Shlok Sharma’s Two Sisters And A Husband to be premiered at Tribeca Festival 2022

Shlok Sharma’s third feature, Two Sisters And A Husband, will have its world premiere at the Tribeca Festival in June. The American festival is being held in New York City from 8–19 June 2022.

The Hindi film, produced by Anurag Kashyap, will compete in the International Narrative Competition section with nine other movies.

The unusual drama, written by Sharma and Shilpa Srivastava, revolves around two sisters, Amrita (Manya Grover) and Tara (Avani Rai), and their relationships with Rajat (Dinker Sharma). Tara and Rajat are married, but when Amrita becomes pregnant, they have to flee and start anew at a mountain town in a hotel owned by the heir of a royal family.

The festival’s website says of the film, 'The classic ménage à trois receives a uniquely Indian twist in this riveting and restrained drama, set in the 1990s against the majestic backdrop of the Himalayas. As the three protagonists try to make their way through an impossibly tangled domestic arrangement, love and duty increasingly find themselves at tragic odds with each other, a situation that will result in unimaginable consequences.'

This year, the festival will showcase 110 feature films from 151 filmmakers from 40 countries. The line-up includes 88 world premieres; 32 directors coming back to the festival with their latest projects, and 50 first-time directors.

According to the festival’s press release, more than 64% (81) of the feature films are directed by female, BIPOC and LGBTQ+ filmmakers — 46% (58) female directors, 34% (43) BIPOC directors, 8% (10) LGBTQ+ directors.

“This 2022 feature film programme leaves us proud and humbled by the boundless ingenuity and passion of our indefatigable filmmaking community,” festival director and vice-president of programming Cara Cusumano said. “Whether a comedic breath of fresh air or a trenchant exposé of the most urgent contemporary issues, this year’s official selections again remind us of the vitality and urgency of independent film in a world that needs it more than ever.”

Tribeca will begin with the world premiere of the Netflix documentary on actress-singer Jennifer Lopez on 8 June and close on 18 June with another world premiere, Josh Alexander’s Loudmouth, a documentary on the Reverend Al Sharpton.

Some notable films from the South Asian diaspora are also being premiered. In the US Narrative Competition, filmmaker Ravi Kapoor’s Four Samosas makes its world premiere. Starring Venk Potula, Sonal Shah, Sharmita Bhattacharya, Nirvan Patnaik, Karan Soni and Summer Bishil, the quirky English film tells the story of a wanna-be rapper, Vinny, who gathers his friends in an attempt to disrupt the wedding of his ex-girlfriend by bankrupting her family and stealing its jewels from a supermarket safe.

In the Viewpoint section, which highlights distinct voices in independent filmmaking, writer-director Nardeep Khurmi’s feature Land Of Gold will have its world premiere. Khurmi stars as truck driver Kiran who finds a young Mexican-American girl inside a shipping container he is transporting. Despite the stakes, he looks to reunite her with her family. The English-, Punjabi-, Spanish-language film also stars Caroline Valencia, Pallavi Sastry, Riti Sachdeva, Iqbal Theba, Dhruv Uday Singh and Karen David.

Naman Gupta's short film Coming Out With The Help Of A Time Machine stars Karan Soni as Sid who uses his time machine to reset his day to make sure he comes out in a perfect way to his traditional Indian parents. The English-language short will be a part of Tribeca’s Online Premieres program.

Finally, Pakistani-American filmmaker Nausheen Dadabhoy’s An Act Of Worship looks at the last 20 years of Muslim life in America in its world premiere in the Documentary Competition section at the festival.