of writer-director Rohan Pingal.
Filmed primarily in black-and-white across the Konkan region and the coastal parts of Maharashtra, Gadi explores themes of grief, free will, and human conditioning. The narrative centres on a grieving father in a small Konkan hamlet who is confronted with the realisation that he possesses no free will.
The film features theater actor Raj Sane in the lead role, supported by Kishore Kadam, Shirish Kulkarni, Shabnam Nad, and Hadelin De Ponteves. The music is by Ankush Boradkar.
Rohan Pingal, a self-taught filmmaker hailing from Sangli, Maharashtra, had a chance meeting with Kashyap at a dubbing studio. Impressed by the visual effects Pingal had independently built, Kashyap connected him with Singh, paving the way for the project.
“Gadi is a film that asks more than it explains,” Pingal, who has also written and shot the film, said. “It lives in silences, in what's left unsaid, and we wanted the audience to feel it rather than decode it. I got full support from Anurag and Ranjan sir from the very beginning. They never asked us to simplify it or make it easier. That belief gave us the freedom to make the film exactly as we felt it, and I'm grateful to have walked this path with them.“
Anurag Kashyap stated, “I met Rohan at a post lab, where he showed me some of the visuals he had been creating for his film’s pitch and I was surprised that they created them all by themselves far away from where all the VFX studios were. In Gadi, his fresh approach challenges the filmmaking norms, and that’s why the film generates different kinds of response. I am happy for the film as it is premiering at Dharamshala and curious to see the reaction of the audience.”
Gadi is backed by Amaze Production Film in association with Flip Films.