Suggested Topics :
'Shadowbox' Movie Review: A Fantastic Tillotama Shome Anchors This Drama
In 'Shadowbox/ Baksho Bondi,' which premiered at the Berlin International Film Festival in the Perspectives section, there’s no real mystery; the film cycles through the same motions. Instead, the best parts of its storytelling are wordless
Directors: Tanushree Das, Saumyananda Sahi
Cast: Tillotama Shome, Chandan Bisht, Sayan Karmakar, Suman Saha
Language: Bengali, Hindi
Bars are a recurring motif in Shadowbox/ Baksho Bondi, emphasising the loneliness and isolation of its characters. One of them will end up in prison by the end, as the recurring visual cannily foreshadows, but for now, they’re all trapped.
In the Bengali film, which premiered at the Berlin International Film Festival in the Perspectives section, cages of chickens are transported from one place to another. Characters are framed through their window grills, peering inside from behind them or separated from each other by them.
For Maya (Tillotama Shome), whose former armyman husband Sundar (Chandan Bisht) suffers from PTSD, these bars effectively convey the feeling of being boxed-in, not only by circumstances but society. Her family has shunned her — grills denote the firm wall they’ve put up between them — and her neighbours screech at her angrily.
Even her hopes hit a ceiling — in one scene, when she inquires about sending her son Debu (Sayan Karmakar) to tuition classes, her employer suggests he focus on earning, not studying. The barriers of class continue to hold them back.
Much of the Kolkata suburb’s disdain is directed at Sundar, who Bisht portrays without the hair-trigger temper commonly used to signify PTSD in film.
Instead, he adopts the mannerisms of someone who comes across as developmentally delayed instead, a child frozen in time. The writing heightens this impression — the film opens with a set of successive scenes in which Maya attempts to rouse both husband and son. It’s the husband who needs reminders that water has been heated for his bath and that he must get a haircut.
Later, when Sundar is at a job interview at a local school, Maya speaks on his behalf, making a case for him. As he stays silent and downcast, the scene evokes a mother at their shy child’s school interview, further emphasised by the noise of students in the background.
The film’s Berlinale blurb mentions PTSD upfront, but had it not, it might’ve taken longer to suss out Sundar’s condition using context clues. During an early scene in which sounds of an explosion are heard on television, there is no perceptible change in his demeanour; it’s only Maya’s instinctive reaction that clues us in. It’s not just the neighbours who are miffed, however — Sundar’s need to be coddled is a great source of irritation for Debu, who insistently shrugs him off.
Within the house, grill imagery is once again used to great effect, evoking tremendous sympathy for the ill man. In one scene, Debu breaks into an impromptu dance, only to spot his father watching from outside the house; his performance immediately deflates, all he wants is some space. Later, when Sundar interrupts his son as he’s about to leave the house, you immediately sense Debu’s desire to be on the other side of that door grill, just within grasp.
Sundar’s condition has rendered him unable to work, which means Maya must hold down several jobs, all the while trying to hold herself together. There’s a weary efficiency to Shome’s performance that suggests the character is used to it. Outside, however, the facade crumbles, bit by bit. When Sundar embarrasses her publicly, she’s momentarily taken aback before smoothly making up an excuse for him, her strained composure suggesting it’s routine for her now.
Years of repressed anguish flit across the actress’ face; she wordlessly evokes worlds of frustration and sadness. The film puts Maya in situations to which she has no verbal response, instead letting the hunch of Shome’s shoulders and the knot of tension in her neck do the talking.
Shadowbox’s wide frames capture the bustle of city life, but also emphasise just how alone the character is. Maya is never really part of the spaces she occupies; her presence is often an intrusion, her husband’s disorder means that people talk about her behind her back.
Shome’s delicate performance also makes room for some deft comedic moments. When a cop’s foolish question irks her, she slows down her way of speaking, enunciating each word, simplifying the situation, explaining it to him like a little child. The effect is marvellously sarcastic.
At this point in the film, Sundar’s friend is dead and he has gone missing, but this major plot point changes little in the way of Shadowbox’s tonality.
There’s no real mystery; the film cycles through the same motions. Instead, the best parts of its storytelling are wordless. All That Breathes (2022), Trial By Fire (2023) and Black Warrant (2025) cinematographer Saumyananda Sahi, making his feature directorial debut with editor Tanushree Das, once more conjures up expressive imagery.
A scene shot in near-total darkness towards the end is conversely illuminating about Sundar’s selfishness and his paranoia. Shome, playing a woman shouldering life’s many indignities, gamely bears the weight of a sputtering third act too.
Our coverage of the Berlinale is made possible with the support of the Goethe-Institut / Max Mueller Bhavan Mumbai.