Set in the lower Himalayas, Yudhajit Basu and Prithvijoy Ganguli’s short film Khoji is an ominous piece that uses the violent history of its people as a background in order to explore (and explain, perhaps) the people’s struggle today. And yet, this history is visually absent from the screen.

Set somewhere near Darjeeling, against the backdrop of the 1980s Gorkhaland Movement, Khoji is a poetic take on an era of strife and uncertainty that gripped the region. This fictional short beautifully alternates between ambient sounds and silence to create an atmosphere of impending doom.