Pine Cone was released in 2023 but the ripples of conversation that the film triggered reached Calcutta in June 2024. Post the screening of the film at The American Center, an afterparty was hosted at Lord of The Drinks, South City Mall. I got to talking with the man of the hour, filmmaker Anirban Dhar aka Onir on the sidelines of the afterparty. Onir shot to fame with his strong debut film My Brother Nikhil, which dealt with raging sexual health issues in the queer community. His other films I Am, Shab, Kuch Bheege Alfaaz and Chauranga are critically acclaimed across international borders. From being the first filmmaker in the Indian landscape to make a prominent gay film with sensitive issues, to continuing that over two decades, Onir has been a trailblazer and artistic pathbreaker in the truest essence.
Pine Cone, which has been screened at the prestigious BFI Flare: London LGBTIQ+Film Festival as well, deals with Sid Mehra (played by Hanun Bawra), a filmmaker partly based on Onir’s life, who navigates life as a homosexual man beginning from 1999 to 2019, a year after homosexuality was finally decriminalised. Excerpts from our conversation over drinks with Onir...
Congratulations! After so much international attention, your hometown is also showering you with love for Pine Cone. What are your thoughts on this?
I’m feeling happy now after the response. I’m happy that the film has finally reached Calcutta. However, I was feeling very sad that it took one whole year for Pine Cone to come to Calcutta. I have been travelling extensively with the film. Of course, the international attention is humbling but even in India multiple cities, including Bengaluru, Chennai, Mumbai and Chandigarh, have hosted special screenings for Pine Cone but not Calcutta. Another realisation is that My Brother Nikhil has been re-released and it is showing in eight cities but, again, not in Calcutta!
You’ve been making queer films much before the decriminalisation of Section 377. Does it take guts for Onir to make the films he does?
I don’t think it’s about guts. Be it the first film My Brother Nikhil, which was the first mainstream queer film at that time, or the recent one, Pine Cone, for me it is always about me because I am talking about myself. I never take my films as a bold film and I do not see them as something gutsy. My films are about having a dialogue and the problem is the other side. Why is your identity and so-called society so fragile that you cannot accept mine? I accept you the way you are in all your reality.
With the smile Onir is always spotted with, he continued, “We were talking about this just today during the screening of Pine Cone at The American Center that when International Pride Month occurs and there are all these events and appreciation and people say that they are doing it for the community but I say that you are doing it for yourself. You can do it because we accept you, your happiness, your everything from childhood but you have to learn to accept me, which is... so simple. I do not understand what is so complicated about accepting my life. This is also because of which when I was making Pine Cone I wanted to express desire and to bring out the aspect of queerness which you do not see on Indian screens very often. More than the queer community, I want straight people to watch Pine Cone and share the joy.
As we sat in the lounge area right outside Lord Of The Drinks, the loud music from inside was trickling out every time someone opened the door. It did not matter. As Onir, dressed smartly in black, sat there with me, glasses on the table, talking about the strength in expression and his evolution as a person. Talking about the reaction Pine Cone has received, the filmmaker said, “I find that women especially, wherever I have screened, identify much more with the storyline and essence of Pine Cone... so many of them have come up to me and said: “We could feel what you were depicting in the film”. In a way, we are all fighting patriarchy. I have always given the example of how it took hundreds of years for women to break the oppression and the fight is ongoing! So our journey has just begun... I mean I will probably never experience it in my lifetime to be treated as an equal citizen in this country. It is so unfair, what did I do to deserve this?”
There is a flicker of sadness in his eyes peeking through his simple glasses. “Recently, I was in Bengaluru at Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS) for the screening of Pine Cone and my brother is the dean there. So he along with his students were there and I could not help but think that both of us were born in the same family, both of us were pushed into sports even if we did not want to be there, I was better (laughs)! At one point, while growing up, he realised he was straight and so did my sister while I came to terms with my homosexuality. Now, I am really fortunate that my parents accepted all three of us. They were very clear... they did not have a conversation with my brother because he was straight so they did not have a conversation with me because I was gay. Moreover, they always say that they are the happiest living with me more than the others.”
He takes a sip of his drink while maintaining his composure while narrating the story of his life, this time not through a film. “I see my siblings living happy lives, having families right and I, like millions of other Indians, am forced to think that if I would do the same mundane things, it would be considered criminal.
As queer people, one doesn’t have basic rights like getting married legally....
Yes, like we attend anything and everything that the straight community does, beginning from weddings to anniversaries to whatnot... and we do that happily! Why can they not do that for us? This very fabric of our society keeps pushing me to narrate stories and express myself.
So, how was the journey like for you while identifying yourself?
Oh! It took me a long while (giggles). The time when I was growing up, there was no representation. Even when I was in college, I was constantly falling in love with girls! While I was also attracted to boys, I just took it as a part of my life and not an identity per se. It was only when I watched My Beautiful Laundrette (1985 film) in Jadavpur University that I realised that s**t that is me! That is the power of cinema.
A beaming Onir continued, “That is when I felt that these are the stories I need to tell so that the next generation does not need to watch only Hollywood films but they can watch our films and relate more while also feeling understood. I want my films to make people and their stories feel visible and that their lives are not running jokes but they matter.
Pine Cone is being called a semi-autobiographical film. As far as we know, Sid’s character is Onir, beginning from supportive parents, his view of life and the way he could be a guiding light to Derek. Walk us through the conceptualisation of showing a part of your story on-screen.
So, in the first draft, I wrote Sid as myself and then I realised it was too close. Then I brought in a writer... everything that happens after the first night in the film is fictional. In fact, everything that happens in the film till the first night happened here in Calcutta in 2019.
Out of curiosity, I ask him if the real-life Derek knows that the film is about him, to which a melancholic Onir replies, “I don’t know, he has gone off to Canada. I was like a climbing stone for him and it really hurt me. However, this is why the storyline has been fictionalised post the first night because I wanted the film to have a message of hope. My writer also believed that the film must end on a hopeful note.”
Why name it Pine Cone?
A pine cone is what he gifted me and I still have it at home. Obviously, I named the film like that.
That little pine cone was only yours once and now Pine Cone belongs to so many others. How does the attention feel, both nationally and internationally?
Honestly, I was very surprised at BFI Flare: London LGBTIQ+ Film Festival. They had earlier talked about two screenings but they were both sold out and then a third screening was arranged. Plus, when I was there they wanted my presence to be a surprise so they did not take me to the hall directly. And I was like, why do you think it is so popular? There will anyway be mostly South Asians who would want to watch the film.... When I walked into the theatre, 450-seater, packed, 80 per cent White people. The way they said they could identify with the film, especially the older audience, was surreal.
Tell us a little about the casting...
Since the auditions took place post-Covid-19, we arranged it through an online medium. The challenge was that there was intimacy. So while a lot of people came on board, they would eventually back out because of familial restraints and more. They would literally be like their families would be okay if it was about kissing a girl on screen but not with kissing a boy. Hanun was cast last moment when my original choice backed out saying ‘Ma Baba bolche korte na...’. Hanun (Bawra) was working on my social media team earlier and then he shaved off his beard one day and I noticed him. Whilst in talks with Hanun, I told him that I hope he would not have a problem with his parents back in Kashmir. I still recall he said, “Kashmir mein toh if I kiss a woman also it will be a problem... so I would rather explore myself as an artiste and kiss a man.”
Onir, how is Pine Cone different from your previous films?
I feel it is a film made with a queer gaze and it celebrates queerness without filters.
So much so without filters that the entire film was shot on an iPhone?
Yes... the key is to download every night after shooting! (Laughs)
What is your take on making films starring heterosexual characters?
Actually, most of my films don’t have queer characters. Out of the eight films I have made, five of them are heterosexual love stories. My last one, for instance, was shot in Calcutta, Kuch Bheege Alfaaz, is about a love story of a man and a woman.
Your films that stand out are about the queer gaze...
Yes, because in a country like India, there are already very few films that have the queer gaze. So a certain amount of international attention comes because of that.
What does Pride mean for you?
It does not just mean to stand up for the queer community but for all marginalised communities. Like in my film I Am, all four stories deal with different kinds of marginalised sections. While one story dealt with Nandita Das as a single mother or Manisha with the Kashmiri political backdrop. So that is Pride for me, to stand up fearlessly for all the marginalised communities and it is not a barter. I will speak up for anything that I feel is wrong because how can my morality be a barter?
How does the future look like? What is the way ahead?
The next film I am doing has all my life’s savings and everything I have ever earned. It is shot in Kashmir and I have initiated a dialogue on queerness in Kashmir as well. I cannot reveal more about the project as of now.
He looks towards the now-empty corridors of the food court of South City Mall and says, “I have faced so many hurdles in life by now that I am used to it and I don’t think much about it. I do what has to be done. Filmmaking is my voice, my identity and my life. Given a choice, I would any day make a film people advise me against instead of getting a flat. The film will be here even when I am not here, who’s going to use the flat? When they re-released My Brother Nikhil in Delhi, I had crying mothers tell me that they realised how they wasted so many years without accepting their sons. That one comment keeps me going.” He concluded, “I am tired of people saying that my films are ahead of their time. I say you’re behind time!”