Gondhal Enters Oscar Race With a 25-Minute Unbroken Take

By Grace Kim

Gondhal, India's submission for the international feature Oscar at the 99th Academy Awards, opens with a 25-minute unbroken take. The Marathi-language thriller has launched its global trailer as its Oscar campaign enters a new phase.

India chose Gondhal from a field of 33 films in contention for the country's submission. It is writer-director Santosh Davakhar's first feature. Davakhar also won the Silver Peacock for best director at the 56th International Film Festival of India (IFFI).

Davakhar said, “Global perceptions of Indian cinema are often shaped by narratives of poverty and caste conflict – important realities, but not the complete expression of India,” setting out the incomplete frame he wants to challenge. The distinction is cultural, not a denial of the poverty and caste conflict he names.

He added: “India is also a civilization of extraordinary cultural wealth, sustained by traditions, music, and collective memory. I created this film to bring one such powerful tradition to the global screen through a culturally authentic and universal cinematic language.” His stated aim is to carry one such tradition beyond its local context while preserving its cultural specificity.

What does the global trailer change for Gondhal?

The trailer shifts the film from India's selection process into international promotion. For viewers beyond India, it is the immediate point of contact with a film built around a Marathi folk ritual, a single-night tragedy and a 25-minute opening take.

That specificity is also the film's dramatic engine. The story takes place over one night in rural Maharashtra, during a Gondhal, a folk ritual in which devotion is expressed through song, dance and theatrical storytelling. The setting supplies pressure that governs the characters' choices.

Ishita Deshmukh plays Suman, a young wife stuck in a suffocating marriage. She tries to regain control by playing on the fixation her lover Sarjerao has developed for her; Nishad Bhoir plays Sarjerao.

As Suman's desires run against codes of honor and custom, the night ends in tragedy. The structure makes the ritual an active constraint rather than decoration: a marriage, an affair and customary codes converge during a single night.

Form, music and performance

Amalendu Chaudhary shot Gondhal, which opens with an unbroken take lasting 25 minutes. An unbroken take presents a continuous sequence without a visible edit, requiring the audience to remain inside the scene rather than reset it through a cut.

The cast also includes Kishor Kadam, Yogesh Sohoni and Anuj Prabhu. The legendary composer Ilaiyaraaja wrote the music and background score, adding another cultural layer while the Gondhal supplies the dramatic center.

Jury members at IFFI called the film “like a Shakespearean fable set in a real world.” The description fits a film that pairs a compressed, stylized night with a marriage plot grounded in rural custom, and it gives the Oscar campaign a concrete festival credential.

Davakhar produced the film with Diksha Davakhar, his co-founder at production banner Davakhar Films. The company backs regional stories and aims for top-tier craft in camera work, sound, music and acting.

The next test for Gondhal is whether the global trailer can communicate that specificity without reducing the film to a generalized ritual story or a familiar class-conflict narrative. The film entered the 99th Academy Awards race after selection from 33 contenders, carrying a 25-minute opening shot and a Silver Peacock.

Its case now depends on whether international viewers will read those choices as part of a tradition of Marathi language and performance rather than an obstacle. The trailer introduces that proposition; only the completed film can test whether it travels.