Charu, a young graduate from a northern province, flat-shares in Mumbai, where she hopes to make a career in marketing. When the labourer who has come to repaint a sitting-room wall collapses, she has no choice but to take events in hand, even though the painter has no identity papers on him. From the chic balcony on Link Road to a far distant slum, I.D.’s mobile camera follows a quest in which Charu’s own migrant status mirrors that of an illegal immigrant, lost in the mass of moonlighters and ignored by all. Shot in almost documentary-like conditions, her journey hints at the style of Filipino Brillante Mendoza in John John, which underlined the stark contrast between Manila’s slum districts and the city’s international hotels. Without empathy or irony, Kamal K.M focuses on Charu’s growing determination to discover the man’s identity – a determination doubtless driven by a humane impulse but also by the imperative need to confront her own. CG
