Sharing the sense of wonder | The Limits of Light and Sound

Remember Sean Baker bigging up going to the pictures while he was picking up one of his many Oscars? The magic of moving images, stories and the inspiration and connection from sharing those big screen moments is captured in The Limits of Light and Sound, a film by Shivam Pota which is at the English Riviera Film Festival.

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“My ideas come from the most random places possible,” Shivam tells D&CFilm. The seeds of The Limits of Light and Sound germinated during a screening of the film Drive My Car by Japanese filmmaker Ryusuke Hamaguchi.

“I’m always fascinated by slice of life,” says Shivam. “The cinema represents a lot to me in terms of memories and emotion. People have met through films and going to the cinema.”

A still from The Limits of Light and Sound. Warren (Samuel Sherpa-Moore) left, and Dominic (Vincent Oblyschuk) right

Along with these inklings came the sense of being restrained. Shivam uses the world ‘soulful’ a lot, and going against his more indulgent qualities as a filmmaker.

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“Back then I was doing things that weren’t gunning for emotion, or trying to be vulnerable through film,” he says.

The Limits of Light and Sound owes plenty to another of Shivam’s films, Speeding Slowly, which he says was the first time he put his vulnerability on screen.

“Through that, I realized I can make something that can resonate with people, and I can make something a bit more slow, a bit more focused, a bit more mood-bearing.”

Finding a bond

The Limits of Light and Sound focuses on a simple idea of an empty cinema with two people meeting and watching a film, and finding a bond through the experience.

The short was due to be filmed at a university screening room, because that’s what Shivam had access to. But filmmaker mentor Amit Agrawal suggested making use of a really nice old English cinema to add to the atmosphere and romance. They changed the location to the historic Rex Cinema, Wareham

The Limits of Light and Sound marks a change in direction for Shivam’s filmmaking.

Samuel Sherpa-Moore (left), who plays Warren and Shivam Pota on set.

“I am moving more towards an atmospheric place with how I make films,” says Shivam. “I really care about telling story through atmosphere. It’s made me feel more confident in being sincere in terms of writing and direction and filmmaking – it’s daunting to be sincere and have your heart on your sleeve when you’re writing a film.”

Speedy Slowly

Within The Limits of Light and Sound there’s a nod to Speeding Slowly. The earlier short features as an easter egg in the film, with its replacing a poster in the background of one of the shots. That appreciation is well founded, not only in approach, but The Limits of Light and Sound owes its practical existence to Speeding Slowly, which won Best Impact Award at the Mental Health Impact Film Festival in Singapore. The prize gave Shivam the funds to complete The Limits of Light and Sound.

“Without that money from winning at the festival, the film wouldn’t exist,” admits Shivam.

In The Limits of Light and Sound, two people bond over is a movie called Our Crumbling Void.

“It’s not a real film,” says Shivam, but it’s inspired by movies of the mid to late 90s, when there was a fresh wave of new cinematic voices, like Danny Boyle.

The Limits of Light and Sound team inside The Rex

“In my head, it’s a supernatural sci fi drama, a blend of your kitchen sink dramas with a lot of supernatural and mysterious elements that tie into each other.”

But Shivam didn’t admit that to the cast. Both the actors have their own version of what constitutes Our Crumbling Void.

“I like to think that everyone on set had a very different version of that fake film in their head. And perhaps it reflects something thats important to them. I have my own version of what the visuals are,” he says.

Flurries of intense light and colour

The images for the fake film were provided by Adelaide Sherry a filmmaker and friend of Shivam based in Singapore/Australia. They include flurries of intense light and colour to reflect the vivid dream-like mystery of the surreal and supernatural sense of what’s on screen. For Shivam, that action takes place in an old building that’s slowly crumbling and about to get demolished. The story focuses on two friends who live in the building, which, like their friendship, is slowly falling apart. They can either save the building or their friendship to defeat the supernatural entity, but only one can be saved.

Alive

As they watch with a sense of shock and awe, it’s almost like the auditorium is alive and the screen is breathing. The cinema itself has a melancholy beauty. And the soundtrack reflects the easy majesty of the setting and the occasion.

Behind the scenes filming The Limits of Light and Sound

“I took some cues from films like Cinema Paradiso. I wanted to give the audience a bit of a spectacle, because the audience needs to feel that magic,” says Shivam.

Films are better with a crowd, although there is a luxury to being alone in a cinema with a huge screen and big sounds to yourself. But films deserve a packed audience. Shivam saw Indian blockbuster RRR in Watford with a disappointing house. A few months later he presented it at his university. “It played like a stadium,” he says, beaming. Another example he mentioned was a screening of The Cremator which also had a very packed audience and “when the film ended the whole room was stunned into silence in a way I’ve just not seen before”.

Bonds

“It’s the magic of shared spaces,” he says. “You can have really amazing, and simple yet almost transformative interactions with complete strangers in shared spaces,” says Shivam, who has made some amazing friends through cinema screenings. “Without knowing it, there’s already this unspoken bond between the people in that room, and the same goes for a play or a concert or a comedy show. There’s a shared experience in art that I think is so profound and so wonderful.”

But it’s not just watching films that can have that sense of wonder.

“Being on set felt electric,” says Shivam. “Almost every film set you’ll be on is stressful because there’s never enough time and there’s never enough resources, or you can’t get every shot you want. But the film was in my head for a long time. And there were many times that it nearly never happened, due to delays with things like funding coming through, because we weren’t sure how the films would get made.”

Music, performance and atmosphere

A moment on set that really moved Shivam was one you might not expect. It’s from a lighting test before they started rolling the camera, and it was the combo of music, performance and atmosphere. It was that zing of working together to create something new.

Shivam summed up his ethos to filmmaking by saying: “To me emotion is the key to everything, it always is and will be my priority as an artist.”

The Limits of Light and Sound by Shivam Pota is at the English Riviera Film Festival on March 15 at the Lyceum Theatre Torquay. Get your tickets