All That Breathes

Nomination Detail

The story of Delhi’s apocalyptic air and its escalating communal violence is woven together by an unlikely figure – the black kite. In the toxic opacity of Delhi’s air, black kites routinely collide into buildings and drop out of the sky.

Two Muslim brothers, Nadeem and Saud, operate a healing centre for kites out of their tiny basement. The brothers treat thousands of kites from their basement each month, because these birds are rejected from established bird hospitals as their predatory meat diet is seen as “non-vegetarian.”

This is the story of one Muslim family and their relationship with these birds, set against the backdrop of India’s sharp turn towards Hindu majoritarianism. Through them we get a definitive snapshot of contemporary India, and its surreal environmental and political absurdities.

Trailer