Filmmaker Rahul Roye, while researching for a project in Mumbai, came across the story of a trans person who was undergoing gender-affirming medical treatment but had to stop hormone therapy after discovering they were pregnant. They eventually gave birth to the child, and later continued with their transition. Inspired by that story, Roye continued researching the subject and eventually arrived at the idea for Aman.

The short film Aman, directed and co-written by Roye, premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) on Tuesday. The film follows Aman (played by Kabir Maan), who ahead of his gender-affirming surgery realises he is pregnant. This takes him on a journey of self-discovery as he finds support from Sirat (Sirat Taneja), a trans woman nurse.

“Being non-binary, I have never been able to fit myself into this pre-existing algorithm of gender. I have always seen the binary as more of a political tool used to preserve hierarchy. That discomfort was really the inception point for Aman,” shares Roye, who has directed several acclaimed shorts including Man & Wife, A Lullaby for Yellow Roses.

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With Aman, he wanted to make a film that could question the fundamentals of gender. “Pregnancy is one of the most gendered experiences, so I began thinking: what if I put a trans man at the centre of it? What would happen if we saw the experience through him and how he sees himself after discovering that he can become pregnant,” says Roye.

For Roye, it was non-negotiable that “trans characters would only be played by trans actors”. The self-taught filmmaker approached Sirat for the film after watching the acclaimed 2023 documentary I Am Sirat, which is co-directed by Deepa Mehta. “Casting trans actors is difficult because the available resources are so limited. Eventually, it worked out. Siraj and Kabir are friends, and Siraj referred Kabir for the audition. The moment I saw him, I knew he was going to be Aman,” says Roye.

Talking about the representation of transgender characters on screen, Roye says they are often presented in ways that “emphasise beauty or make them seem almost otherworldly”. That’s why he wants trans characters to feel “as real and comfortable in their skin as possible”. “For the character of Aman, I wanted someone who was handsome but also had the quality of the guy next door, someone we could encounter in everyday life,” Roye says.

Aman, says Roye, is a collaboration between its producers, assistant directors and London-based cinematographer Tamás A Méder. The film is produced by Elle León Nostas, who is also the film’s co-writer, Apoorva Bakshi, Tushar Tyagi and Abid Aziz Merchant.

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Roye, who was born and brought up in Kolkata, chose to shoot the film in the northern parts of the city. “I wanted North Kolkata’s old architecture and textures to become part of the fabric of the film,” says Roye, who counts Rituparno Ghosh’s work as one of his influences.

A still from Rahul Roye’s Aman.

Currently, he is working on his first feature film. “This comes from a personal experience from my school years, when I was sexually assaulted. The film is about what happened afterwards and how the school took the side of the boy who had assaulted me because he conformed to the social norms associated with masculinity. As someone perceived as feminine, I was ostracised,” shares Roye.