An immersive rural tragicomedy built on loops of oppression…

In his first full-length feature itself, Raam Reddy seems to have mastered something that’s most difficult to master in cinema: a way of suggesting a dreamlike clarity in a brazen setting…

His organic approach reflects in the film. The story uses death as a tool to make a statement on life in all its shades, while staying true to the world it is set in.  Art and form couldn’t be a more potent mix than in Thithi.

Thithi isn’t issue-based, unlike many Indian films that have traditionally received such acclaim. Despite depicting many aspects of rural Indian life — patriarchy, religious beliefs, and teenage sexuality, for instance — it isn’t ‘important’ or a ‘must-watch’. It has no flag to wave, and no apparent desire to kick-start conversations on hot-button issues.

While many young directors brag about their debut with a star actor, Raam Reddy is a perfect example of a top class debut director.

The film is indeed poignant, and affirms that Raam’s philosophy of weaving a story by understanding life backwards can result in a standing ovation if balanced by a forward-looking approach.  

Like the countless sheep that appear in it, Thithi is shorn of fluff. Because the film is so engaging on a minute-by-minute basis, it’s a while before one notices the absence of the usual markers of movie-dom. There are no songs or dances or fights (at least in the accepted sense), no heroes or villains. The cast is made up of non-professionals from screenwriter Eregowda’s village, Nodekoppalu, in Karnataka. There’s no background score, unless you count the constant refrain of bleats and baas and moos and clucks.

You’d expect a film about a funeral to be sombre. But Reddy takes the theme of death, inheritance and family and throws it up in the air to make you see your world for what it is.

Stripped off its unusual settings, Thithi’s story is most ordinary – a crooked deal gone badly wrong. By plonking it in a place that is both “once upon a time” and a recognisable town in Karnataka, Reddy has brewed a curious mix of anthropology, comedy and commentary on the futility of resistance.

I recommend that you do not miss Thithi. Raam Reddy’s debut is searingly honest, and yet so charming that its characters stay with you long after the lights come back on.

…most of it is funny, even if the film suffers from occasional flatness. Reddy’s is an original voice, and the 26 year old is a welcome addition to the growing number of young filmmakers in India creating cinema which has provenance, which has something to say. Thithi has won the National Film Award for Best Feature Film in Kannada.