
“To Evoke Those Deep Emotional Layers With Utmost Honesty”: DP Vikas Urs on Sabar Bonda (Cactus Pears)

When he returns to his remote hometown in western India for his father’s funeral, Anand (Bhushaan Manoj) is immediately faced with intrusive questions from relatives about his marriage status in Sabar Bonda (Cactus Pears). When sparks fly between him and a local farmer, he must navigate his community’s tolerance while learning to accept his own sexuality.
Cinematographer Vikas Urs discusses shooting director Rohan Parashuram Kanawade’s feature debut, which premieres in the festival’s World Cinema Dramatic Competition.
See all responses to our annual Sundance cinematographer interviews here.
Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the cinematographer of your film? What were the factors and attributes that led to your being hired for this job?
Urs: I was approached by the director of the film Rohan Kanawade. He had heard about me and my previous work through some acquaintances. I was then introduced to Neeraj Churi, the producer and our conversations regarding this film and cinema in general led to a lot of common ideas. Rohan and I spent a lot of time discussing the screenplay as I felt that the film had a very personal quality to it, to achieve it would mean to be able to evoke those deep emotional layers with utmost honesty. These initial conversations led us to build a strong visual world for the film and with our shared cinematic sensibilities, Rohan found perhaps the right collaborator.
Filmmaker: What were your artistic goals on this film, and how did you realize them? How did you want your cinematography to enhance the film’s storytelling and treatment of its characters?
Urs: My artistic goals were to build a visual language which was transparent, intimate and simple in letting the audience enter into the world of the characters and their interpersonal relationships. The image had to not draw too much attention to itself, but rather become a quiet carrier of the subtle narrative and emotional shifts within the story. The challenge in this approach was to be able to arrive at a sort of realism which was not just rooted in the cultural and geographical ethos of the characters, but at the same time evoke the internal emotions of the characters. This was realized by a combination of choices including the right kind of compositions, lighting and selective movements which ensured both space and characters are seen equally and not isolate the characters from their space. The subtle lighting shifts within the ten day mourning period was carefully done to help the film play between the harshness of the physical world in which the characters are dwelling but equally evoke the tenderness of grief and love they go through. As a result the film now has a poignant imagescape which affects the viewer and yet creates a lucid cinematic form.
Filmmaker: Were there any specific influences on your cinematography, whether they be other films, or visual art, of photography, or something else?
Urs: I generally do not refer to any other work while preparing for a film. In this case Rohan and I spent a lot of time in these locations during our location scout and were drawing a lot from our past emotional experiences of varied kinds. These locations were very every day and mundane, but it also became a genesis for our ideas on how these spaces can be transformed into living or lived in spaces filled with human activities and emotions.
Filmmaker: What were the biggest challenges posed by production to those goals?
Urs: The biggest challenge was the unpredictable weather conditions. The film deals with a rural western Indian landscape and heat. The consistent sense of heat through the film had to be maintained despite some drastic and untimely weather changes that happened. The other challenge was to ensure the mood of every scene is still maintained throughout the narrative despite the movements from day, night, late evening, early morning, exterior, interior etc. Also working with limited lighting resources, I had to ensure the technical competence of the film still remains of the highest quality.
Filmmaker: What camera did you shoot on? Why did you choose the camera that you did? What lenses did you use?
Urs: The film was shot on the Sony FX9 in Prores Raw. The choice of the camera was dictated by two factors one being the budget, given this was an Indian independent film and the second being the optimized image quality one could get straight out of the sensor for its price. The Sony FX9 was a budget camera with a refined color science, a good dynamic range and the dual ISO feature. This could then help me make careful choices on shoot and enhance them further during my color grade.
The lenses used were the Lomo Illumina MK II set. This lens set has a distinctive character to it, with its sharpness, color aberrations and contrast which have significantly contributed to the feeling of the film.
Filmmaker: Describe your approach to lighting.
Urs: The lighting approach was to work with a lot of natural light in the daytime and shape it according to the time of the day, but yet make it evocative. The night lighting was approached by using a combination of everyday lighting fixtures which are used in Indian villages like cheap LED bulbs and combining them with conventional photographic lighting fixtures. This approach helped me keep the film rooted to its geographic reality, yet render spaces and people in a manner that could ensure the mood within scenes and across scenes is reflective of the subtle shifts in the story.
Filmmaker: What was the most difficult scene to realize and why? And how did you do it?
Urs: The most difficult scene was the scene when Balya and his father get into a fight regarding his marriage and Anand’s family are spectators in it. It was a single shot in deep framing and action, but it had to be shot at night when there’s no electricity in the village, and as the fight grows the electricity comes back within the shot. We did the shot in the last hours of dusk when there was just enough ambient light to give us some exposure, to ensure we are giving a sense of night. As the action grew, at the right cue we had to turn on all our artificial lights to give a sense of the electricity having come back. I also was able to use the dual ISO feature to its full potential to accommodate multiple takes.
Filmmaker: Finally, describe the finishing of the film. How much of your look was “baked in” versus realized in the DI?
Urs: We did test shoots of key scenes to arrive at an overall look of the film. However, we didn’t bake in the look at the time of the shoot. We did the lighting and made color choices which would ensure we don’t deviate too much from the look during the color grade. The first step in the color grade ensured we get back the original image, from there we made subtle enhancements, keeping in mind that the images are still transparent and evocative without any embellishments.
TECH BOX
Film Title: Sabar Bonda (Cactus Pears)
Camera: Sony FX9 with Prores Raw
Lenses: Lomo Illumina MK II
Lighting: ARRI M Series and Aputure LED Fixtures
Color Grading: DaVinci Resolve