Sundance 2025 Sabar Bonda review: Grief begets love in this poignant exploration of queer desire in rural India

As I watched Sabar Bonda (Cactus Pears), I found myself tearing up multiple times. I welled up when Anand (Bhushaan Manoj, in a poignant portrayal) looked for the exact spot in Hanuman Mandir where his late father sat. My heart sank each time he refused to eat. Anant is systematically excluded from family dinners. He is forced to mourn the death of his father by indulging in bizarre rituals, ranging from food deprivation to tonsure. He walks barefoot in a mourning ritual which is ridiculous at best, abusive at worst. Anand cannot eat rice. He must sleep on the floor. He has also just lost his father, Kailas, who was supportive of his queer son. He doesn't have the right to mourn him.

Sabar Bonda Movie: Plot

Anand is trapped in his village for ten days…a village full of homophobic locals as they drop not-so-subtle hints and disgraceful comments on his sexuality. At one point, Anand’s uncle offers to take him to a doctor, for he assumes that he is struggling with performance anxiety.

Quietly bleeding into Anand’s tragedy is Suman. In one scene, camera pans on Suman’s lifeless face, as a relative passes unsavoury comments on her son. Suman knows Anand is queer. In a telling scene, she says "We couldn't sever ties with them [distant relatives] like you [Anand] did".. Coming out of the closet doesn’t have consequences only for the queer folk but also their families, especially if they live in collectivist cultures like India. Anand is aware that his mother might just be forced to bear the brunt of his choices if he were to come out of the closet. The mother-son duo seem to have accepted their fate.

Sabar Bonda Movie: Performances

As the ten-day mourning period passes, Anand becomes more and more defiant. He responds to the corrosive jibes by his uncle and grandmother with a defiant silence at first, and by drawing firm boundaries later. He spends more time with Balya (Suraj Saaman), the local milkman, who was his childhood love. The two steal moments of intimacy when no one is looking.

The two men are clearly, desperately and hopelessly in love but as luck would have it, their families are hell bent on fixing their marriage to women. Balya has heated arguments with his father, Gajanan. In the next scene, they are shown eating dinner at night, silently. It is a testimony to how conflicts often remain unaddressed in South Asian households. There is hardly any scope to resolve conflicts or have difficult confrontations as they are often swept under the rug.

Sabar Bonda Movie: Writing And Direction

Much like Payal Kapadia’s All We Imagine As Light (2024), Sabar Bonda also showcases an exquisitely shot lovemaking scene in the forest. The interplay of light and leaves, as Anand and Balya make love to each other, is ethereal. The two dream of twin mango trees as they try to escape the shackles of their controlling families. Much of Sabar Bonda’s beauty lies in what is unsaid. As Anand’s family repeatedly bring up the question of his marriage, hinting at his sexual identity, he says “The people who are important to me, I have told them everything”.

Sabar Bonda Movie: What Works, What Doesn’t

The acoustics of the film are on-point. From the sound of birds chirping in the hinterlands to the noisy fan running at low speed, the sound direction is faultless.  In many ways, Sabar Bonda shows how familial bonds keep queerfolk from fully exploring their sexuality, even if they have supportive parents. Balya craves financial independence. As many queer folk (especially in the South Asian nation) are aware that money gives them power to walk out of situations that aren’t accepting of their choices.

I could feel the claustrophobia creeping up on Anand as he sat down at a place where he doesn't want to be, with people he doesn’t like, trying to conceal the grief of having lost his father. Ironically, Anand’s tragedy is such that he is not able to let out a good cry unless he is back home. The film seems to make a strong case for just how important it is to do away with intrusive rituals around death, and giving the emotional and physical space to those grieving. What takes the cake however, is the shot of Balya and Anand’s feet in Hanuman mandir, where, much like Anand, Balya is barefoot.

Star rating: 4.5 / 5 stars