Critic Reviews

There is a freshness and emotional clarity in Payal Kapadia’s Cannes competition selection, an enriching humanity and gentleness which coexist with fervent, languorous eroticism and finally something epiphanic in the later scenes and mysterious final moments.

The beats of All We Imagine as Light are calibrated with hypnotic grace creating a rhythm that induces pure pleasure.

Just two features into her young career, Kapadia has established her rare talent for finding passages of exquisite poetry within the banal blank verse of everyday Indian life.

It is universal and emotional enough to hypnotise anyone who has been alone in a city, or been spellbound by a film on the subject.

Poignantly lyrical as a city symphony, it branches out for a sequel, when the characters abscond to the coast to figure out what to do: at once a respite and a reckoning, ghostly and mysterious.

The film is a reminder of the transcendent power of cinema, even, and perhaps especially, when not all that much is happening.

One of the pleasures of Kapadia’s filmmaking is that she’s inviting you to discover her characters on their terms, which means embracing the inner and outer rhythms of their lives.

What makes Ms. Kapadia so clearly an artist is her ability to let a scene breathe, to be patient but not ponderous, suffusing the film with atmosphere and unarticulated feeling.

One of the year’s great movies, in any form, style, or language.

A miraculously subtle piece of work.