From the ind.igenous desk
Often, while doomscrolling through Instagram, I come across reels that make me pause, my brain going numb for a moment. Someone crying after a heartbreak, someone breaking down after the death of a loved one – recording themselves in their most intimate moments, liked by millions. Thousands of comments from strangers, some in solidarity, some sharing extreme criticism, some simply making fun. These videos are, of course, from the extreme recesses of our online existence. Sharing is a spectrum that encompasses the entirety of living – pictures of your cat, your favourite song, selfies with friends, the new cafe you tried this weekend, a trip, moments of tenderness with your partner, hatred towards a particular group, a divorce. It never stops.
Preeti and Samrat are 20-somethings in Mumbai from smaller towns, with jobs that cover the rent of a small one-bedroom apartment, allow them to send some money back home, and then leave just about some to call their own. They are in love – new to the feeling, new to being together. As they navigate through building a life amid this newness in the big ‘city of dreams’, they begin putting out their moments on social media, without really giving it much thought. First, these posts only reach friends, then strangers, then Samrat finds his colleagues at work discussing their reels, then a brand reaches out to collaborate. Before they know it, they are influencers.
Debut filmmaker Priyankar Patra got interested in the world of influencers and content creation for the first time because of a younger cousin who made YouTube videos. ‘I was interested in filmmaking and would make short films, while he would make vlogs, and like a very concerned older brother, I would advise him to be more ‘serious’ about what he was shooting. I think I judged him for a long time, but I finally realised that just because the tools he and I are using are the same, our methods of storytelling do not necessarily have to be so. After this realization, I was very interested to know how the space operated, how he was earning a living. I also began asking many questions to my influencer friends and doing my own research.’
Upward mobility is not simply a desire, but is also supposed to be a natural progression of the world. Every generation wants to be richer than the previous one. And economic mobility comes hand-in-hand with a desire for social mobility. We aspire to rise to a higher class than we were born in. For the middle class, it had been the government jobs in post-independent India, and the IT sector under neoliberalism, which allowed for this mobility. A little later came the startups, the unicorns, the self-made entrepreneurs raising billions in funding and calling the shots. Today, it is the content economy – except that we still look at it with suspicion, and while brands spend a considerable part of their budgets getting their products advertised by influencers, we still wonder if it is a bubble that is not meant to last long. But it is a democratic space, they say. Anyone with a mobile phone can be famous. Influencers tell us that it is possible – perhaps easy, even – to magically make our lives better. ‘How much is the brand paying?’ Samrat asks Preeti. ‘A little more than a month’s salary of yours,’ Preeti responds. Success has never been quicker.
The currency of the content economy is aspiration. Preeti, on the first day of moving into their small apartment, dreams of living in Bandra someday. She has a friend, Sonam – a character we never meet in the film, but know all about. Sonam is a model, also an influencer, very possibly from an upper-class background, whose life should have nothing to do with Preeti’s, but it does. Preeti is in constant, imaginary competition with Sonam. Both Bandra and Sonam stand for all that Preeti’s life isn’t but desires to be. Influencers aspire to be more and more famous – more likes, follows, shares. The audience aspires to lead picture-perfect lives like their favourite influencers. Pinterest-like living rooms, a particular way to celebrate a birthday, how date nights should look at home. Our individual moments of joy constantly fall short, because we only aspire to emulate. What Preeti and Samrat sell is the idea of being happily middle-class. They are loved because they are relatable. But the boundaries of aspiration keep getting pushed. The first big brand they land is of home decor. They do up their room with the products they get, and shoot a reel. Is that how a room at their standard of living can look? Relatability and aspiration continue to win over each other in this game.
And if aspiration is their currency, their product is their way of life. Preeti writes her reel ideas on sticky notes – ‘Spa day at home’, ‘pillow fight’, ‘sunset at bandstand’. Are these manufactured moments, or are they real? How do we even define real today? In a particularly poignant scene, Preeti and Samrat fight over clicking a selfie during dinner at a high-end restaurant. Preeti thinks it is important for their brand-building, for their followers to know about this moment. Samrat wants the moment to be theirs, and theirs alone. It seems that they are now too far away from the innocence of unadulterated emotions, the primal joys of feeling. It is an irreparable damage that neither of them wanted – no one ever does. But it has been happening too much around us lately.
Priyankar shot the film himself, on a handheld camcorder. First, it was because of convenience – it was easy and liberating to be able to simply pick up the camera and go out to make your film, without having to wait around for projects to be greenlit, and without being answerable to anyone. But it becomes more than that – ‘the film is about voyeurism in a way,’ Priyankar tells me. ‘I realised that my limitation helped with the script and I went all-in.’ The grainy texture of his 8-bit camcorder, which he uses to shoot Preeti and Samrat’s ‘real’ life, is also in sharp contrast with the 4K resolution in which we watch their reels.
From the very beginning, we notice that Preeti and Samrat aren’t really walking at the same pace when it comes to content creation. Samrat considers it a fun engagement after work, Preeti is conscious of the content they are putting out – how they look, what goes in the frame. As they become more famous, the burden of content creation falls entirely on Preeti – while the money benefits both of them, Samrat is not an equal partner in the hard work. Preeti is also entirely in charge of the housework. Samrat is one of those men who are largely unproblematic, but with remnants of patriarchy still in their system. He doesn’t believe in content creation as a profession, and doesn’t see it as a replacement for ‘actual’ jobs. But he’s also suffocated – by the constant blurring of the real and the reel in his everyday life. One cannot fully blame – or fully empathise with – either of them. Everyone is flawed. And any speedy ride is a dangerous ride.
Early Days looks at Preeti and Samrat without judgment, and it leaves the audience, perhaps especially the generation living lives on the internet, slightly unsettled and with some thoughts to think about. Which is what makes it a good film. It is a fresh voice, and an attempt at honest storytelling, especially in terms of technique. The film premiered at the Red Sea Film Festival 2025.
