Filmmaker from Ferozepur gets slice of glory at Toronto fest with ‘India in a Day’

“The one-and-a-half-hour Google documentary film titled ‘India in a Day’ was made with about 16,000 clips of 370 hours, and some footage submitted by me is part of the final film,” explained Sunil Kataria, a resident of a locality in Ferozepur cantonment area who works in Chandigarh.

A filmmaker from Ferozepur, one of Punjab’s hinterland towns on the border with Pakistan, has brought a slice of glory as video footage submitted by him is part of a feature screened at the Toronto International Film Festival earlier this month.

Sunil Kataria, a resident of a locality in Ferozepur cantonment area who works in Chandigarh. (HT Photo)

“The one-and-a-half-hour Google documentary film titled ‘India in a Day’ was made with about 16,000 clips of 370 hours, and some footage submitted by me is part of the final film,” explained Sunil Kataria, a resident of a locality in Ferozepur cantonment area who works in Chandigarh.

“The film tries to capture the essence of India through footage shot on a single day. It is co-produced by filmmakers Ridley Scott and Anurag Kashyap while Richie Mehta directed it. It will be theatrically released too in some main towns on Friday,” he added.

What’s the footage? He shot it last October when he was otherwise working in a news channel at Hyderabad. “I recorded the newsroom culture besides some shots from the life of a common man, within 10 minutes,” said Kataria.

Two years ago, Kataria’s 41-second micro-film titled ‘Honesty is the Best Policy’ was screened at the Third International Film Festival of South Asia and the Punjabi International Film Festival in Toronto too.

Kataria says he has recently joined a media firm in the state capital but at his heart he remains equally committed to his passion, filmmaking.