The Indian cinema audience has already discovered “Delhi 6”, from native son Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra, who came to Venice to present his fifth film, showing out of competition.

It tells the story of American Roshan who visits India for the first time while escorting his sick Grandmother back home to Delhi. “It’s a very personal film. It’s semi-auto biographical. It’s got incidents from my childhood, what I saw growing up. But it’s like a microcosm of India. If you were to shrink India it will fit into that city,” says Mehra. Having led a very western lifestyle in America, Roshan discovers along with his grandmother in Delhi Indian culture with its richness of sights and sounds, perfumes, food and culture, religion and beliefs. Roshan quickly settles into the local community. However, the locals are hiding ancient secrets that are as old as Delhi itself. “India today is a growing society. It’s an evolving society. It’s coming together with the whole global aspect and finding itself in the global arena in the world but the mindset remains 1000 years old. When people are confronted with issues of religion, caste, social imparities, family values, you, in the name of culture and tradition, we retort to some very archaic kind of measures,” Mehra insists. The Venice film festival is the European premiere for ‘Delhi 6’ which features music by Oscar winning composer A. R. Rahman, who scored the music for ‘Slumdog Millionaire’.More about: Cinema, Festival, Venice film festival

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