Media plays an important role in promoting public knowledge and perceptions. As a filmmaker, I am compelled to communicate the reality of life as it unfolds focussing on nuances that cannot be dwelled upon or deliberated in mass media. Through my films I hope to break barriers, build bridges, change attitudes and take risks. One learns the rope of life by untying knots. LIfe is full of challenges and challenges validate life. Some people live the story and I am honored to share it with the rest of the world. I feel the responsibility, and urgent need to tell stories and memories that last a life time. – Chithra Jeyaram
AWARDS
Dancing Films Post Production Grant for Foreign Puzzle 2011
Pic Wagner Award 2011
Dina Sherzer Scholarship Award for Social Awareness 2009
Mahatma Gandhi Travel Scholarship Award 2003
FILM IN FESTIVALS
MIJO (2011) a 10 minute short doc.
SYNOPSIS: Mijo (My Son) is an evocative portrayal of a mother and child’s intimate relationship in the midst of life altering medical events.
Mijo is a vignette from “Foreign Puzzle”, a feature length documentary. It is currently in the festival circuit. The film has received an amazing reception so far.
Awards for MIJO
Winner Best of Show Award, 21st Rosebud Film and Video Festival, Arlington, VA, USA Nov 2011
Second Place Best Short Film Award James River Shorts, Richmond, VA, USA Nov 2011
Finalist, Online Shorts Contests, Breast Fest Film Festival, Toronto, CA, Sept 2011
Official Selections @ Festivals for MIJO
Thin Line Film Fest (Texas International Documentary Film Festival), Denton, Texas Feb 2012
The Mix International Film Festival, Richmond, Virginia Feb 2012
Super Shorts International Film Festival, London, UK Dec 2011 – Short Listed for Best Documentary Award
Official Selection Wevuwega International Film Festival, Wevuwega, WI, Nov 2011
FILMS IN PRODUCTION
FOREIGN PUZZLE : debut feature length documentary. (Anticipated Release 2012)
If you like MIJO you are very likely to love Foreign Puzzle. Like us on “THE FOREIGN PUZZLE” FACEBOOK PAGE to get updates on the project.
“Since that day, I walk around in the world disguised as Sharon. The eyes I see with belong to someone I do not know, and my body is a foreign puzzle with missing pieces. Every day I am newly surprised by the decimation of what my life once was”. – Sharon Marroquin.
SYNOPSIS:
Confronted with her mortality, angered and frustrated over her inability to handle the disintegration of her body, Sharon Marroquin, begins to consciously deal with it through art and decides to create a dance called “Materiality of Impermanence”. Through the creation of the dance, Sharon escapes to another realm that is not confined by physical limitations, disease, childrearing, teaching and running a home. Foreign Puzzle is a documentation of Sharon’s journey to heal and reclaim her self after she was diagnosed with breast cancer.
Articles about Foreign Puzzle on realtalkies:
SILK SKIRT: A Short Animated Film, Writer/Director. (Anticipated Release 2013)
SYNOPSIS: “Silk Skirt” is the story of a little girl Nila in a small town in Southern India who gets the prettiest silk skirt for Diwali in 1984. A skirt that would lift her of the floor if she spun fast enough. A week later, she was at her uncle’s house and the first thing she ever saw on TV was the news of Indira’s assassination and her funeral. Unfortunately, her family was gathered in her uncle’s house to bid farewell to her very ill Uncle. The film takes us through Nila’s memories of her beloved Uncle, his death and events that follow. It is a coming of age story of a little girl who learns about life, death and beyond.
THE SILK SKIRT DIARY is a blog where we chronicle the making of Silk Skirt and build a strong community of donors, film supporters and story lovers who are eager to help make the film and share it with the community.
PREVIOUS FILMS
DRAFTED (5min), NON-FICTION, EDITOR 2010
VOCES ORAL HISTORY PROJECT provided several WW II veteran interviews to choose from. I picked a two hour long interview of Mr John Walls – What a life and what a man. It was an honor to be able to edit and work on this project. I had spent the summer of 2010 at the National Archives in Washington D.C. collecting film reels from 1940s. That experience helped get a lot of archival material to edit this project. I enjoy structuring and stringing non-fiction stories.
If you have an audio-visual non-fiction story and need an editor contact me.
Winner: Second Place in an editing contest.
SQUEEZED OUT OF BUSINESS (10min), DOCUMENTARY, DIRECTOR 2008
This is my first independent documentary though the film could have benefited from a better technique. it has its heart in the right place. Sharing stories of every day people doing extraordinary things. Tom and Judy in this film are Austinites that have been making fresh juice for 30 years in their nature friendly, small scale business and the FDA imposed corporate juice regulations to shut them down. The film played in a few festivals in the USA, Portugal and viewed ONLINE about 629 times. It is available as a DVD as a part of 10 under 10 2009 collection. http://www.10under10.com.
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