Straightaway, I must say the anthology comes as a welcome surprise. When I heard of a Covid anthology I thought it would one of those let’s-make-hay-while-the-sun-shines kind of obscenely exploitative ventures. Thankfully, the films are born out of compassion rather than greed. The Covid theme flows organically out of the stories, and the characters are never allowed to feel sorry for themselves. These are bright stories burnished with a directorial acumen that elevates the theme from a topical statement to an enduring experience. In the story Rat-a-Tat(inaptly clever title just because it’s got a rat in it) one of my favourite segments of the omnibus, a 65-year old uperclass woman(Lilette Dubey) finds herself getting close to a young feisty Maharashtrian girl who moves in from nextdoor when a rat infests her apartment. A potentially manipulative formula film(two women from diverse generations and culture locked up together in one home) grows into a gentle,warm,engaging study of the human condition when pushed to the wall. In case you had forgotten how accomplished Lilette is as an actor here she is, in full command over a story that needed the two women to feel like a makeshift family. The surprise is Rinku Rajguru, the Sairat girl whose eyes dance as though they know the secret of staying happy during a crisis. There is an awkward moment between the classy Lilette Dubey and her young unlikely Covid companion when the former….there’s no polite way of putting this…farts. Both the women laugh off the moment in a way that can only happen when there is deep comfort level between two people. This moment in Unpaused, a resplendent anthology of five Covid –related film,emblematizes the absolutely unforeseen equations and bondings that the pandemic had perpetrated. Tannishtha Chatterjee directs the two women with that nurturing care that comes naturally to a woman director.