When garbage turns golden

An article about how the rich and the poor are connected through garbage inspired filmmaker Suman Ghosh to make his latest film The Scavenger of Dreams, which had its premiere at the prestigious Busan International Film Festival. Starring Shardul Bhardwaj of the Eeb Allay Ooo! fame and National Award-winning actress Sudipta Chakraborty, the film was screened under ‘A Window on Asian Cinema’ section on Thursday.

Ghosh, a National award-winning filmmaker known for Dwando, Nobel Chor and Kadambari, said he wanted to highlight the plight of those left behind in the ‘so called modern and globalised world’ through a garbage collector and his family from Bihar, who make a living by collecting trash from posh localities of Kolkata. “The idea was sparked by an article in the New York Times and it had an interesting line: One man’s trash is another man’s treasure. It was about a garbage collector in California where billionaires like Mark Zuckerberg and other IT tycoons live. I found it fascinating…,” Ghosh said in a virtual interview from Miami.