Filmmaker Subhadra Mahajan dives into how her feature film 'Second Chance' came to life

In Second Chance, a young urban protagonist travels to her family’s summer home in the hills and gradually opens herself up to the people and ways of the Himalayan winter life

I'm a product of two very different worlds and I wanted to tell a story that would combine them," filmmaker Subhadra Mahajan tells us when we ask her of the genesis of her debut feature Second Chance which premiered at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival last year and is gearing for a theatrical release on June 13. Mahajan, "a Pahari kid", was born and raised in Himachal and spent a large part of her childhood in the Kullu Valley where the film is shot, only later adopting the life of a city person as she settled in Mumbai for higher studies and work. In her new film, faced with a sudden crisis, a 20-something protagonist Nia (Dheera Johnson), an urbanite, escapes to her family's summer home in the hills only to gradually open herself up to the people and ways of the Himalayan winter life.

The film's primary location, a quaint, lonesome house where Nia heals and re-centres herself, assumes the significance of a character in the film. A house in Manali, known locally as the Birla house, was chosen in favour of initial suggestions to use Mahajan's own home in Shimla for the shoot ("Shimla feels like a city"). "It was a miracle that the house was left pretty much the way it is [in the film] and it's got a huge orchard estate surrounding it, which means that there's not a lot of construction. So, it feels like a bit of a time capsule," says Mahajan. Its remoteness helped to build the film's soundscape, adds cinematographer Swapnil S Sonawane, known for his work on Sacred Games and films like Monica O My Darling, Newton, and Superboys of Malegaon.

Subhadra Mahajan and Swapnil S Sonawane

Mahajan, who was a co-writer on the Pan Nalin-directed Angry Indian Goddesses, speaks of Iranian New Wave filmmakers like Majid Majidi and Abbas Kiarostami, and English filmmaker Andrea Arnold with her "imperfect young female protagonists" as inspirations for Second Chance. She believed the story's setting had to relay the idea of human insignificance when faced with the immensity of nature, as well as that of the inevitable passage of time "so that you can leave behind whatever's happened and move on, which is the crux of giving yourself a second chance. For me, I felt that that would be best expressed in the Pir Panjal Range."

The other aspect, she says, was the culture of its inhabitants - a hard-working people whose wisdom is disguised in humour and who live by a gentle philosophy where they are openly giving to all, whether those from their community or outsiders. "This would be a great atmosphere for a person who's healing from betrayal, hurt and trauma to regain faith in life."

Second Chance's cast is made up of performers who have all faced a film camera for the first time. While Johnson's strong presence, energy, and whimsicality stood out for Mahajan, the rest of the characters were cast from the local community. This was because Mahajan sought a degree of authenticity - coming down to details like pigmentation on cheeks or facial lines caused by years of exposure to the harsh Himalayan sun.

The film is also shot in black and white, a decision that lends a starkness to the natural beauty of its location. Sonawane says, "The way black and white translates in a close-up is that you end up looking into a character's eyes more rather than getting distracted by everything else."

"I think the reason is because I was pretty certain I'm telling a story about healing, and Nia's journey is about finding light at the end of a long, dark tunnel," adds Mahajan. She points out that the locals of the region dress colourfully and with colour photography, there was a risk of reducing them to ethnographic representations of a tribe. "Once all that is stripped away, they become these characters with all these layers of emotion."