Raj Amit Kumar’s provocative directorial debut, Unfreedom, starring Adil Hussain & Victor Banerjee, has recently been released internationally by Netflix, making it one of the boldest & the most controversial Indian films to release on the platform.
Unfreedom is a contemporary thriller based in a society torn apart by political, religious & sexual turmoil. Alternating between New York & New Delhi, the film combines 2 powerful stories about religious fundamentalism & intolerance. One of which follows a Muslim terrorist Husain (Bhanu Uday), attempting to silence a liberal Muslim scholar Fareed (Victor Banerjee).
The other story is about a young woman Leela (Preeti Gupta), who defies her devout father Devraj (Adil Hussain) & escapes an arranged marriage because she is secretly involved in a taboo lesbian romance with Sakhi (Bhavani Lee).
Through these stories, the film creates a powerful portrait of the troubled times we live in and depicts the lengths to which the protagonists go in order to hold on to their strong & conflicting viewpoints on freedom, faith, family & love.
Unfreedom is based on an original story by Raj Amit Kumar and marks his directorial feature film debut. He has also produced the film under the banner of Dark Frames & co-written the screenplay with Damon J Taylor.
The film’s technical team comprises of Oscar-winner Resul Pookutty (of Slumdog Millionaire fame) who has done the sound design for the film and was nominated for the Motion Picture Sound Editors’ 63rd annual Golden Reel Awards.
The film is shot by award winning cinematographer Hari Nair (of Shutter & Kerala Café fame) & edited by Atanu Mukherjee, who debuted as a director with the acclaimed film, Rukh in the year 2017.
Unfreedom was banned by the India’s Censor Board of Film Certification, (CBFC) in 2015 (which was then headed by ex – producer & Director Pahlaj Nihalani) who was of the opinion that the film will ignite unnatural (read homosexual) passions & incite rapes & communal violence in India. Initially the film was under review by Central Board Of Film Certification (CBFC) who wanted director Raj Amit Kumar to cut crucial elements from the film in order to be shown to the Indian public.
Not to be bogged down by their demands, Raj Amit Kumar appealed before the Indian Government’s Information & Broadcasting Appellate Tribunal, (FCAT). And in response, the FCAT banned the film without any possibility of cutting or further appeals.
Later on Raj Amit Kumar & his team ran a campaign for a year during which they did around 100 screenings of the film globally in India & US amongst other countries. The film was screened to immensely encouraging audience response in cities such as Mumbai, Delhi, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Kolkata,
Los Angeles & New York. Following this, the film was recently released internationally by Netflix.
Talking about the film’s release by Netflix, director Raj Amit Kumar averred, “I am glad that Unfreedom finds such a popular platform like Netflix after the ban in India and the efforts of censorship guardians in India to stop the film. It also exposes the hypocrisy & the divide between the reality & the fantasy of censorship system in India. There is no way they can control & censor content in digital age, yet, they try their best to choke filmmakers like me who have something relevant to say that makes them feel threatened.”
Elaborating on the film’s ban by Central Board Of Film Certification (CBFC) and it being labeled as one of the boldest Indian films ever, Raj Amit Kumar stated, “The boldness of something is always defined by what you are allowed to say or not in a society. The boldness of an artist is always defined by what others artist around him have not said or what they are not allowed to express. Thus, it is not the content in my film per se makes it bold, but it the context of a society in which it is told, it is the fact that we have become such a weak & conservative society where we are asked to shut up all the time. Our voices are being crushed unless we are chanting slogans that the powers to be & moral guardians are ok with.”
Raj Amit Kumar concluded by saying, “And in today’s time our art is being crushed in much more violent ways than ever before. Journalists are getting killed, films are getting banned for the slightest of transgressions and the whole mediascape is turned into a trumpet sound. Any other vision, voice, expression has to be curtailed. So I guess it is the boldest film ever because I did not give a damn about anyone or anybody. I didn’t care & I don’t think I will care in future as well. Unless artists take that approach and risk their well being, we will soon be living in a world where everybody is frightened to say anything truthful.”
Raj Amit Kumar graduated in Masters of Arts in Cinema & Media Studies from City University of New York (CUNY) in the year 2006, where he received the George Custen Memorial Award for Academic Excellence. Raj Amit Kumar finished his Ph.D. coursework in Cinema & Media studies at Southern Illinois University (SIUC) before beginning work on his 1st ever feature film, originally titled as Blemished Light, the script of which won the 1st ever Prize in Faculty Screenwriting Award at University of film & Video Association (UFVA) in the year 2009.
Also a media academic, teacher & writer, Raj Amit Kumar has taught cinema theory & history at both his alma maters, City University of New York & Southern Illinois University College from the yeafr 2005 to the year 2009 and his writings & research papers have been published & presented at varied conferences.
In early 2012, Raj Amit Kumar established Dark Frames as a development & production company. Its primary goal is to develop & produce provocative independent films.
Unfreedom is produced by Dark Frames, which is a new film & web Series development & production company set up by Raj Amit Kumar which is dedicated to bringing high-quality, independent films to international audiences.
The company is recently in production with its 2nd feature film Brown which is also directed by Raj Amit Kumar. And it is a pre-production of Black Boots, a story of the 1st ever Black Marines who went to World War II. The movie has a backing & support of Montford Point Marine Association & USA Marines. The company has also acquired Erotomania, a Novella by Francis Levy to be made as a Sex -Comedy in India.
