Anasuya Sengupta received the prestigious Best Actress award at the 77th Cannes Film Festival. She was awarded the Un Certain Regard Prize for her portrayal in The Shameless, becoming the first Indian to receive the highest acting honor.Anasuya, overcome with emotion, dedicated the award to the queer and other marginalised communities for "bravely fighting a war that they shouldn't have to."
"You don't have to be queer to fight for equality, and you don't have to have been colonized to understand how pathetic colonizers are." "We just need to be very, very decent human beings," she remarked to cheers and clapping, according to Variety. Anasuya appears to be tearful in a video going popular on social media as her name is called for the award.
In addition to her, Chinese director Hu Guan's Black Dog won the Cannes Un Certain Regard Prize, while Boris Lojkine's The Story of Souleymane received the Jury Award. Notably, Un Certain Regard is a special award segment of the Cannes Film Festival's official lineup.Prior to this significant win, FTII's Sunflowers Were The First To Know and Bunnyhood won first and third place in the La Cinef Selection, respectively.
More about The Shameless
The Shameless is directed by Bulgarian Konstantin Bojanov and follows the lives of two sex workers. Sengupta, who plays sex worker Renuka, escapes a brothel after killing a police officer and seeks safety in a sex workers' commune. This is where she meets Devika (Omara Shetty), a teenage girl who is also sentenced to prostitution. They quickly form a relationship, which blossoms into a forbidden romance. Anasuya Sengupta is from Kolkata. Sengupta relocated to Mumbai after finishing her studies at Jadavpur University, where she worked for several years as a production designer. One of her most well-known acting roles occurred in Anjan Dutta's 2009 film Madly Bangalee. Her earlier projects include Forget Me Not and Masaba Masaba.
