Bhubaneswar: After getting into the race for Oscars, Kalira Atita (Yesterday’s Past), an Odia feature film scripted, directed and produced by Indian film maker Nila Madhab Panda, has been selected for its world premiere in one of the oldest global film festivals, the 28th Prague International Film Festival, FEBIOFEST. Scheduled from April 29 to May 7, it is the longest running and the biggest feature film festival in the world, based out of the beautiful city of Prague, Czech Republic. While releasing the movie’s trailer, the filmmaker said, “We have the pleasure to inform you that the film will have another world premiere in Prague. I am happy to release the first trailer of Kalira Atita and I hope people will love it and share all over.”
The film was also screened at the Panorama Section at IFFI in January. The journey for this film started when Nila saw a photo of a hand pump in a newspaper in 2006. He was shocked to see the pump drowned in the sea, and the picture showed the horrifying truth of sea ingression to him. Nila says that he has followed the story of sea ingression for over one and a half decades. He did not follow any screenplay or story for this film, but took his team to the affected areas in Kendrapara district in Odisha, and shot the film without makeup, sets and lights.
The film, starring Pitobash Tripathy, is a story of the struggle between man and sea, highlighting the issue of seawater ingression.