CFF screening - short review - FROM GULF TO GULF TO GULF by Shaina Anand and Ashok Sukumaran

Life is not easy when working on a boat in the Arabian Sea – though it has its fair share of romanticism. That is the conclusion we can draw from this experimental documentary feature, which is not afraid to take us out of our comfort zone and practically force its audience to engage actively with the film.

From Gulf to Gulf to Gulf is the fruit of the collaboration between filmmakers Anand and Sukuraman with a group of sailors from the Gulf of Kutch. It is, in fact, a collage of clips shot by the crew members themselves during their trips over the course of four years, some with good cameras but others with anything from phones to webcams – which means that the quality of the clips goes from good to very bad.

It’s a challenging film and some will find it inevitably tedious, but there is nothing sadistic about it not wanting to please its viewer in the most obvious way with a narrative or even any sort of structure worth mentioning. In its form, and its radically realistic representation, this is exactly as tough an experience as it needs to be.

Yet, every now and again, the film will logically compensate and please the viewer through its simplicity, whether it is through a fleeting ray of light captured on the screen, the graceful sight of playful happy dolphins or a particularly exciting shot of a boat with a popular Arabic song playing in its background.