Pan Nalin, writer-director of “Last Film Show,” India’s official submission for the Best International Film Oscar, turned to his own childhood growing up in the Saurashtra village of Adtala for inspiration for the semi-autobiographical film.
Centering on 9-year-old Samay (Bhavin Rabari), “Last Film Show” details a summer spent watching movies in the projection booth of a dilapidated movie palace, falling in love with the art of cinema and changing the course of her entire life. . .
Imagine Nalin’s surprise to see a similar story unfold in another contender for this year’s semi-autobiographical awards, Steven Spielberg’s “The Fabelmans.”
“We went to see the movie with the entire cast and crew and when it started, at least 30 times we looked at each other, like, ‘How is that possible?’” Nalin said during a virtual screening of the film as part of the TV series. TheWrap’s 2022-2023 awards season screening.
Nalin, who appeared alongside producer Dheer Momaya and actor Bhavin Rabari, described several similarities between “Last Film Show” and “The Fabelmans” to moderator Steve Pond, from the names of the leads (Samay and Sammy), the tight-knit circle of friends each child had, the supportive mother and the disapproving father, even a shared obsession with trains.
“It was pretty amazing how all the filmmakers think alike,” Nalin said. “Talking about my own story 25 years ago, when I saw ‘Cinema Paradiso’ for the first time, there were at least three scenes directly from my life. I said, ‘I live far away in a remote part of India. How can this Italian director know about my friendship with the projectionist?’”
For her part, Momaya always wanted to know about Nalin’s childhood, even before meeting the director, as she was inspired by his films, which Momaya described as “indigenous, local, but still having a global quality.”
“Give me the backstory,” Momaya said when she finally met Nalin. “And in some meetings she gave me the backstory of her, and that’s essentially what you see here. The field she grew up in, the relationship she had with her mother and her father. There was a deep emotional texture, which moved me a lot.”
However, not everyone shares Nalin’s passion for cinema. According to director Rabari, the young star of “Last Film Show” liked playing cricket much more than going to the movies. Rabari is from a small village in northwest India and had rarely been to the movies in his life, according to Nalin, who served as the boy’s interpreter.
But film appreciation is definitely having a moment. Beyond “Last Film Show” and “The Fablemans,” Damien Chazelle’s “Babylon” and Sam Mendes’ “Empire of Light” also wax poetic about movie magic.
“During the COVID-19 situation, people had a lot of time for introspection, thinking: ‘Why am I making movies? Which was the reason? When did I fall in love with cinema?’ And somewhere, we all start looking for a story,” Nalin said.
See the full interview here or at the top of this file.