It’s been a year since Academy Award-winning filmmaker Guneet Monga Kapoor made history with her Oscar win for the short documentary The Elephant Whisperers, directed by Indian director-producer Kartiki Gonsalves. It was the first Indian film to win an Oscar in the Best Documentary Short Film category. “I am grateful for the honour and the opportunity to represent my country to the world,” she tells ELLE India.
Behind the glory and success lies decades of persistence and hard work. “Nothing is an overnight success. I have been doing this for a long time so it’s the ultimate validation to earn the most coveted award in our industry,” she says. “But I also feel like I am just getting started.”
Currently, she’s excited about Nikhil Nagesh Bhat’s Kill, which was a breakout success at the Toronto Film Festival in September 2023. The film will also be screened at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York City and the Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles (IFFLA) in June 2024. Monga-Kapoor shares that the project – part of a strategic content partnership between Monga’s Sikhya Entertainment and Karan Johar’s Dharma Productions – will likely be India’s most violent film. “Here comes my skull-smashing, bone-breaking, intense version,” she adds.
The film, which stars Raghav Juyal, Laksh Lalwani, and Tanya Maniktala in lead roles, is slated for a theatrical release in the US on July 4, 2024, and a day later in India. “We were bought by Lionsgate for the US and were able to sell it to 20 other distributors worldwide. It is the first for any Indian film to be distributed by a listed international studio,” informs Monga-Kapoor.
Her genre-bending storytelling is visible across genres, be it in feature or short films. American Sikh is proof that the film that brings together Monga-Kapoor and celebrated chef Vikas Khanna as executive producers looks at an immigrant’s experience in America. The film has won multiple titles, including Best Short Animation at the Sidewalk Film Festival in Birmingham, Alabama, Best Animation at the San Diego International Film Festival, and a special mention at the Chicago International Film Festival, among others.
While Monga-Kapoor’s craft is now known worldwide – many other documentary filmmakers are doing important storytelling and need to be empowered and celebrated, she believes. “We are a very fiction-heavy country, and documentaries are beautiful. It’s real life and real people, which cannot be staged,” she concludes.
ELLE India Editor: Ainee Nizami Ahmedi; Photographer: Amitava Saha; Cover Design: Sanjana Suvarna; Videographer: Akshay Pawar; Video Editor: Tanish Kothurkar; Fashion Assistant: Komal Shetty; Words: Geetika Sachdev; Hair & Makeup: Bhavya Arora; Bookings Coordinator: Anushka Patil; Assisted by: Aaryaa Chhabria (styling), Jasleen Narang (bookings), Praveen Varma (Hair and Makeup); Artist’s PR Agency: Hardly Anonymous; Draper: Daulli; Production: Tafreeh Studios
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