”The Last Tenant: A Melancholy Duet of Grief and Acceptance” – Sharmindrila

How far are you willing to run from your own ruins? – The moment the violin started fading, and the credits rolled up for The Last Tenant, I kept wondering about this thought. The enduring emotional weight of this thought is a testament to the film’s creators and premise.

Directed by Sarthak Dasgupta, the film released on YouTube 25 years later, just before the 6th death anniversary of the legend, the late Irrfan Khan. Starring Khan, Vidya Balan, Saurabh Agarwal, and Annu Khandelwal in prominent roles, The Last Tenant revolves around Sagar (Khan), a troubled yet brilliant violinist,  who lands up in an abandoned property/mansion,  while trying to move on from his stained relationship with Maanvi (Balan). There, he encounters the spirit of Maria (Khandelwal) and forms an inexplicable bond with her that transcends the usual idea of romance and friendship. 

Both haunted by their past loss, connect and communicate through the violin, the only language they seem to understand and express. It seems to act as a bridge between – life and death, the known and unknown, grief and acceptance. This trope creates a sense of profound intimacy that can only be shared in silences and come alive in stillness. 

Now restored, the film traces the journey where loss, sorrow, memories, and music bleed and blend into one another. Sagar and Maria do not have any conventional, tangible exchange of thought or feeling. In fact, Sagar can only feel Maria’s presence (read omnipresence) and after learning the tragedy of her past—a woman haunted by the murder of her lover by her own father—he starts talking to her with tenderness. Trying to move away from the noise of the city, the mansion acts as a perfect getaway for him to retreat into solitude, immerse himself in his language of music and begin an introspective journey to make sense of his emotional upheaval of holding on and letting go. 

The Last Tenant uses violin tunes from Schindler’s List (1994) by Itzhak Perlman hitting the right chords to depict his inner storms. Khan, though in his earlier years before attaining the status of a ‘legend’, in this film, remains a champion of restraint, subtle nuances, and pauses. He carries scenes -both light and heavy, alike. Balan, with her effortless charm, hesitance, and lingering guilt makes her presence felt. Khandelwal’s very limited screen presence is aptly utilized. Sagar’s one-way communication with Maria forays him on self-confrontation. Oscillating between leaving India to pursue music and staying back with his unresolved grief of heartbreak of turning Maanvi away, he finally realises that physically running away from his pain wouldn’t necessarily provide him respite. So, he decides to face his own ruins that break him, yet make him. 

The mansion becomes the vulnerable common ground shared by two wounded souls fluent in music, lamenting melancholy and loneliness. Where words become elusive and silence speaks volumes. They hold space for each other through their tunes of violin which makes this 45-minute short film delicate and worth watching.