When journalist-turned-director Vinod Kapri had met farmer Padam Singh and his on-screen wife Heera Devi during his trip to Uttarakhand in 2017, he hadn’t quite imagined that he could tell a story of love and loneliness through their performances. But today, Singh, 80, and Devi, 70, are the unusual leads of the director’s next, Pyre. Revolving around an elderly couple’s challenging life in the remote mountains of Uttarakhand, Pyre premièred at the Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival on November 19.  

“My team and I were nervous when we attended the film festival because the film is about a remote village in Uttarakhand and stars non-actors. But the moment the last title credit rolled, the response was incredible. People had tears in their eyes; some kept talking to us and others wanted to have a conversation with Amma and Bubu [Singh and Devi],” says the proud director.