This film uses music, moving image as well as still photography. All of the visual media used here has been produced over a period of four years; from trips to India made in 2015, 2017 and 2019. The film acts as a home movie through which narratives of photographs, home and identity can be explored.

    The title of this piece, Alas, this song of you and me is but a fond memory is a translated lyric from the Hindi song that features at the end of the film. The song was released in the 1960s and is called Ajeeb Dastan Ye Hai, which roughly translates to “It’s a strange story”. The familiar voice of Lata Mangeshkar and Kishore Kumar (whose song Mere Samne Wali Khidki features in the film too) are reminiscent of road trips with my parents and my grandfather’s radio. As a child, I would moan and groan as the long intro and melancholic melodies began playing. As I now understand Hindi better as an adult, I grew from detesting this music to craving it. I can now relate to and understand the masterful lyrics and poetry and composition of Ajeeb Dastan Ye Hai. Thus, it was only appropriate for this ode of a film to take its title from a Bollywood song that would always remind me of my parents and their parents.

   This film uses music, moving image as well as still photography. All of the visual media used here has been produced over a period of four years; from trips to India made in 2015, 2017 and 2019. The film acts as a home movie through which narratives of photographs, home and identity can be explored.

    The title of this piece, Alas, this song of you and me is but a fond memory is a translated lyric from the Hindi song that features at the end of the film. The song was released in the 1960s and is called Ajeeb Dastan Ye Hai, which roughly translates to “It’s a strange story”. The familiar voice of Lata Mangeshkar and Kishore Kumar (whose song Mere Samne Wali Khidki features in the film too) are reminiscent of road trips with my parents and my grandfather’s radio. As a child, I would moan and groan as the long intro and melancholic melodies began playing. As I now understand Hindi better as an adult, I grew from detesting this music to craving it. I can now relate to and understand the masterful lyrics and poetry and composition of Ajeeb Dastan Ye Hai. Thus, it was only appropriate for this ode of a film to take its title from a Bollywood song that would always remind me of my parents and their parents.