A Chronicle of the Lost – Films

Soumya Mukhopadhyay
Indien | 2026 | 25 min
Weltpremiere
Sprache : Hindi
Untertitel : Englisch, Französisch

Basierend auf den Aussagen ehemaliger Wanderarbeiter, zeichnet A Chronicle of the Lost den Werdegang eines dieser Arbeiter nach, verkörpert durch eine fiktive Figur, die durch die heute verlassenen Jutespinnereien von Kalkutta wandert. Die imaginären Briefe, die der Protagonist an seine im Heimatdorf zurückgebliebene Frau schickt, verweben sich zu einer ergreifenden Elegie auf eine Gemeinschaft, die durch den Aufstieg des Kapitalismus zerstört wurde.

Along the banks of the Hooghly River, in Kolkata and its surroundings, the first global jute production industry developed under the influence of the English colonisers. For decades, recurring social crises kept capital away, leading to the closure of numerous mills and leaving thousands of migrant workers impoverished. Soumya Mukhopadhyay collected their testimonies, imagining a hybrid narrative in which a fictional character, embodying “their emotional truth,” sends letters to his wife who has remained in the village. A Chronicle of the Lost, oscillating between analogue and digital images – the former carrying the weight of history and repetition, the latter the relentless immediacy of the present – depicts the protagonist’s meanderings through the streets of the Indian megacity, haunted by the clamour of machines and past social struggles. At the heart of his purgatory flows the river, a silent observer, whose waters carry the fibre and memory of its industrial transformation before sweeping into oblivion the lives of those who formed its backbone.

Emmanuel Chicon

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