Slamdance 2019 Review: CAT STICKS Makes Poetry of Pain and Beauty of Desperation

Kolkata, the eastern Indian megalopolis once known as Calcutta and commonly referred to as the City of Joy, has long been thought of as the center of intellectualism in India. Many of the country's most internationally lauded artists hail from the West Bengal capital. Not only are filmmakers like Satyajit Ray and Ritwik Ghatak associated with Kolkata, but also some of the nation's most famous authors like Rabindranath Tagore also hail from the region. So when images of Kolkata come to mind, it is these lofty names that tend to shape the world's vision of the art of the region. 

Fine Art photographer Ronny Sen's debut feature film, Cat Sticks, points a well trained eye at the underbelly of the city, tracing a loosely interwoven network of drug addicts as they chase their next high, and the results are arresting. Shot in high contrast black and white, Cat Sticks is a series of vignettes that follow various groups of addicts as their search for "brown sugar" takes them to increasingly dangerous places across the city.

Lost is the mystique of Kolkata, the city of celebration, instead it is replaced with a dance of desperation as they seek connection with each other and the high that they all need so badly. The film is decidedly light on plot, with only a few solid story fragments for viewers to cling to, but it is instead bolstered with a deep and often literally penetrating visceral connection to its characters, all of whom are sympathetically written people whose lives have taken a sad turn toward chasing the dragon that cannot be tamed.

Sen's portrayal of these characters, each caught up in their own delusion, is remarkably empathetic, in a way that recalls the work of our most humane cinematic voices. I was frequently reminded of the work of Sean Baker, who has made a successful career of turning his attention to underrepresented communities whose stories often go untold. Cat Sticks makes a similar efforts to shine a light on those the world would rather keep in the shadows. 

Perhaps the film's greatest triumph is the way the camera manages to beautify a world that is inherently ugly. Violence, degradation, and sickness rule the lives of these souls, but that doesn't mean they cannot be beautiful in their misery, and Sen captures that beauty in a remarkable way. One scene in which a pair of addicts fix each other in a beautifully balletic dance is a showstopper, and is sure to be one of Slamdance's most talked about sequences of the year.

Using a cast of mostly unknown performers (apart from Sundance and Berlin vet and frequent Q collaborator, Tanmay Dhanania), Cat Sticks is a thoroughly affecting piece of work that will challenge many viewers preconceived notions. Much like the work of India's great enfant terrible - and fellow Bengali - Q, Ronny Sen is challenging that nature of narrative film and all of India's cinematic language to bring this story of the downtrodden into the light, and it's a beautiful thing.