Filmmaker Anuparna Roy’s sophomore feature film, Lovers In The Blue Night, has won the prestigious NETPAC Award for Best Asian Film at the 83rd Venice International Film Festival. This major win comes just one year after Roy made history at the 2025 edition of the festival, where her debut feature, Songs of Forgotten Trees, won her the Best Director award in the Orizzonti (Horizons) section.
Set against the restless nightlife and margins of Mumbai, the film weaves together the multi-lingual lives of four displaced migrants dealing with love, loneliness, and survival. The narrative follows a closeted husband named Karim (Pritam Pilania), his unhappy bar-working wife Ameena (Neelima Sharma), a small-time criminal named Sukka (Bhushan Shimpi), and a new co-worker, Omran (Jatin Sarin).
The movie competed against fourteen other titles in Venice’s Orizzonti competition. Following its world premiere in Venice, it is headed to the Busan International Film Festival for its Asian premiere.
