Chippa, a movie about a determined 10-year-old boy in search of his father will premiere in North America at the 17th Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles (IFFLA) 2019. The festival will be held from April 11 to 14 at the Regal L.A. LIVE: A Barco Innovation Center in Los Angeles. Written and directed by first-time filmmaker Safdar Rahman, the film has Sunny Pawar of Lion fame in the titular role.
The entire story takes place in a single night in the streets of Kolkata. On the eve of his tenth birthday, Chippa gets a letter from his long-absent father and as he ventures out on the streets of the city along with his pet dog, he comes across several colourful characters.
Besides child actor Sunny, Chippa stars actors including Chandan Roy Sanyal of Kaminey, D-Day fame, Sumeet Thakur, Veer Rajwant Singh, and Masood Akhtar among others.
The film is edited by Manas Mittal and shot by National Award-winning cinematographer Ramanuj Dutta. Cyrille de Haes has composed the music for the film.
Last year November, it was shown at the Jio MAMI 20th Mumbai Film Festival and received a warm response from the audience.
“Chippa is a small film shot in the by-lanes of Calcutta by a crew made up of friends and family, and it’s amazing to see it travel the world. It’s a really intimate story about the dreams of a kid who lives on the pavement and the flight his imagination takes. I am intrigued to see how audiences outside the country will respond to a story like this," says Safdar Rahman.
Safdar Rahman is a filmmaker based out of Calcutta and Mumbai. After having directed a few plays in school and college, Safdar taught kids at a school in East Delhi for a couple of years.
Consequently, he founded and runs a non-profit called Red Lorry Yellow Lorry, which works in the sphere of education and arts. He has a production house called Travelling Light along with his wife, Celine Loop and Chippa is his first directorial venture.