Indian filmmaker Ram Reddy is working on his third feature, Lavender Fire, a stripped-down coming-of-age drama set in the Mumbai model and influencer scene. The project follows Reddy’s 2024 Berlin production Jugnuma: The Fable and Locarno Prize-winning debut film Titi (2015).
After completing extensive world-building for “The Fable,” which was based on a 300-page visual concept and included 600 VFX shots, Reddy says he was ready for a reset. “It was everything I dreamed of. But the process was rigorous because I wanted to go back to something more spontaneous,” he told Variety at the WAVES Film Bazaar, the market component of the International Film Festival of India (IFFI) in Goa.
Lavender Fire is about three Gen Z brothers living together in Mumbai. Reddy has cast three newcomers from the fashion and creative fields. Their stories unfold against career pressures, viral fame, and changing social norms, and the narrative “clock” increases the urgency.
Reddy is returning to the method he used for Thithi, which is to cast first and then write the script with the cast. He is developing the film with photographer Maurya Dandu and long-time collaborator Ere Gowda.
As an accessible and unbiased look at Gen Z urban culture, the filmmakers believe the project is both locally rooted and globally marketable. “As a Millennial, it’s very interesting to see Gen Z culture. The closer I get to it, the more I realize that the instantaneousness of it is so exciting in its own right. It makes me want to take life a little less seriously. I hope Gen Z kids can have a movie they can call their own, and that I can uncritically introduce that culture to non-Gen Z people,” Reddy says. It represented a live-in sibling dynamic and moved away from the heavy machinery demands of previous works.
Reddy is scheduled to shoot in January under his banner Prspctvs Productions and is “open to collaborating with financiers and international production partners”.
“I don’t want to fit into a box,” Reddy says of his filmmaking graph. “This is about instinct and immediacy. After this, if the right project calls for it, I’m ready to scale up again.”
