A 26-minute psychological drama in which the image drains, shot by shot, from colour to black-and-white
Independent filmmaker Jai Batra has completed HOMEMADE (2026), a 26-minute Hindi/English psychological drama, and launched its festival run, with submissions to festivals including Berlinale Shorts, Oberhausen, Tampere, Fribourg and Vienna Shorts. The film’s world premiere is still available.
HOMEMADE follows Aadil (Vheer), a meticulous fine-dining chef who cooks dinner at home for his partner Maya (Dayana Erappa), a corporate executive. Over one evening, small details stop adding up, and the version of their life together that he believes in starts to come apart. As his certainty fails, the film’s colour drains from the frame, returning only at the very end. Batra borrows Alfred Hitchcock’s visual grammar throughout: voyeur framing, Vertigo zooms and characters who look straight into the lens.
“I wanted to make a film about the moment certainty breaks. A chef’s kitchen is a place of total control. I was drawn to a man who brings that control home, and to what happens when the person across the table no longer fits the recipe,” says Batra.
Batra wrote, directed, produced, shot and edited the film, and composed its original score. His previous short, Paharganj to Phuket (2026), won Best Short Film at the Mumbai International Film Awards and Best Indian Competition – Short Film at the Rameshwaram International Film Festival. His earlier films The Meeting Point (2025) and Wohhh (2025) screened at festivals across India, with The Meeting Point receiving an Honourable Jury Mention at the Noida International Film Festival.
Runtime: 25 min 36 s · Language: Hindi / English · Country: India, 2026 · Genre: Psychological drama
IMDb: https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.imdb.com/title/tt50137613/&source=gmail&ust=1794284384821000&sa=E
Letterboxd: https://www.google.com/url?q=https://letterboxd.com/film/homemade-3/&source=gmail&ust=1794284384821000&sa=E
Instagram: https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.instagram.com/jaivheerumotionpictures/&source=gmail&ust=1794284384821000&sa=E
source: http://www.thecurb.com.au / The Curb / Home/ by Press Releases / November 10th, 2026
