15 Park Avenue ready to woo audiences

Kolkata: After the critically acclaimed Mr and Mrs Iyer, Aparna Sen is all set with her next venture 15 Park Avenue.

The film which releases this Friday is already a big hit with critics at the London and New York Film Festivals.

Konkona Sen Sharma, whose performance opposite Rahul Bose in Mr & Mrs Iyer hogged a lot of critical acclaim will be facing a jury of critics yet again as 15 Park Avenue releases.

The film narrates the story of a girl who turns schizophrenic after being raped by a gang of political goons, and that's the kind role that excites Konkona.

"I don't actually choose roles because they are difficult or because they are serious, it just so happens that some roles that I have liked have happened to be serious, or happened to be complicated…and seem more serious because we are also used to watching a lot of films where characters are really very, very, you know, banal," Sen-Sharma says.

Addressing a press conference in Kolkata, director Aparna Sen said mentally and physically challenged people were, as a rule, marginalised in mainstream Indian cinema, and that's what led her to write the story and make this film.

She cast Shabana Azmi as Konkona's elder sister in the film, and the story revolves around the relationship between the two sisters. Waheeda Rehman, who makes a comeback, plays Konkona's mother, while Bose plays her fiancé, who deserts her after she turns schizophrenic.

"It's only lately that you have a spate of films like Black in mainstream cinema in fact or Iqbal where you found characters that are not normal within quotes. But I've had an interest in them for a long time. In Sati, the character of Shabana Azmi was mute and in fact she was not as they say "normal." And then again in Paromitar Ekdin, I had two challenged people. So my interest in these challenged people has been a long standing one."

The film that cost Rs 3 crore to make, premieres on Friday. Originally made in English, 15 Park Avenue has now been dubbed in Hindi to make it saleable to a larger audience.

Yet is there an audience big enough for films like this for the producers to recover costs? 15 Park Avenue will be a test as much for Konkona as it will for the Indian audience.