The Filmmakers
Shashwati Talukdar, Director/Producer has an MFA in Film and Video Arts from Temple University, Philadelphia (1999). She began working in the film and television industry as an assistant editor for a TV show by Michael Moore. Since 1999, she has worked on projects for HBO, BBC, Lifetime, Sundance and Cablevision.
Shashwati has directed over a dozen films and videos, which have been screened at venues including the Margaret Mead Festival, Berlin, the Whitney Biennial, Kiasma Museum of Art in Helsinki and the Institute of Contemporary Art in Philadelphia. She has been supported by entities including the Jerome Foundation, New York State Council on the Arts, and Pennsylvania Council on the Arts. She has been awarded the James T. Yee Mentorship Award from NAATA (2002) and the Project Involve Fellowship (2003) from IFP/New York.
In addition, Shashwati has taught at NYU, Arcadia and Temple University. She lives in New York City. For more information about Shashwati’s films see www.shashwati.com.
P. Kerim Friedman, Ph.D., Director/Producer has studied and taught ethnographic film and photography since 1993. He has a long standing commitment to working with indigenous peoples, having done his dissertation fieldwork in a rural Taiwanese Aborigine community. That research examined contemporary linguistic markets and language policy in Taiwan in terms of the historical processes of state formation, class alliances, and identity politics. He has been supported by the Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation, the Institute of Ethnology, Academica Sinica in Taiwan and was awarded a Fullbright-Hayes Fellowship.
This is his first project in India, but he hopes it will just be the beginning of many more to come. His writings and links to various online projects can be found on his web site.
Henry Schwarz Consultant and Producer is professor of English at Georgetown University and Director of the Program on Justice and Peace. He has published four books to date, two of them on Indian culture. He is Executive Producer of a 30 minute documentary video, “Mahasweta Devi: Witness, Advocate Writer.” He maintains a close affiliation with the Bhasha Research and Publication Center in Baroda. He has joined the Fair Trade Federation on behalf of the Tribal Artists Cooperative. He raises funds and works for the rights of the Denotified Tribes and Tribal groups in India. He held a fellowship from the National Endowment for the Humanities in 1998, and has been a visiting professor at Jadavpur University in Calcutta and the University of Pennsylvania.
Kurt Engfehr We are very pleased to announce that Kurt Engfehr has agreed to be an advisor on the film. Kurt was co-producer and editor on both Bowling For Columbine and Fahrenheit 911. Not only did those two films win an Oscar and a Golden Palm, but Kurt’s editing work on Columbine also earned him the American Cinema Editors’ Eddie award. His support and advice means a lot to us. His critical eye will help us keep Hooch And Hamlet In Chharanagar clear, honest, and engaging.
