Produced by: Hitansh Gaur
Designed by: Manoj Kumar
The Film Federation of India announced Tovino Thomas-starrer ‘2018’ as the country’s official entry for the Academy Awards 2024. The Malayalam disaster-based film enjoyed immense success on the box office and became the second highest grossing Malayalam film of 2023 just behind Romancham.
The film is based on the real life Kerala Floods which hit the southern state in 2018, hence the name of the film. The floods were the worst Kerala had seen in nearly 100 years and took more than 450 lives, while 15 people went missing. The film shows how the people in the state worked together to survive the calamity.
The floods based film was directed by Jude Anthany Joseph and featured Tovino Thomas, Asif Ali, Tanvi Ram, Kunchako Boban and Aparna Balamurali in lead roles.
The decision to select the Malayalam film was taken by a jury of 17 members led by 14-time National Film Award recipient Kannada director Girish Kasaravalli.
There were more than 20 films in the contention for this year’s Oscars entry selection including Alia Bhatt’s ‘Rocky Aur Rani Ki Prem Kahani’ and Rani Mukherjee’s ‘Mrs Chatterjee vs Norway’.
Other regional films in the pool were August 16, 1947 (Tamil), Balagam (Telugu), Vaalvi (Marathi) and Baaplyok (Marathi).
The controversial film by Sudipto Sen was also in the fray to become the country’s official entry for next year’s Oscars. The film was produced by Vipul Shah.
Earlier this year, India’s unofficial entry ‘RRR’ won the Academy award for Best Original Song for the film’s track ‘Naatu Naatu’. The award was received by the music composer M M Keeravani and lyricist Chandrabose. Indian producer Guneet Monga and Kartiki Gonsalves also won the award in Best Documentary Short for their film ‘The Elephant Whisperers’.
No Indian film has been chosen for the Best International Feature Film award at the Oscars since ‘Lagaan’ in 2002. Apart from that only two other films have made it to the category – Nargis starrer Mother India and Mira Nair’s Salaam Bombay.