
Gurvinder Singh
Directing
Biography
Gurvinder Singh is an Indian film director. He is best known for his Punjabi language films Anhey Ghorhey Da Daan (Alms for a Blind Horse), and Chauthi Koot (The Fourth Direction) which premiered at Venice and Cannes Film Festival respectively. Gurvinder is an alumnus of Film and Television Institute of India (FTII), Pune from where he studied film-making and graduated in 2001. He travelled extensively through Punjab between 2002 and 2006, living and wandering with folk itinerants, documenting folk ballads and oral narratives. It led to his first documentary 'Pala'. He continued to make short experimental works and documenting arts/artists for the next few years. In 2005 he was invited by avant-garde Indian filmmaker Mani Kaul to be his teaching assistant for a master-class at FTII, which led to a close association with the filmmaker who became his mentor.
Known For

Soni, a young policewoman in Delhi, and her superintendent, Kalpana, have collectively taken on a growing crisis of violent crimes against women. However, their alliance suffers a major setback when Soni is transferred out for alleged misconduct on duty.
Soni

The anthology film showcases three independent stories that capture the experience of small Indian towns and villages where people take incredible measures to survive.
Lantrani

Fear and paranoia pervade life in rural Punjab of the ’80s, before and after Operation Blue Star, as separatists clash with security forces.
The Fourth Direction

We all live on the same planet, under one sun which nurtures and renews our unique and common hopes for the future. No matter how much we differ from each other in color, ethnicity and belief, we all share the same source of life, united in our destinies. An omnibus film on the topic of Turkish - Armenian relations.
In the Same Garden

Follows three interconnected stories in present-day Punjab: a woman hiding a wounded stranger from police, a family coping with a disappearance, and an elderly man who returns from England claiming to be God.
Rehmat

A family living in a Punjab village deals with social and labor inequities until a fight breaks out during a lunar eclipse.
Anhey Ghorhey Da Daan

After 15 years in prison, for committing a murder to save his father’s honour, Modan returns to his village in Punjab. In his absence, the village’s power structure has shifted towards a landowner, to the detriment of his family. Worse still: his brother is the landowner’s lapdog.
Crescent Night

Sea of Lost Time is an allegory set in an undefined time and space, evoking the magic realism of Gabriel Garcia Marquez, inspired by his characters. A soldier comes back from the dead to a seaside village. He reminisces on the time lost while he was away, like a sea between his past and the dysfunctional present. Through him we discover a motley of characters: a rag-tag musical band, a man locked up inside an abandoned horse stable, his sister, also the soldier’s lover and who has been bemoaning the loss. An impressionistic view of the intertwined lives of those inhabiting imaginary spaces, with an underpinning of social and political metaphors.
Sea of Lost Time

This film is an account of Singh's time in the town of Bir in Himachal Pradesh taking a look at migration and reverse migration in Bir, Barot and Baragraan through the lives of real people.
Bitter Chestnut

Based on a newspaper story, Ghuspaithiya is the satirical tale of a pigeon that apparently crosses a national border into Punjab and is investigated by the police as a spy.
Infiltrator
Documentary on a Punjabi Folk Singer
Pala

In September 2020, the Indian government passed three acts, known colloquially as farm laws, that sought to reform the way farmers sold their produce to the market. This triggered a series of non-violent protests across the country, with farmers chiefly from Punjab and Haryana marching towards New Delhi demanding a repeal of the laws. Prevented from entering the capital, they set up camps along highways, forming a veritable community that sustained the protests for over a year.