Sister Midnight is a Mumbai-set black comedy following Uma (Radhika Apte), a headstrong woman fresh from the sticks who’s chafing at her arranged marriage to a distant man. As she grapples with isolation and circumscribed domesticity, Uma’s frustrations manifest in ways both macabre and surreal (not to mention darkly funny), including sucking blood and galavanting with a gaggle of stop-motion goats.
Boasting striking compositions (with every shot evocatively storyboarded), rich colors, and the first score composed by Interpol frontman Paul Banks, writer-director Karan Kandhari’s feature debut premiered at last year’s Cannes Film Festival in Directors’ Fortnight and was nominated for outstanding debut at the BAFTAs.
It’s a marvelously audacious, utterly sui generis salute to those who defiantly flout tired rules and clash with customs, whether you call it feminism or punk rock; really, they’re two sides of the same rebellious coin, Kandhari points out. “The film is a hymn to being an outsider,” the London-based filmmaker tells Vogue. “I’m attracted to misfits and weirdos and people who don’t fit in society.”
The film was inspired by his first visit to Mumbai 20 years ago. “I was mesmerized by this chaotic city, full of character and contradictions. It possessed me.” He’d always gravitated toward films where specific cities loomed large, like the Hong Kong of Chungking Express and the New York of Taxi Driver. But Mumbai is also a place where he struggled. “I found it very hard to penetrate. A lot of this film is about loneliness, which I experienced the first time I went there,” he explains.
Its story is about operating in the world without a manual, whatever your role: adult, man, woman, husband, wife. “It spun out from this one moment in the traditional setup of an arranged marriage,” Kandhari says. “The very next morning, after the dude has gone to work, what happens? The whole thing unfurled from that.”
Apte, whose face graces practically every frame, is crucial to this unconventional film’s success. Hers is a star-making performance—though she’s already a household name in India, with nearly four million Instagram followers. She describes being drawn to the project because of “how crazy it was and yet it made complete sense. It’s a journey of self-discovery, which is universally relatable. I also love how Karan the writer looks at his characters with complete empathy and equality. I think they’re a mix of children and animals—so purely innocent and playful, with lightness and tons of curiosity.”
Over the decade that the film was in development, Kandhari had struggled to find his pivotal lead before seeing a short clip of Apte’s work. “She was fearless and completely committed,” he recalls. “I couldn’t see the mechanics of her consciousness working. I could just see the character. And she’s very funny in real life, which I knew we could tap into.”
During their three weeks of rehearsals, they concentrated on getting down Uma’s movements. “He wanted me to have the impulse rooted in the body—not use my brain, basically,” Apte says, smiling. “I remember thinking about how she’d sit or stand in every shot—or, oh my God, the walks! We discovered so many different walks.”
“We did lots of walk rehearsals, focusing on the posture,” Kandhari affirms. “The method to convey the character was to de-intellectualize so it was sitting in the unconscious. Once she marinated in all this and knew the character so well, it would come out without having to think and the body would be the vessel to express it.”
And Apte is particularly gifted in conveying things physically, according to Kandhari. “The story and information coming to the audience are literally happening on her face and in her body,” he says. “I see the performances as rhythmic beats, and we needed to hit all those without any words. It’s pure expression and reaction, but it isn’t easy. Not all actors have such a grip on their own bodies.”
Indeed, in a film that doesn’t rely much on conversation to propel its narrative, Apte’s cartoonish, outsized expressions more than compensate. “It’s a treat for any actor to have less dialogue and have your body and face convey emotion or story,” she says, noting that these days, it’s rare that a script doesn’t spell everything out in spoken lines.
Music also plays an outstanding role in the film (the title comes from an Iggy Pop song), its eclectic soundtrack ranging from Bengali folk to Cambodian soul and the blues. “Music is my great love, and it’s my constant companion,” Kandhari says.
He already knew which songs he wanted for each cue, and certain scenes were even drawn from cherished lyrics. While writing, he would play tracks to channel an emotion like grief or anger. “I would attach myself without really thinking to a lyric that somehow embodied where I needed to get to. Those lyrics never end up in the film, but it’s like a breadcrumb trail or a mood board. I think all art comes from the unconscious.”
For the score, the filmmaker managed to lure musician Paul Banks, whom a mutual connection revealed to be a massive movie buff. Kandhari frequently listened to Interpol while writing, befitting the film’s nighttime mood. “There’s something very nocturnal about Interpol, even though Paul is actually a joyous, bright dude who surfs,” he observes. “You don’t think of sunshine when you think of Interpol.”
But Kandhari revels in those juxtapositions—the sounds of British heavy-metal band Motörhead while Uma runs through a slum, for example. “Likewise, I like to work with people who are, in a punk way, coming at something that isn’t their main vocation,” he explains. “You get interesting stuff because there’s an untaintedness to the process. And there’s lots of nonactors in the film, who bring their own magic. I’m always searching for raw expression.”
Sister Midnight opens theatrically in New York today and in LA on May 23, with additional markets to follow.
