Animagic India’s labour of love bears more fruit.
MUMBAI : In what is an encouraging sign for small and mid sized independent animation studios in India, Animagic India’s ‘Raju & I’ has won the UNICEF Regione Campania Prize at the prestigious Cartoons On the Bay Festival in Italy.It was amongst 14 films selected in this category and the only one from Asia.
This award takes the film’s total awards tally to five, the booty also includes honours at the likes of NewYork Film & Television Festival , FICCI BAF awards amongst others.
Directed by Gayatri Rao, commissioned and distributed by childrens charitable trust ASEEMA, the 30 minute short film was made on a shoestring budget of US$50,000. The animation being mostly hand drawn, the film was two years in the making.
When contacted, Animagic India spokesperson Romel Dias said that “‘Raju & I’ is aimed at creating an awareness about social conditions and deals with issues faced by underprivileged children, as seen from the eyes of a 12-year-old city boy.”
On being asked the modus operandi for entering festivals, he added ” Earlier, when we started out we were aware of a few well known festivals like the ones at Ottawa, Hiroshima & Edinburgh, and the big ones like Cannes. Gradually we have formed a habit of searching the Internet for details about animation festivals, we download forms and send across our entries, sometimes we get calls from other organisers who have seen our film at a festival. Once your movie starts circulating, invitations to festivals and the like follow”
Interestingly, inspite of their film featuring at so many international festivals they have not yet visited any festival themselves, preferring to send across entries and keep their overheads in check. It also goes to show how passion, hardwork and initiative can overcome obstacles caused by budgetary constraints. Way to go !