Rohan Parashuram Kanawade’s Sabar Bonda made history by becoming the first Marathi film to premiere at the Sundance film festival 20ℱ25 in Park City, Utah. Armed with his primary cast members, co-producers Jim Sarbh, Naren Chandavarkar among others, Kanawade came on stage of the Egyptian Theatre to a rousing applause from an audience that included Daniel Kaluyya. Safe to say, for such a culturally specific and restrained film, it found its takers.
The story of two men reconnecting during a sudden visit to the ancestral village, Kanawade’s film does a fine job of correcting the narrative. Most films around queer characters tend to mine its tragic circumstances – but what is charming and defiant about Sabar Bonda is how it reℱmaiඣns authentic to its own voice. Aware of the tropes of a standard queer love story in a regressive setting, Kanawade subverts audience expectations by being restrained.
A self-taught filmmaker, Kanawade attributes his parents as his most important cheerleaders for his 18-year journey to make his debut as a feature film director. He had good instincts even when he didn’t have the resources at his disposal. “We di✤dn’t have a way to record sound properly (in the early short films), so I decided to make silent films – with title cards appearing between scenes,” he says. The journey has been long, riddled with disappointments and doubt, but Kanawade is on the big stage now.
Right before making history by becoming the first Marathi film to win the Grand Jury prize in the World Cinema competition of the Sundance film ℱfestival 2025, Kanawade spoke to Outlook about th🌠e making of the film, finding his directorial voice, and how there’s no need for drama in every film centered around queer characters. Edited excerpts:
What’s your first memory of a film?
The first ever film that my father took me to watch, it was called Maherchi Saadi (1991). It felt like a huge TV, and I asked my father about it. He very patiently explained that it wasn’t a huge TV, and that there was a projector on one end of the screen. I don’t remember anything about the film per se,🔴 and I was interested in learning about the gadgets. Was the screen flat or curved? It’s w🎉hat I was interested in. It was this theatre called Topiwala in Goregaon, I’m not sure if it’s still around.
You changed tracks from interior designing to filmmaking in 2010. Was there a particular moment that prompted this?
I was always interested in films, and I never knew I would grow up to make films. Jurassic Park is when I fell in love with the sound of cinema. There was this chapter in my Marathi textbook in 10th standard, which inspired me to write mꦚy own short story. So, these were elements that I discovered along the way, which got me excited. When I completed my 10th standard – I was terrible at Maths and Science, so I was kind of sure that I didn’t want to go to college. My Dad’s boss suggested Interior Design because I was good at d🎀rawing. I had no clue, and he explained it to me.
Even while I was doing my interior designing, I was still writing short stories. Then in 2007, this friend of mine pushed me to make a short film for this competition.🅺 This friend of mine had a Nokia phone with a 1.5 megapixel camera, and this other friend said he had a comp🃏uter at home – and we very naively set out to make the short film. We never ended up completing it because the computer would hang each time we would open the project on it, but I fell in love with the process.
The Internet was a huge bonus for me - I watched the interviews of my favourite directors, the BTS footage of my favourite films, and just overall watched as many movies as I could.
So, in 2007, when you realised you wished to make the switch – how old were you?
I’m terrible at math, but I’m 38 rᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚight now. So, you’ll hav💮e to help me with this.
So you were around 20 when you attempted to make your first short.
Yes, I’d just finished my degree in 💜Interior Designing. I’d just about begun my first job. Do you remember the aftermath of the Mumbai floods? I’d bought this tiny Chinese camera, and I used it to document the floods in my area.
Between 2010 to making your feature debut in 2025 – what’s that journey been like?
I always say this, I was extremely, extremely lucky. I had certain people in my life – who have supported me no matter what. First, it was my Dad. Then this archꦬitect friend – he said he didn’t have a♊ lot of work, so I could make a fixed amount of salary every month – but I’ll also have the time to work on my writing and films. He loves films too, and that’s probably the reason he has decided to help me out. Also, lastly, my partner and I have been living together since 2014. If not for these people, I don’t think I would have been able to do anything in the world of filmmaking.
Coming from relatively fewer means – what are the additional obstacles you’ve had to face as a filmmaker, something an upper-class 'struggling filmmaker' would know nothing about?
I think it depends and varies from film to film. The hyper-realistic film I was trying to make, with little to no background music, was a challenge to raise money for𒈔. I don’t know if I’ll face the same challenges when I pitch my next f༺ilm, which will be different from this. Since the film is so faithful to my actual life, making it without sanitising or diluting the ground reality was the biggest challenge. We got no support from established producers of the mainstream Marathi industry.
You mention Sairat (2016) in the film – how much do you think its success has to do with raising the profile of Marathi cinema? Was it a coincidence, or an intentional hat-tip?
Not really, it just so happened that around the tim🗹e I went to the village in 2016, everyone was obsessed with Sairat and its album. So, the mention was to situate it in a particular time more than anything. It grounds the story in a reality.
Do you remember the first scene from Sabar Bonda that helped crystalise the idea that you have a film script in hand?
Since 2013, I’ve been writing feature films. I’ve written my fair share of ‘bad scripts’, which I was doing along with my shorts. I’d written three scripts before Sabar Bonda – they didn’t get much support. For me, ideas have a long gestating period, so I don’t work on them immediately. I had the idea for Sabar Bonda, while I was mourning my father in 2016, but then I didn’t start working on it till around 20🌳20. That’s when I began to see the first scene of the film in my head. I toyed with it for about two-three weeks, and then I wrote the scene. It was after that I was sure that I have something feature-film worthy in this. And I directly jump into the screenplay – I don’t write outlines, character arcs etc. The scene eventual༒ly got cut out in the successive drafts of the film, but it did provide me with the jump-off point.
We went to the labs, and ♏we kept getꦇting feedback. I always knew it was going to be a feature film.
Your credits list 10 co-producers including actor Jim Sarbh, musician Naren Chandavarkar and colorist Sid Meer. How did you get in touch with them?
I didn’t know them. But I had this wish that if we do our post-production work in India, 𓂃I wanted to work with Sid Meer (of Bridge PostWorks). We were at the NFDC co-production market in 2022, and we pitched our film. Naren and Sid were there, and in a party that day they mentioned that they’d like to meet me and my producer. They helped us to finish our post production by coming on board as co-producers.
Depicting gay desire on screen can be tricky – I think it’s one of your biggest successes in the film. What did you have to keep in mind before going on floors?
It was one of the most important things we discussed with our actors, while getting them on board. I wasn’t looking at it as ga💃y desire – because the whole point of the film was this was a love story between two individuals – not gay men. We wanted to keep it as simple as possible. I think that simplicity is what is radical about the moments in the film, because we just haven’t seen two men in each other’s arms. It’s just that. We only see them fighting, being toxic to each other – but we hardly ever see just affection.
When you’re a cinephile and wish to make films – how do you separate your voice and the voice of the influence of having seen it in another film?
Thank you for this question, because it’s something that haunts me in almost every choice I make as a director. I love watching as much cinema as I can, but I think while making films I ⛄do try to leave out any impressions from the outside. I love photography, and I think I always saw things in my own way. Observing life helps me craft my own language.
Were there any films on your radar whose elements you were fascinated by while making Sabar Bonda?
Some of the films that inspired me were Amour (2012; by Michael Haneke), Nuri Bilge Ceylan and Hirokazu Kore-eda. I think Kore-eda and Ceylan’s films unfold like novels. I knew I wanted Sabar Bonda to leaඣve the audience with this feeling, something I was left with after watching their films. I don’t think I wanted to limit myself♕ in terms of style – it’s something that will evolve with respect to the story. So, I’d like my style to serve the story.
LGBTQI issues have been considered the domain of the privileged. There’s a disconnect even within the community. Do you think films like yours can help bridge the gap?
That’s exactly why we wanted to make this film. I’ve seen LGBTQI stories on screen, and rarely felt represented in them. A significant queer population lives with fewer means, and we hardly see their stories on screen. I had to tell my own story – no one else is going to do it for me. So, I just went ahead with my own observat🐬ions, and tried to be as authentic as possible to my story.
I loved the film’s quiet nature – it builds up to this dramatic confrontation, but then it doesn’t happen.
What you’re saying is your impression of stories you’ve probably seen/watched before. And that’s why I think it helped that I was writing my own story – something that had happened in my own life. I never even had the thought of the confrontation. One of my mentors in a lab even told me that the two men should stand up for their rights, there should be a meltdown. To which I politely said – it’s not that kind of a fil🎐m. But I did eventually partially take their note, and that’s how that scene of Anand defiantly telling his relatives he doesn’t wish to marry, in the end. I got the gist of what th🃏e advice was, and I incorporated it in my own way. There’s still no big confrontation in the film, but everything is also not super smooth. I believe people can navigate their way through life, and live on their own terms. There’s no need for drama.
*Sabar Bonda premiered at the Sundance film festival 2025, and won the Grand Jury Prize in the World Cinema Drama Competition.
