Kiran Rao On Her Kolkata Memories, Humans In The Loop And What Ails Independent Cinema

Kiran Rao was part of a recent film-based summit where we managed to catch up with her and have a face-to-face interaction. When I told her the common link between the both of us was that we both went to school at La Martiniere in Kolkata, the city where she had spent a huge part of her early life in, it set a jovial tone to the conversation.

One of the topics we spoke to her about is the indie film Humans In The Loop, for which she is an Executive Producer. Directed by Aranya Sahay and produced by Storiculture, it is about an Adivasi woman from Jharkhand who finds herself interacting with artificial intelligence, unraveling its hidden biases and ethical dilemmas. The film premiered at MAMI and received a nomination for Gender Sensitivity from the Film Critics Guild.

The film was developed as part of the Storiculture Impact Fellowship, which supports socially relevant storytelling in media. It was created in partnership with the Museum of Imagined Futures, which focuses on the intersection of technology and society. Excerpts:

Q. How did your association with Humans In The Loop start?

A. Actually, Aranya had invited me for several screenings of the film, which I couldn't manage to attend. And then finally, I attended a screening that he had in Whistling Woods with his cast and crew around six months ago. I absolutely loved the film, and I told him as much. At that time, he was trying to build a sort of theatrical plan for the film. But it was when Storiculture was planning for its theatrical release a week before, he asked whether I would come on board as an EP to help them promote the film because it was a very small platform release, and that's when I came on board.

A still from Humans In The Loop

Q. What all do you think needs to be done to strengthen independent cinema in India?

A. It’s an incredibly unorganized, ad hoc sector at the moment. People somehow manage to find money, and then they make films, and then they don't know what to do with them because they don't have the money to release it. And there is a glut of such films that are waiting for a platform, either in theaters or on streaming or in broadcast or somewhere. And we have many such films that just never make it to the cinema or OTT, because also OTTs have now reduced their purchase of independent cinema. It's become much less than, say, five years ago when they first came. So, where is it going? I will really not be able to tell, except if we manage to decentralize distribution considerably, if we are able to create theatrical — I wouldn't say even full-fledged theatre chains — but theatrical venues where people can get together and watch films together and create a smaller version of this sort of theatrical distribution in a more decentralized way. I feel that would be a great fix because there are people interested in films everywhere, but it's almost impossible for me to reach that particular audience, say in Coimbatore or in Ranchi or in Chandigarh or Kochi. So a more decentralized distribution model is what I feel is required so that there would be access to more films. Of course, streaming and digital, or a pay-per-view model, or, you know, a TVOD (Transactional Video on Demand) model would help films, but even getting attention of the audience to that film requires an advertising push and marketing, which most independent films don't have. So these are problems that I'm actually really working on at a deeper level and trying to solve as well. I'm trying to work on a model that can help independent cinema.

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Q. Any memories of Kolkata which you'd like to share?

A. Ahaha, yes, I have lovely memories of the food, Durga Puja, the lovely pandals, going to watch plays, and the floods in my city, when my Ambassador car would get stuck in the lane because of water going into the radiator or whatever. My Saturday Club life, where I spent so much of my youth. I learned to swim, play tennis, play every other sport, spent hours in their library. I have only amazing memories of Calcutta.