Filmmaker Sidharth Harikumar on Vasu being chosen as a finalist on the Student Academy Awards 2025

While exploring the German capital of Berlin, the place he was a postgraduate scholar in cinematography on the MetFilm School, filmmaker Sidharth Harikumar typically sensed a weight within the air, shadowed by the reminiscence of the Holocaust. He skilled this in public transport and museums.

He got here throughout a number of pictures with Nazi troopers holding a gun to somebody’s head, forcing Sidharth to ponder whether or not the troopers questioned their actions or their superiors.

This thought led Sidharth to make Vasu as a part of his final-year undertaking on the MetFilm School. The quick movie tells the story of a retired police officer main a secluded life within the woods as a part of his final-year undertaking on the MetFilm School. Vasu is without doubt one of the seven finalists nominated for the Student Academy Awards 2025 within the Narrative class. It can be the one movie from India within the operating throughout 4 classes —Alternative or Experimental, Animation, Documentary and Narrative.

“It is surreal. Vasu, being a scholar undertaking, was made on a restricted funds. This recognition has put us on the worldwide map,” says Siddharth, who has additionally achieved the cinematography of the quick.

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“I began by researching frontline employees and their trauma,” says Sidharth over a name from Chennai. “I focussed on individuals within the uniformed companies in Kerala who have been coerced to comply with their superiors’ orders and the way they lived with that guilt for the remainder of their lives.”

The 16-minute movie explores Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) skilled by a retired police officer. “Vasu’s character is formed by obedience and suppression of his feelings,” says Sidharth.

Parameswaran Kuriyathi, 77, a famend theatre artist from Manacaud, Thiruvananthapuram, performs the titular character. “One of my household pals launched me to him. When I met Parameswaran chettan, he had lengthy hair and a moustache. He appeared like a sadhu. He had not shaved in 30 years. And my first query to him was, ‘Are you keen to shave it off?’ Fortunately, he agreed after our first narration,” says Sidharth.

The movie was shot at Chitranjali Studio in Thiruvananthapuram, aside from a number of scenes shot in Peyad. Vasu treats the wilderness as a personality. The plot and visible language aptly conveys a disturbing actuality.

Before he joined MetFilm School in London to pursue a grasp’s in movie route, Sidharth completed his bachelor’s in biotechnology. Soon after he completed his course in London, his father handed away, compelling him to take up the household enterprise.

“My father supported my ardour. He uncovered me to good cinema at a younger age. When I used to be 10, I used to look at motion pictures that is likely to be thought-about ‘boring’ at that age,” says Sidharth, who admits his love for legendary Malayalam director G Aravindan, sneaking into Vasu.

“I didn’t consider cinema for 5 years. Then I labored on a undertaking that rekindled my ardour and made me wish to examine extra,” says Sidharth. In 2023, he joined the MetFilm faculty in Berlin to pursue a grasp’s in cinematography.

Sidharth’s earlier work, Saffron Ash (2017), received Best Student Film on the Calcutta International Cult Film Festival (CICFF) in 2018. Much like Vasu, Saffron Ash facilities on reflection, an unintentional inventive alternative by the maker. “I’ve by no means considered it that approach. But I’ve learnt loads by trying again, and possibly the subsequent film I do may not have such a component.”

Sidharth is presently engaged on the screenplay of his debut characteristic. “I obtained affords to show at movie faculties earlier than I received to know concerning the Student Oscar nominations. Maybe, it was an indication for me to not give up filmmaking but.”