- Welcome to POV.
I'm Pete Schwaba, host of PBS Wisconsin's Director's Cut.
When it comes to the American dream
and immigrants who chase it,
we typically hear about the successes,
or the rags to riches stories.
But there are many who come here and live pretty mundane lives
that would still be considered successful.
Then, there are people
like the main character of tonight's film,
whose American dream was not only not fully realized,
but fell far short of what he had hoped.
This evening, we bring you the story of Shantha Murthy
in tonight's film The Gas Station Attendant.
Shantha grew up in poverty,
homeless and living on the streets of Bangalore, India.
As a boy, he traveled the country,
working jobs that barely kept him fed and clothed.
He dreamt of one day going to America,
and eventually, he made it happen.
Once he arrived, Murthy worked a slew of different jobs,
doing whatever he could to support his family.
He chased jobs in America, like he did in his homeland,
but found that the American dream was elusive.
In his later years, he settled into work
as a gas station attendant.
The film's director is his daughter, Karla Murthy,
who was living in New York City,
and out of concern would call her father in Texas
while he worked late night hours to help him stay awake
and to stay connected.
She was also concerned for his safety
as other gas station attendants
in Shantha's area of Houston, Texas
had been killed during late-night robberies.
Karla started recording their phone conversations.
Some nights, the two would be in the middle of a conversation
about Shantha's childhood, and in the background,
she would hear a customer come in
and listen to their conversation,
pausing the call so she could visualize a slice
of her father's life.
On these calls, Karla would say
her father did most of the talking,
and like a good storyteller herself,
she let him jaw and absorbed everything.
The director thought she might have a documentary on her hands,
but could never settle on what story to tell.
Years later, after her father passed
and while she was a mother herself to a ten-year-old son,
it came to her.
Murthy saw a parallel between her son and her father
at the ages of ten.
Her son, well cared for and loved,
and Shantha living on the streets in India,
scrounging for food and shelter at the same age.
It made her realize what a truly remarkable and miraculous story
her father's was.
In addition to the audio of her late-night phone calls
with her dad,
Murthy uses archival footage from the streets of India
around the time her father was a boy,
mixed with home movies and her own voice,
which narrates the film.
The Gas Station Attendant won a Grand Jury Prize
in the best documentary feature category
at the Nashville Film Festival,
and won a Special Mention jury award
at the Sheffield DocFest in New York City.
Murthy says her film is a story
about being rich outside the material sense.
So, let's all sit back and watch this heartfelt love letter
from a daughter who, thanks to her father,
is living the American dream.
The Gas Station Attendant starts now on PBS Wisconsin,
your home for independent film.