Indian film spotlights political drama, pandemic tragedies at Cannes

An Indian movie based on a New York Times feature about a man returning his friend’s body home during India’s COVID-19 lockdown drew a standing ovation at Cannes.

The Martin Scorsese-backed Homebound is a fictionalized retelling of a Times story by Basharat Peer, who explored the origin of a viral photograph: a young Muslim man holding his Dalit friend in his lap, after the latter collapsed from exhaustion during the 900-mile trek home amid India’s national lockdown — a similar journey was undertaken by millions of Indians.

“It was the dignity of the journey that moved me,” Peer told Rediff. “In a world … full of categories, hatred and ideologies, there was this basic decency.”