Screenings of DraftCraft Film 'Tides, Toddy and Time' Conclude in Mumbai
By A Draft Correspondent
In the courtyards across Goan villages, a quieter season begins before tourism does. From March to May, as cashew apples ripen and fall, homes turn into micro-distilleries. Families and neighbours gather to make feni - the earthy spirit that carries Goa’s cultural memory. It is within these shared spaces of labour and inheritance that docu-film Tides, Toddy and Time by DraftCraft Films locates its gaze.
Screened over the past year in private sessions at DraftCraft Studio in Mumbai and several other locations, the film documents not just how feni is made, but the ecosystem that sustains it. Across villages, the process is rarely individual. It is communal, almost ceremonial. Cashew apples are collected at dawn, crushed underfoot and left to ferment in large vessels. Distillation follows in makeshift home stills, where copper or earthen pots and pipes work alongside generational knowledge. The sharp, familiar aroma signals not just production, but participation.
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| The docu-film is a quiet portrait of Goa’s feni culture |
In many villages, feni-making is as much about social cohesion as livelihood. Tasks are shared organically where one household lends its orchard, another its equipment, others their labour. Conversations flow alongside the brew, turning work into ritual. “It is less about who owns the feni and more about who was part of its making,” said cultural researcher Devika. “The film shows how community itself becomes the distillery.”
The documentary, however, does not romanticise without context. It situates this tradition within a fragile economic cycle. Once the season ends, many farmers turn to fishing to sustain themselves through the year. The shift reflects a dual dependence on land and sea, shaped by season rather than market. “What emerges is a portrait of resilience. These communities adapt, but without abandoning their core," noted writer Raghav.
The Mumbai screenings drew a discerning audience. Academicians read the film as ethnographic documentation while legal practitioners engaged with questions of geographical indication and intellectual property. “How do you protect something collectively owned and orally transmitted?” asked Advocate Meera. “The law seeks definition, but feni exists in fluidity,” she added.
Activists pointed to the vulnerability beneath the tradition. Sociology student Arvind Kamat said, “As tourism expands and land values rise, these communities are pushed to the margins. The film does not dramatise this. It simply shows it.”
These invitation-only screenings acquired a seminar-like afterlife. Conversations moved beyond the screen into debates on sustainability, culture and economic justice. The film became not just documentation, but a catalyst. What distinguishes it is its refusal to impose urgency.
At dawn, in Arambol, the sea breathes and remembers. In its ebb and flow stands Sebastiao, a fisherman in one season, a feni farmer in another. By summer, he turns to cashew orchards, brewing feni with his mother in a process shaped by time and care. Each drop carries inheritance.
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| Sebastiao is a fisherman in one season and a feni farmer in another |
A few metres away, a different Goa asserts itself. Neon lights, electronic beats, transient crowds. The contrast is stark. One thrives on speed and consumption, the other on patience and memory.
The film lets time unfold through the crushing of fruit, the waiting of fermentation, the slow distillation. “It makes you realise how conditioned we are to speed,” said filmmaker Rohan. “Here, value lies in waiting.”
In doing so, the documentary underscores a larger truth. Feni is not merely a drink. It is memory, labour and identity. It cannot be separated from the people, land and seasons that produce it.
As Goa accelerates into a high-intensity tourism economy, such traditions face an uncertain future. The film does not resolve this tension. It records it, quietly asserting that documentation itself is preservation.
As the cashew season closes and production winds down, DraftCraft International has concluded the private screenings of Tides, Toddy and Time. The work, however, continues - documentation and research will now move forward under DraftCraft International's Goa Programme, carrying this story beyond the season that sustains it.
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