In the village of Dayalpur in Haryana, Satbir is a retired professor who now lives with his wife on a small farm. The fields are veiled in smog, the young are leaving for jobs in the city, and the rhythms that once gave shape to rural life are slowly disappearing.
Then his only cow gives birth to a stillborn calf and stops producing milk. Desperate to save his livelihood, Satbir turns to a ritual passed down through his family. His wife warns him against the forbidden practice, but he becomes increasingly consumed by it as reality, memory and superstition begin to blur.
Ankur Hooda filmed in his ancestral village, casting his grandparents and other residents as alternative versions of themselves. Developed through improvisation and lived experience, The Calf Doll inhabits an elusive space between fiction and documentary. Anish Sarai’s patient compositions transform fog-covered fields, animals, trees and solitary bodies into images of strange and melancholic beauty.
