Interviews

Interview: Pavia Sidhu & Yugam Sood – Dear Jassi

Published on January 17, 2024

A tale as old as time, and tragically a tale that was never meant to be. As the true story goes, Jaswinder “Jassi” Kaur haphazardly (one can say love at first sight) fell for Sukhwinder Singh Sidhu (nicknamed “Mithu”) but the forces (family, the legal system, corrupt police) tried in vain to keep them apart. Fast-forward two plus decades later and Tarsem Singh returned to his homeland to film Dear Jassi with fresh-faced tandem playing star-crossed lovers who can escape their fate but for a fraction of a second.

Plucked from obscurity, Pavia Sidhu and Yugam Sood play the unlikely pairing and let’s just say that cinema magic dust made its way onto set. Premiering at the 2023 Toronto Intl. Film Festival and winner of the Platform section’s top prize, I got to sit down with Pavia and Yugam and the 2023 Red Sea Film Festival – got to discuss the first day jitters, how it was to work with Tarsem (on a two month shoot) and the weight of playing real people.

Eric Lavallée

Eric Lavallée is the founder, CEO, editor-in-chief, film journalist and critic at IONCINEMA.com (founded in 2000). Eric is a regular at Sundance, Cannes and TIFF. He has a BFA in Film Studies at the Mel Hoppenheim School of Cinema. In 2013 he served as a Narrative Competition Jury Member at the SXSW Film Festival. He was an associate producer on Mark Jackson's This Teacher (2018 LA Film Festival, 2018 BFI London). In 2022 he served as a New Flesh Comp for Best First Feature at the 2022 Fantasia Intl. Film Festival. Current top films for 2022 include Tár (Todd Field), All That Breathes (Shaunak Sen), Aftersun (Charlotte Wells).