Fire in the Mountains, Writing with Fire to represent India at Sundance 2021

Ajitpal Singh’s Fire In The Mountains and Rintu Thomas-Sushmit Ghosh’s Writing With Fire are the two Indian titles at the 2021 Sundance Film Festival. 

Fire In The Mountains will compete with 10 other films in the World Cinema Dramatic category. Writing With Fire, meanwhile, has been selected in the World Cinema Documentary Competition section.

Fire In The Mountains tells the story of “a mother who toils to save money to build a road in a remote Himalayan village to take her wheelchair-bound son for physiotherapy, but her husband believes that a shamanic ritual (Jagar) is the remedy.” 

On the inspiration behind the film, Ajitpal shared, “The idea of Fire In The Mountains came from a personal tragedy, when my cousin sister Amarjeet Kaur died because her husband didn't take her to the hospital thinking she was possessed by a ghost. The film is about the clash of two worldviews- traditional and modern, with a strong woman at the heart of it. I hope my film will make people ask some relevant questions about their blind faiths.”

Writing with Fire documents the cluttered news landscape dominated by men, and how chief reporter Meera and her journalists break tradition to come out with  Khabar Lahariya, India's only newspaper run by Dalit women

(with inputs from IANS)