India at Oscars: Film body raises concerns over ‘unusual norms’ followed for Chello Show

The Gujarati drama Chhello Show (Last Film Show), directed by Pan Nalin, was chosen by the Film Federation of India, as India's official entry for the Best International Feature Film category of the 95th Academy Awards. After the panel, which was presided over by seasoned Kannada filmmaker TS Nagabharana, decided on Tuesday, FFI Secretary General Suparn Sen made the announcement.

Chhello Show will debut in India on October 14. The film was initially available on MUBI, but now, it has been taken down. There is no information available about whether it will stream on Netflix, Hulu, or Amazon Prime Video.

On Satday (September 24), the film body FWICE raised some concerns over the selection of the movie and the ‘unusual norms’ that were followed for this year’s selection.

‘THE CHOICE SEEMS QUESTIONABLE’

“We at FWICE have observed that this year’s nomination of the film ‘Chhello Show’ as India’s Official Entry to the 95th Oscar Award is not as per the usual norms and has therefore created lot of doubts and issues we thought of raising. We strongly feel that the selection process was not thoroughly followed. We have nothing against the producers and makers of the film which has been nominated but at the same time the real successors of this award cannot be left in dilemma. Official selection of an Indian film means produced by Indian companies. This year’s selection of Chhello Show seems questionable. This film is primarily produced by foreign studios and most of the crew is also from foreign countries. Its major producers Orange Studios are foreign studio,” said the film body during the press conference.

During the course of the press conference, FWICE also talked about Chello Show being plagiarized.

“There are some very serious allegations against the film that it’s inspired/copied from Oscar winner Cinema Paradiso. And prima facie, if we look at the poster and synopsis there are uncanny similarities between both.  This is a very serious allegation because in the past (Gully Boys) India was humiliated when Oscar committee rejected that film as plagiarized from 8MM. Are we making the same mistake again because Oscar is very strict about the originality and even slightest of similarities disqualify a film. This is important for Indian Cinema’s honor, prestige and integrity,” said one of the attending members.

DOES IT QUALIFY: HERE’S WHAT WE KNOW SO FAR

Acccording to the members of the film body, Chello Show was first premiered in June of 2021, thus making it ineligible for being considered under the Best Foreign Film category this year.

“The film premiered on June 2021. How is it qualified for 2022 films? What are the FFI’s rules? If this is the case then it’s not an equal opportunity competition and would be an injustice to the other successors of real Indian Films who are the real claimants of the Oscar selections,” asked the committee.

It is worth noting that the chairman of the jury, T S Nagabharana, has given an official statement to Bombay Times that this film was also considered last year.

“We therefore are making an appeal to the Ministry of Information & Broadcasting to take serious note of this issue. We suggest that as this decision of nominating a film for Oscar constitutes the dignity of the Film Industry, the Ministry should take over the entire process of nominating the film and should not allow an organization to do so,” concluded Federation of Western India Cine Employees (FWICE).