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Director K. Sreekumar reflects on his film Anyarude Akashangal, screened at the 30th International Film Festival of Kerala (IFFK), in a candid conversation on politics, identity, and personal truth.

Q: Anyarude Akashangal engages deeply with contemporary social systems and individual conscience. To whom does the film most powerfully speak, society or politics?

A: More than addressing society at large, the film speaks to the individual. Society is never foregrounded as a collective entity. Instead, the narrative progresses through the inner evolution of a single character. The film is concerned primarily with internal conflict and personal growth.

Q: Even though social attitudes are gradually changing, discussions around transgender identities often carry undertones of marginalisation. Did you face challenges while making a film on this subject?

A: I am a transgender person myself. Gender and sexuality remain concepts that are still beyond the grasp of prevailing public consciousness, and the term ‘transgender’ is widely misunderstood. The foremost challenge was how to represent the character truthfully.

I met a transgender woman whose family background was entirely different from mine. To internalise the character, I lived as her for six months. I have always wanted to cross-dress, and during this period I wore a sari consistently. I also participated in the ‘Gender and Literature’ programme held in Kozhikode. These experiences helped me overcome my fears and embrace my desires. The script emerged organically from these lived experiences.

Q: How did you arrive at the central theme of the film?

A: Anyarude Akashangal is deeply autobiographical. I came to understand my gender identity at a much later stage in life, and it was through professional consultation with a psychiatrist that I was able to recognise and affirm my identity as a transgender person.

Even friends of 48 years initially struggled to accept this truth. A month later, one of them told me that my life itself was a powerful story, and that moment marked the beginning of the film’s journey.

Q: How did you conceptualise the title Anyarude Akashangal?

A: Vaikom Muhammad Basheer’s Bhoomiyude Avakashikal speaks of an earth that belongs to everyone, an idea that has since eroded, with ownership now the earth seems to belong only to a few.
Our freedoms are steadily eroding—our skies now belong to others. The shrinking right to live and fly freely affects all marginalised communities, with transgender persons being one part of this larger reality. This idea shaped the title Anyarude Akashangal.

Q:Have you received any memorable responses at IFFK?

A: The response has been overwhelmingly positive. Several viewers came forward to share their impressions, and I was truly taken aback by the reactions. Flabbergasted is the word that best describes my experience. As one of twelve films produced under our banner, the appreciation it has received stands as its greatest success.