KOCHI: Nimisha Sajayan and Lena Kumar will star alongside Adil Hussain (Parched, Hotel Salvation) in a British-Indian feature titled Footprints on Water, to be directed by Nathalia Syam from a script by her sister Neetha Syam.
Neetha Syam, who is a UK-based Malayali, had earlier won fifth place in Cinestaan India’s Storytellers Contest for the same script. In a recent interview with The New Indian Express, Neetha had described it as the story of a father—an illegal immigrant in the UK—who looks for his missing daughter while trying to avoid the police radar.
She also added that it was written for a global English-speaking audience and features dialogues in Malayalam, Hindi and Tamil. Said to be a story of immigrant lives, the film will have Adil Hussain playing the father, and Nimisha and Lena will play the daughter and stepmother respectively.
Nimisha last appeared in Sanal Kumar Sasidharan’s critically acclaimed Chola. Actor Antonio Aakeel (Tomb Raider, The Hungry) also appears in a significant role, as an Afghan refugee.
In a conversation with Variety, Nathalia said, "Neetha’s script will be visually approached by elements of realism. As immigrants of Indian origin brought up in Britain, we’ve had a ringside view into the lives of various people, their cultures and ethnicities. Through the plot of an illegal immigrant father’s search for his missing daughter, we raise the question of what happens, when the invisible goes missing."
Mohaan Nadaar’s London-based The Production Headquarters is backing the project. The company is also involved with the Randeep Hooda-starrer Rat on a Highway. Alagappan is the director of photography. Footprints on Water has Birmingham and neighbouring areas as locations, with shooting scheduled to begin in December.