1557 India: Best script award for Dominic Savio student
austraLasia 1557
Nine year old Indian lad from Dominic
Savio High wins 'Best Script 'award in Canadian young filmamkers
Festival, Toronto
ANDHERI, (Mumbai) 10 May, 2006: He's
only pint-sized - and just nine pints at that, but producer and script
writer Anshul Khosla of Mumbai, India
won the ‘Best Script’ award for his stunning documentary
‘Love Changes Everything’
at
the inaugural the inaugural Young Filmmakers Film Festival, Toronto,
Canada.
Young Anshul, of St. Dominic
Savio High School, Andheri
(East), won the award in the Under-10 category; his was the only
entry
from India. Anshul, an outstanding student who has just passed
Std. IV, based his
documentary on the true life stories of street children.
Anshul, already a
concerned young human being who empathises with
the less privileged, was inspired by the plight of these street
children,
some of whom are being cared for by Shelter Don Bosco, Wadala, a home
for
homeless children run by the Salesians of Don Bosco.
The idea of
submitting his film for the Toronto festival was
initiated by senior journalist Ronita Torcato, of Mumbai, who informed
Anshul’s Vice-Principal, Fr. Joaquim Fernandes. Being the head of Media
Initiatives at St. Dominic Savio, Fr. Joaquim teamed up with Anshul to
shoot this 16 minute and riveting documentary using a handycam.
Following his visit to Shelter
Don Bosco on a social
awareness programme about street children, Anshul was shocked after
hearing
their real life stories first-hand and instantly decided to base his
documentary on Ganesh, Babloo and Ijaz, the characters in the film.
“Here was a golden opportunity to showcase their
lives and
hopefully bring about a change for the better through love,” reveals
Anshul. “I believe love can change lives and decided to make it the
theme
for my documentary.” Anshul also
remembered the audio skit ‘Love Changes
Everything’, aired on All India Radio in December 2005, in which the
young director himself was the narrator, and used the same title for
his
documentary.
Apart from going behind the
camera with Fr. Joaquim, Anshul
was supported by a team of experts from school. Support also came from home, including dad Lakhnesh,
mother
Pooja and sister Donna who helped during filming.
Festival Director, Vince De Marinis was full of praise for this effort.
“To begin with, it is excellent and thoughtful of
you to actually create a DVD cover for the film. That shows a real
level
of commitment on an artistic and business (promotional) level. “Your story is very good and believable. Many people
think that when you write a script or story about
personal experience it is easy to do. This isn’t necessarily true. You
have shown an
ability to choose the right moments to give the audience a sense of
conflict and obstacle,” Marinis said in his appreciation of Anshul’s
effort.
_______________________
AustraLasia
is an email service for the Salesian Family of Asia Pacific.
It also
functions as an agency for ANS based in Rome. For queries please
contact admin@bosconet.aust.com
Try
out BoscoWiki to be interactive. For RSS feeds, subscribe to www.bosconet.aust.com/RSS/rssala.xml
