Kapadia’s first fully narrative film, “All We Imagine as Light,” begins more like a documentary, surveying Mumbai, particularly at night, before gently gravitating toward three women, all of them hospital workers, who are juggling their workaday realities, and those of India’s stratified society, with their own aspirations.

Director Payal Kapadia, in an interview with India Today Digital, spoke about the movie and the nuances of making the same. She even shared the inspiration behind the characters in th movie.

A delicate, lyrical drama of sisterhood echoing through the sights and sounds of modern India, All We Imagine As Light cements Payal Kapadia as a major voice.

Almost 12 years ago, on my first day in the city, this was the first picture I clicked, with the sun setting behind the dargah. Then it is almost befitting that I am staring at the same view, so many years later as I am writing the review of the most honest portrayal of Mumbai in a film.

O n May 26, India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi congratulated filmmaker Payal Kapadia on the Cannes success of All We Imagine as Light, her drama slated for U.S. release on Nov. 15. Not only was it the first Indian film to play in competition at Cannes in 30 years,

Filmmaker Payal Kapadia begins her first narrative film, “All We Imagine as Light,” observing. Bringing in her documentary roots, she focuses on the streets of Mumbai through the lens of a passing bus.

Amid the heady haze, unrelenting traffic, and humidity of the city of Mumbai, three complex women sit at the core of Payal Kapadia's All We Imagine As Light. Written and directed by the Mumbai-based A Night of Knowing Nothing filmmaker in her first fiction feature, the film is as much an ode to modern womanhood as it is to the bustling city itself.

Payal Kapadia's All We Imagine As Light has been released in theaters. The Cannes Grand Prix award-winning film is a slap on the politics of awards in our country. Kani Kusruti, Divya Prabha, Chhaya Kadam starrer is this year's finest film.

Every day, the world over, we feel these things because we’re human: Longing. Peace, where we can find it. Belonging. Loneliness, sometimes. Unsteadiness in an ever-expiring present tense. If we’re city dwellers in a great urban center that feeds millions while starving millions more,