Shonali Bose and Nilesh Maniyar-directed documentary “A Fly On the Wall” will have its world premiere at the 29th Busan International Film Festival. The documentary chronicles the last days of their friend Chika Kapadia who opted for physician-assisted suicide at Dignitas in Switzerland in 2022 after a terminal cancer diagnosis.
It is part of the Wide Angle Documentary Competition section, which also features projects such as “Ainu Puri”, “Another Home”, “At the Park”, “Every Single Dot”, “Gingerbread for Her Dad”, “K-Number”, “Ms.Hu’s Garden”, “The First Responders” and “Works and Days”.
“A Fly On the Wall” marks the third feature film collaboration between Maniyar and Bose after “The Sky Is Pink” (2019) and “Margarita with a Straw” (2014).
“Fulfilling Chika’s dying wish and shooting this film has been the hardest challenge of my filmmaking career. This film is my love letter to Chika and to life. I am honoured to premiere it at Busan, a festival that values such deeply personal stories,” Bose said in a statement.
Maniyar said the impression that Kapadia left on him has been life-altering and he also found it right to tell the story of a friendship through the camera lens.
“Chika was a friend who gave more than he took. And what a life-altering impression he left on me in his last days. Hence it was only apt to tell his story via a lens of friendship that Chika and Shonali shared for 25 long years. With the premiere at Busan, we hope to further the conversation about the right to dignity in death, as in life,” he said.
It is part of the Wide Angle Documentary Competition section, which also features projects such as “Ainu Puri”, “Another Home”, “At the Park”, “Every Single Dot”, “Gingerbread for Her Dad”, “K-Number”, “Ms.Hu’s Garden”, “The First Responders” and “Works and Days”.
“A Fly On the Wall” marks the third feature film collaboration between Maniyar and Bose after “The Sky Is Pink” (2019) and “Margarita with a Straw” (2014).
“Fulfilling Chika’s dying wish and shooting this film has been the hardest challenge of my filmmaking career. This film is my love letter to Chika and to life. I am honoured to premiere it at Busan, a festival that values such deeply personal stories,” Bose said in a statement.
Maniyar said the impression that Kapadia left on him has been life-altering and he also found it right to tell the story of a friendship through the camera lens.
“Chika was a friend who gave more than he took. And what a life-altering impression he left on me in his last days. Hence it was only apt to tell his story via a lens of friendship that Chika and Shonali shared for 25 long years. With the premiere at Busan, we hope to further the conversation about the right to dignity in death, as in life,” he said.
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Busan International Film Festival will commence on October 2 and conclude on October 11.