The BAFTA recognition for Boong has rightly been celebrated as a milestone for Indian cinema. But the film has also done something else for many viewers outside the Northeast: it has introduced them to Bala Hijam, a performer whose quiet authority on screen feels like a discovery.
Hijam plays Mandakini (Boong’s mother), the mother at the emotional centre of the story. It is a performance built on restraint rather than display. She never pushes a moment or reaches for overt drama. Instead, her presence anchors the film with small gestures and lived-in emotional detail, giving the young protagonist’s world a believable gravity.
For audiences encountering her through Boong, Hijam may appear as a striking new face. Yet that sense of discovery says more about the visibility of regional cinema than about the actor herself.
In Manipur, Hijam has long been one of the most recognisable figures in the local film industry. Over the past decade she has built a substantial body of work across dozens of Meitei-language films, earning awards and a reputation for emotionally grounded performances. For regional audiences, she is not a newcomer but a familiar and respected star.
What Boong has done is simply widen the frame.
Directed by Lakshmipriya Devi, the film’s international journey has brought Manipuri cinema into global conversation, and with it actors who have been shaping that industry for years. Watching Hijam’s Mandakini, there is a sense of an actor completely comfortable in her craft, someone who understands the power of understatement.
Moments like this are reminders that the geography of cinema often hides remarkable talent in plain sight. The wider industry may be discovering Bala Hijam now, but in Manipur she has been a defining screen presence for years.
Boong has simply given the rest of the world a chance to notice.
