“Shimu: Made in Bangladesh,” a story about the struggle and success of determined women garment workers, was released in Japan. The film will be screened in 15 cinema halls from Tokyo to Hokkaido to Okinawa. Pandora is distributing the film in Japan.
The director of the film Rubaiyat Hossain answered various questions of the audience by virtually joining the inaugural show.
Most of the main cast and crew in the film were women. Notable among them are Sabine Lancelin in camera, Elisha Albert in soundtrack, and Jonaki Bhattacharya in art direction. The role of women in the release of the film was also worth mentioning in Japan. The head of the Japanese distributor Pandora is a woman, and the film was subtitled in Japanese by a group of female students at Osaka Oman University.
The film premiered at the 63rd BFI London Film Festival after its world premiere at the Toronto Film Festival. It has been awarded at various international film festivals. Reekita Nandini Shimu won the Best Actress award at the Saint-Jean-de-Luz Film Festival in France. At the Torino Film Festival in Italy, “Shimu” won the Interfedi Award, and at the Amiens International Film Festival in France, it won three awards, including the Best Audience Award and the Jury Award.
The film was released commercially in December 2019 in various cinemas in France, Denmark, Canada and Portugal under the title “Made in Bangladesh.” The film was then shown commercially in cinemas in Mexico, China, Singapore, Australia, Turkey and Germany before releasing in Bangladesh on March 11.
The film is produced by Francois d’Artemare and Ashiq Mostafa and co-produced by Peter Hildal, Pedro Borges, Adnan Imtiaz Ahmed and Rubaiyat Hossain. The distribution and international sales representative of the film is Pyramid Films of France.
Reekita Nandini Shimu, Novera Rahman, Dipanwita Martin, Parveen Paru, Mayabi Maya, Mostafa Monwar, Shatabdi Wadud, Jayraj, Momena Chowdhury, Wahida Mallick Jolly and Samina Lutfa have acted in different roles. Mita Chowdhury and Shahana Goswami from India have acted in two guest roles.
