KASHISH 2023 NARRATIVE FEATURES IN COMPETITION

Laila and Roshni are looking for a house after they are evicted from the place they rented. It soon becomes evident that their search for a home is also their ongoing search for a place in this society that wants to keep them away in a section that can not be the centre. They have a friend in Sharukh but many of their other interactions don’t turn out as expected. Laila is torn between being true to herself and preserving links with the family she was born into. Meanwhile, Roshni treads a fine line between concealing her identity and living the life that she wants but it is not without its dangers.

As the search for a home continues, it transcends physical spaces and biological bonds. New friendships blossom and help comes from unexpected quarters.

Chou, a writer who has not written for years, is looking for a tenant to share a spare room in his house. One day, an actor called Chiang comes to rent the room. His clear and innocent eyes have evoked the writer’s interest. Chou finds out that the daily life of Chiang is a performance in itself, he begins to refer to the new tenant as the blueprint of his novel.

Upon agreeing to be the brand ambassador for a famous cognac celebrating their bicentennial, novelist Stéphane Belcourt returns to his hometown for the first time in many years. Once there, he meets his first love’s son, Lucas. Memories come rushing back to him: irrepressible attraction, bodies becoming one in the heat of desire, a passion that can never be revealed… His first love’s name was Thomas. They were 17.

In the midst of separating from her wife, Jay attempts to move across the country to start her life over again. She stops in the middle to stay with her high school best friend who she used to be secretly in love with, and befriends a charismatic gay man who has long given up on love. Struggling to move forward with the next chapter of her life, memories of the past resurface as Jay grapples with the inevitable cycles of love, loss, and letting go.

On a hot summer day, Paloma decides to fulfill her most cherished dream: a traditional wedding in a church with her boyfriend Zé. She is a devoted mother, a hard-working farmhand in a papaya plantation and has been saving to afford the celebration. The priest’s refusal to marry her and Zé will force Paloma to confront the rural society. She suffers violence, betrayal, prejudice and injustice but nothing shakes the faith and determination of this transgender woman.

When modest tailor and single Indian dad, Varun (Ace Bhatti), is called to break his long-lost white ex-girlfriend, Monica (Diaan Lawrenson), out of a rehab clinic across the country, he and their transgender son, River (Gabe Gabriel), take a road trip across South Africa to rescue her. Varun tells stories of his adventurous past with Monica as he and River jump the border fence and hitchhike in eSwatini with a kind and fiery stranger, Shaunice (Loren Loubser). Finally, they reach the rehab clinic where the receptionist, Hloni (Faniswa Yisa) takes some convincing before finally releasing Monica to the father-son duo. Tensions are high as the dysfunctional new family unit adjusts on their way back home where River is set to compete with his best friend, Ollie (Cleo Wesley), in a once-in-a-lifetime drag competition that could win him his long-awaited gender-affirming surgery, so long as no con artists from Varun and Monica’s wild past with their old friend and mafia man Stan (Rob van Vuuren) get in their way.