Blemished Light, a thoughtful and provocative Indian thriller written, produced and directed by Raj Amit Kumar, will be having a special preview in North America at the upcoming Portland Film Festival on Saturday, August 30th with a Midnight Screening at the Mission Street Theater.
Tickets are $10 in advance or at the door. Advance tickets can be purchased through Cascade Tickets.
Raj Amit Kumar will be in attendance and doing a Q&A after, along with co-writer Damon J Taylor and Dark Frames producer Deepa Bajaj. Supported by a gripping sound design by Academy award winner Resul Pookutty and evocative cinematography by National Film Award winner Hari Nair; combining serious social commentary with an exciting plot spanning from New Delhi to New York City, Blemished Light follows five central characters struggling with the confines of religious and sexual oppression.
In New York, fundamentalist Mohammed Husain (Bhanu Uday) seeks to kidnap and kill a peaceful Muslim scholar Fareed Rahmani (BAFTA nominee Victor Banerjee), whose pacifist views Husain opposes. In New Delhi, Leela Singh (Preeti Gupta) seeks to kidnap and marry her bisexual lover Sakhi Taylor (Bhavani Lee), opposing her conservative intolerant father (Life of Pi’s Adil Hussain). In a brutal battle of identities, the characters come face to face with gruesome acts of violence, exposing the blemished reality of contemporary world.
“Blemished Light catches the decisive moment that divides your expectation from your own desire. The characters are fully layered people, that are products of living in violent worlds, but the hardest fight they have is within themselves.”
– Don Andrews, Programming Director, Portland Film Festival
A Special Screening at the Indie Gems Film Festival, Sydney, Australia will follow this in quick succession on Friday, 12th September.
“Blemished Light is profoundly confronting and beautiful as Amit takes us on a journey with the unintended consequences of extreme doctrine. I see it as an apocryphal tale of tragedy when 2 fathers apply principal and doctrine to the lives of their families ultimately causing great harm. Our great artists hold a mirror to society that is hard to witness yet they give us the opportunity to change our fate. Amit has created a film that will spark debate with his searing vision.”
– John L Simpson, Festival Director, Indie Gems Film Festival
Blemished Light is going to have an official premiere on Human Rights Day, 10 December in New York in support of the LGBT and Muslim identities on this day.
You can view the powerful trailer here.