As any film critic these days will tell you, the word ‘Lynchian’ gets thrown around a lot in reviews. The slightest bit of surrealism in a scene is described as something emulating the work of the man behind masterpieces like Blue Velvet (1986) and Lost Highway (1997). I’m guilty of it too. So much so that the descriptor has lost some of its gravitas over the years. Most things that don’t seem logically coherent are touted as Lynchian. However, ambiguity is not a stand-in for true enigma, nor does density always equal profundity. Sometimes, a scene can play straight like a musical note, evoking something visceral in the audience – leaving no room to question its logic. It’s this feeling of discovery through a film that counts for more than ‘understanding’ it. 

In its duration of a shade under two hours, Raam Reddy’s Jugnuma - The Fable might be the closest an Indian film has come to emulating David Lynch’s genre-breaking style. I’m not saying the film derives it from the existing style, as much as Reddy embraces it and makes it his own. Having made his debut with the fantastic Thithi (2015), the 36-year-old filmmaker might not even have been conscious of it.

But Jugnuma is a rare Indian film that confidently amalgamates genres ranging from folklore, magic realism, paranoid thriller to family drama – making it one heady concoction, without ever truly losing grip of what it wants to say. It’s the kind of a dream film that works as a genre piece, but the deeper one dives into the film’s social, cultural and ecological commentary, the richer the experience becomes. 

Teen Pahad, a fictional hill station where the film is entirely set, is paradise for all intents and purposes. Dev (Manoj Bajpayee) is the sole owner of a sprawling 5000-acre estate, where apples, apricots, peaches, plums are grown and exported. The estate was bequeathed to Dev by his grandfather, who was awarded this for his proximity to the British rulers. Dev is accompanied by his wife Nandini (Priyanka Bose), and two children, teenage daughter Vanya (Hiral Sidhu) and pre-adolescent son, Juju (Ahwan Pookot). It’s a soothing life – however, as the first shot of the film suggests, they’re anything but a ‘normal’ family.

After brushing his teeth, the opening shot sees Dev in front of the bathroom mirror applying an ointment on his shoulders. In an unbroken take, the camera follows him downstairs, as he exchanges pleasantries with the staff, trades a line with Nandini and Juju, and makes his way to the outhouse, where he remains fixed in the dark adjusting something around his shoulders. A few seconds later, he exits the outhouse with two wooden wings on his back. He walks to the edge of a cliff and jumps, only for the audience to see him fly away at a distance. 

There might be more than one way to look at it – that these are gifted people with special powers, and therefore it’s referred to in the most matter-of-fact way. Or that the wings are a metaphor for the jet-setting lifestyle of the family, which spends significant time staring out of an airplane window. If one actually thinks about it, the generationally wealthy people are meted out the ‘special’ treatment, and one might construe that as their gift. For their part, Dev, Nandini, Juju and Vanya are also not your typical insensitive rich people — they’re courteous, polite and well-behaved. But, as their manager Manoj (Deepak Dobriyal) recounts in a voiceover, it takes the slightest push to send even the sanest men to hurtle towards insanity. 

During his morning routine of walking through the orchards, Dev finds a charred tree one day. He doesn’t think much of it and moves on, only to find a grove charred in the same manner a few days later. It’s only after the second incident that he starts to become unnerved by it. He asks Manoj to investigate the matter, and hears all kinds of lore about how this might be nature’s payback for using pesticides for their crops. 

The seeds of distrust between Dev and his estate workers are sown cautiously and gradually. It takes a few incidents to chip away at Dev’s niceties, revealing his cruel side. In two of the coldest scenes, we see Dev sitting inside his car as police officials carelessly round up his employees for the estate fires, after they spent a whole night trying to put it out. In the second scene, Dev tells Manoj to ‘take a few days off’, implying he has lost his faith in him as well. There are a few horse nomads passing through the estate, who become the unintended victims of the xenophobia of the villagers, who are angry after being rounded up by corrupt police officials. The murmurs begin among workers, how the estate owner is unravelling. Written by Reddy himself, the film is stacked with red-herrings, commentary without ever being didactic.

The film is primarily shouldered by the performances of Bajpayee and Dobriyal, the master and servant, minding each other’s feelings, both desperate for answers. It’s a couple of delicate, deceptively straightforward performances by actors, but whose prowess isn’t tapped enough. 

Shot in 16mm, presumably to bring a grainy feel to the visual given that it’s set in 1989, cinematographer Sunil Borkar pulls off some visions of a feverish dream. A man soaring above the clouds with his wooden wings, the wind rustling underneath. Or the apocalyptic visuals of fire erupting out of ground, through the trees and shooting straight into the sky. 

Objectively, these two visuals alone convey the unhindered ambition of Reddy’s film, which is probably the most enigmatic, pathos-ridden and mysterious Indian film I’ve seen this year. The film revises the tragic lore of the mountains with its unexpected climax. In an era where pundits insist on going out with a bang, Reddy picks an ending as sedate as that glorious opening shot.

*‘Jugnuma - The Fable’ had its world premiere at the Berlinale 2024, and is now playing in select theatres across India.

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