In the secrets of… Santosh

Meeting with Sandhya Suri, the director of this first Indian feature-length fiction film, a gripping political and feminist thriller which has been a great success in theaters since Wednesday.

What was the first spark that gave birth to Santoshto this thriller that is both political and feminist, following the footsteps of a police officer's widow who finds herself putting on his uniform and leading the investigation into a femicide?

Sandhya Suri: Contrary to what one might think, it was not the idea of ​​making a film about the police. I wanted to talk about the violence suffered by women in India and I was looking for a way to do it, the best way to film it. And then, one day, in 2012, a horrible news story made headlines: a gang rape committed on a bus in New Delhi. And one image caught my attention: that of a female police officer facing a crowd of protesters. There was an ambiguous expression in her eyes, somewhat out of step with the situation that fascinated me. I then started to research female police officers. That's when I discovered this law that my heroine, Santosh, will benefit from, which allows any widow of a civil servant killed in the line of duty to inherit his or her position. This is how Santosh's trajectory was gradually born.

How did you build it?

I was selected to participate in the Sundance Lab where I had the chance to discuss and compare my work with mentors as diverse as Zachary Sklar, the co-writer of JFK by Oliver Stone or Thomas Bidegain. Americans as well as Europeans, therefore. It both confirmed to me that I had a story that held up and gave me the confidence, as a documentarian, to try my hand at fiction, without ever losing sight of what fascinates me and will guide this script and then this film to the end: the truthfulness of things without falling into didacticism, which I hate as a viewer of fiction as well as documentaries. And my biggest challenge with Santosh consisted of not hammering anything home, of constantly finding deep down the ambiguity that I had seen in the look of this policewoman. To do this, I had to be both efficient and trust the intelligence of the spectators. Allow them to be active, not pre-chew everything. This is perfectly symbolised by the relationship between Santosh and her superior who seems as protective as she is ready to sacrifice her at any moment to protect herself. It was important for me to show female characters with different facets, not to lock them into the camp of good versus the camp of evil. For the sake of realism again and again.

This desire to stick to reality also explains your wish to mix professionals and non-professionals on screen?

Exactly! I had a great time building the cast of this film step by step, seeing the non-professionals take ownership of the text and the professionals feed off them.

SANTOSH: A FEMINIST POLITICAL THRILLER WITH EXCITING AMBIGUS [CRITIQUE]

What made you choose Shahana Goswami for the title role?

Shahana arrived… on the last day of auditions thanks to my casting director who had spotted her in a film, with a role that had nothing to do with Santosh. On paper, it wasn’t obvious: for example, she was a little older than the role. But these reservations were shattered as soon as I saw her act. The innocence of her face immediately gave way to a complexity that corresponded to what I was looking for for this role and for the entire film.

How did you work with her?

To write this film and prepare for the shoot, I spent a lot of time in contact with the police. And I insisted that we both spend several days in contact with the police and their daily lives. And at the end of each day, we discussed it and made changes to the script based on what we had experienced and observed.

Were there any films that specifically inspired you to build the visual atmosphere of the film with your director of photography Lennert Hillege?

Unconsciously, no doubt. But we didn't rely on this or that reference. We really resonated in terms of atmosphere to create the most immersive, most organic universe possible on screen. Which was also achieved through sound as much as through image. I wanted us to feel India in every shot. And shake up the Epinal images. The ambiguity I was looking for came through this realism.

You were talking about a film that is balanced so as not to fall into didacticism. Was it difficult to maintain it during editing?

I love editing! And there my experience as a documentary filmmaker was of great use to me. I worked with a French editor Maxime Pozzi-Garcia (Village faces, Slalom…). And I approached things calmly because I was convinced that the filming material was rich and complete, that I was not missing anything but also that with the time spent on the script and the feedback I had received, I could rely on a solid foundation. The challenge was not to lose anything to arrive at a 2h08 film, with all the material I had. But how I am passionate about this stage!

Santosh. By Sandhya Suri. With Shahana Goswami, Sanjay Bishnoi, Sunita Rajwar… Duration: 2h08. Released on July 17, 2024