A film on parents left to live alone

Actor Shishir Sharma and Smita Jayakar's short film 'Chhoti si Guzaarish' is based on the plight of aged parents living alone while their children settle abroad. The film is directed by Pragyesh Singh and produced by TNV films streaming on MXPlayer.

According to Pragyesh 'Chhoti si Guzaarish' is a mirror of the society that seems as contemporary today as it was 10 years ago, and will be equally relevant 10 years from now until the social structure is reinvents itself. The film underlines how in this highly competitive world of globalisation, the emotions of parents are disregarded and are left to live a distressful lonely meaningless life.

'Chhoti si Guzaarish' raises the questions why parents are not part of the family. Story of 'Chhoti si Guzaarish' roam around "Sugna and Shishir" whose son is settled in USA and he does not even turnout to see his mother even in dying situation. This film stands against the storyline of the popular film 'Baghban' and adopts a realistic approach in its climax. Behaviour of the children break into the pain of separation and they choose the culmination which the new generation can't even imagine."

On talking about working experience with actors, "This was a very challenging role for Shishir as he never cried so much onscreen, to give realistic look to the film, the cremation ceremony was shot at real a location in Lucknow and Asthi Visarjan scene was shot at Bithoor Ghat at Kanpur (Ganga River). During the shooting of the film, Shishir was very sad and cried several times. He has not used glycerine during the shoot, but he just imagined and adopted the story and every shot came naturally."

Smita Jayakar plays a sickened person and sharing about her role she says, "Since I'm playing a sickened person in the film, it wasn't really challenging because I've observed and been close to a cancer patient in family. But the only irony was that my appearance didn't matched with a cancer patient as I was very plump at that time. It was creatively enhancing but not a challenging role."

On talking about her working experience she adds, "I had an excellent and euphoric experience during shoot. My co-actor Shishir is a heart-warming person and a close friend of mine. We enjoyed every shot together. And our director Pragesh, my first working experience with him was a pleasure, he always ensured our comfort.

Also, Lucknow is my favourite city, I enjoy the food, culture and everything about it. And I would love to be a part of his future projects."

This is a wonderful film which will make the audience uneasy at the climax and would create awareness about their responsibility towards their parents after watching the film.