FTII student’s short chosen at Cannes

A short film, Sunflowers Were The First To Know, by four students of the FTII’s (Film and Television Institute of India) TV wing, has been selected in the La Cinef competition section of the 77th Cannes Film Festival. For its 27th edition, La Cinef – which is devoted to searching new talents from around the world – has chosen 18 shorts from among the 2,263 submissions received from film schools globally.

Chidananda S, the writer and director of the film, joined FTII for a one-year TV course after completing MBBS from Mysore Medical College. He says, "When I received a mail from the artistic director of Cannes recently, I initially thought it might be a prank. I'm from the 2020 batch and was on campus in 2022. After graduating last year, I lost touch with the college, so I wasn't aware if the film had been submitted to Cannes. The selection process is confidential, so I had no idea we would be chosen for this prestigious section in Cannes, where our alumni Payal Kapadia was selected a couple of years back. For the past year, I've been preparing for a feature film."
Discussing the film's storyline, he says, "I'm from Karnataka and the Banjara community, folk tales and oral traditions are part of our heritage. When we were assigned to make a short film, I decided to revisit my roots, and this folk tale was a story worth telling."
Three students from FTII were part of the cast, along with some Kannada actors who travelled to Pune to shoot the film.
He says, "Since it's a student film, our budget, time, and everything else were according to the curriculum. But everyone was excited to tell the story, and the energy was very different."

For its 27th edition, La Cinef has chosen 18 shorts (14 live-action and four animated films) from among the 2,263 submissions received from film schools across the world.

Cannes stated, "This year’s programme reflects the geographic mobility of film students, with a Singaporean director in Australia, an Indian and a Lithuanian in the UK, a Russian in the Czech Republic, and three shorts made at American schools by Russian, Chinese, and British filmmakers."

The short film Sunflowers Were the First to Know narrates the story of an elderly woman who steals the village's prized rooster, causing turmoil within the community, resulting in the exile of the old woman's family. The film is directed by Chidananda S Naik, shot by Suraj Thakur, edited by Manoj V, and features sound design by Abhishek Kadam.

This is the only Indian film selected in the La Cinef section of Cannes.