Pachilakoodu – My Home is Green, the animation film directed by Sajan Sindhu and produced by the Kottayam based Digital Media, has won the Golden Camera award for Best Animation Film at the Nashik International Film Festival 2012. The 3D animation film is 42 minutes long but the film that is screened at festivals is of 30 minutes duration.
The film has won many awards like- Best Animation, Best Program and Best Sound Recording at All India Educational Audio Video festival by NCERT at Delhi in November 2011, Best Cinematography at Vatavaran Festival at New Delhi in December 2011, Best Animation and Sound Effects at State Educational Film Festival 2010 by Kerala Education dept. & SIET Kerala. It has also participated in several other film festivals.
The concept of the film is man’s interception into the nature and its consequences. The film tells the poignant tale of two tiny creatures, an ant and a caterpillar. The lonely ant, who lost his entire tribe in a pesticide mishap, one day, meets a baby caterpillar. A relationship develops between them. The story moves forward through the memories of the ant, and the metamorphosis of the caterpillar. And then, the ant, once again, hears the sound of the pesticide sprayer. This movie is dedicated to those children who lost their lives in the Endosulfan (pesticide) mishap of Kasargod district, Kerala.
Talking to AnimationXpress.com about the response of the film Sajan Sindhu, Director of the film Pachilakoodu shared, “We are getting very good response from each shows and festivals especially from children and their parents. For example in a school at Calicut, this film was screened for 20 times before the same audience, those children of 2nd standard were demanding this film every day. In Vibgyor international film festival students of various schools were invited to see this film. As a director it was a great experience for me to be introduced to thousands of children and after the show, each of them wanted to shake hand with me. Overall in all festivals we have received very good responses from audience, media and hosts.”
This film was screened in a number of schools, educational institutes, and youth club festivals in kerala. The first screening of the film was done at Trivandrum on 14th June, 2010 at the third international documentary and short film festival by Kerala Chalachithra Academy. After that it was screened at various festivals like Goa international film festival November 2011, Vibgyor international film festival 2010, Trichur, Kerala, Thendisei international film festival 2010, Madurai, Tamilnadu, Montash international film festival, 2011 Manjeri, Kerala and Nashik international film festival 2012.
It took 1 year and 4 months to complete the production (full time work for 9 people) for developing the story and script. The music was done mainly by Shaan and Midhun. Music was adjusted by Nanukuttan & crew and sound effects were done by the associate director- Jibin Abraham who also handled the camera and editing. Key credits of the film also includes Aakesh Natarajan, Technical Director; Albin Raj, main animator and rigger. The other team members were Jaison Joseph, Shabeeb Areacode, Raheesh, Aneesh and Jaseer.
Sajan and his team faced many technical difficulties while making this film and he knows that there are areas in the film like script and quality of animation that he can better and strives to achieve it in his next project. Talking about those challenges Sajan said, “The most challenging part of the movie was there were limited number of people and all were freshers with very limited facilities and fund. We were not aware of film making and various animation processes. We overcame it by devoting ourselves into the team work and self education. We took help of internet and learned everything. It was a 24 hour work. Even while sleeping, we were thinking about the project”.
Director Sajan Sindhu is an artist, social worker, environmental activist, writer for children and animator. From 1993 to 1997, he volunteered as a teacher for tribal children in Attappadi forests, Kerala State. He has been awarded variously for his works including an award by the Kerala Cartoon Academy. As an animator, he has worked in many movies and has worked in some projects for Middle East and Canada. “My Home is Green” is the first animation work directed by him. Before doing this film he had done a short film which was not for public screenings and was made as an experiment.
Pachilakoodu is also available in the form of a video CD, profit coming from it is used for the rehabilitation of Endosulfan victims, Kerala.
Currently Sajan is working on his next animation film ‘KAYYENI’ which is already a popular novel for children in malayalam, written by him. Kayyeni is a paddy seed. 15 villages in the valley of peak Malleswaraq used to cultivate this seed. But when the new generation seeds came, Kayyeni slowly vanished. This movie is an adventurous journey of a little rabbit searching vanished seed to cure his sister.