Seema Biswas is the best-known face in Jahnu Barua’s Assamese-language Large Short Films presentation That Gusty Morning, but the plum role belongs to Urmila Mahanta. Her Juree is nervous. She is readying along with her father (Arun Nath) for what appears to be a morning ritual: to persuade her mother (Biswas) that college is shut for the day, and that she can correct questions papers at home. The mother is losing her mind to Alzheimer’s disease, a fact that resulted in Juree’s breakup from her previous fiancé. There’s a new prospect (Kopil Bora) on the horizon, but how will he take the news?
Barua handles the story delicately, tracing both the love and empathy the father and daughter have for the mother as well as the trickiness of the situation they have to face. Biswas is predictably good as the woman who sometimes forgets who her husband is, while Mahanta is also impressive as the daughter who is torn between caring for her ailing parent and embarking on a new life.
