F.i.g.h.t C.l.u.b

And the good news for the desi indies continues. This time it’s from Locarno Film Festival. Raam Reddy’s debut feature Thithi has bagged 2 top awards at the just concluded festival.

The First award is Pardo d’oro Cineasti del presente (Golden Leopard Filmmakers of The Present) – Premio Nescens worth 40,000 CHF, to be shared equally between the director and the producer. The second award is in the category of First Feature – Swatch First Feature Award (Prize for Best First Feature) 15,000 CHF to be shared equally between the director and the producer awarded to the Best First Film screened in the Piazza Grande, Concorso internazionale, Concorso Cineasti del presente, Fuori concorso or Signs of Life segment.

The film is a dramatic comedy about how three generations of sons react to the death of Century Gowda, their great grandfather, who is a locally renowned, and is a highly cranky 101-year-old man. Set in a village in the Mandya District of Karnataka, the three storylines intertwine before converging at Century Gowda’s thithi, the final funeral celebration 11 days after a death.

Shot in the Mandya district of Karnataka, this was co-written and developed along with Eregowda, who spent most of his childhood in the same village that the film was shot in. The cast of the film comprises of completely non-professional actors.

Filmmaker Raam Reddy is a graduate of St. Stephen’s College, Delhi and Prague Film School. Previously, he directed a critically-acclaimed short film called Ika (Feather). He has also published a novel titled It’s Raining in Maya.