Shyam Benegal is one of India’s greatest filmmakers. In a career spanning five decades, he has made films that have won numerous national and international awards. He was the pioneer of alternative cinema as a serious art form, holding up a mirror to the inequalities and injustices in Indian society. His work, which has inspired generations of filmmakers, is also responsible for introducing to the world some of the finest actors India has produced. His cinema is not bound to any particular region, and he is perhaps the only filmmaker whose broad subject has been India as a whole.