Last Film Show Trailer: Pan Nalin’s semi-autobiographical drama pays homage to the cinema of the past

EXCLUSIVE: We get an exclusive insight into the Gujarati language from Pan Nalin Last show (Hello show), India’s official entry in the Oscar race for Best International Film. Samuel Goldwyn releases the film in the US on December 2nd. You can check out the official poster of the film below. Watch the trailer above.

Shot in Saurashtra, Gujarat, West Indies, where Pan grew up, the film is a semi-autobiographical drama that pays homage to films of the past – a reminder of childhood innocence and the universal magic of films. It follows Samay, a 9-year-old boy living with his family in a remote village in India, who discovers films for the first time and is absolutely fascinated.

Starring Bhavin Rabari, Vikas Bata, Richa Meena, Bhavesh Shrimali, Dipen Raval and Rahul Koli, the story is set against the backdrop of cinema in India experiencing a massive transition from celluloid to digital. Samay (Rabari) and his friends travel by train past their remote village and find their way to a sleepy cinema that has all the entertainment your heart desires. When his friends are escorted out after sneaking in without pay, Samay bribes the hungry projectionist with the homemade lunch his mother packed for him. And so begins an everyday life: his lunch in exchange for access to the screening room, where Samay is wide-eyed as the world unfolds before him on the big screen. But when theaters go from 35mm to digital, that safe haven is disrupted and Samay asks his friends to build their own DIY projection device.

Last show follows Samuel Goldwyn’s 2021 win in the Best International Film category other round. The film had its world premiere in Tribeca last year and won the Golden Spike at the Valladolid Film Festival in Spain and the Audience Award in the World Cinema section of the Mill Valley Film Festival.