Malaka Dewapriya - Short Films Experience

Short Films Experience

While he was still a student at the University of Colombo, on 9 June 2004, his short film Life Circle (5:31) was screened in the juried international competition program at the 10th International Student Film Festival, held from 5 June to 12 June 2004, in Tel Aviv, Israel. An interview conducted by Sachie Fernando and published in the Sri Lanka Sunday Times on 25 July 2004, observes: "This is the first time Sri Lankan Student’s film took part Recognized International film festival in history of Cinema of Sri Lanka." According to another interview with Dewapriya, conducted by Susitha R. Fernando and published in the Sri Lankan Sunday Times, on 27 July 2008, "This was the first time a Sri Lankan student's film was chosen in an internationally recognized festival. And the selection was a big step to re-establish short film culture in Sri Lanka." Life Circle was also selected for screenings at two other student film competitions outside Sri Lanka, in 2004 and 2005.

Another interview with Dewaprija, published in the Sri Lanka Sunday Times on 5 September 2004, points out that Exchange, a short experimental film whose context is "colonial Sri Lanka under the British rule," which he presented under the auspices of the University of Colombo, was "The first Sri Lankan entry" in the Tokyo Short Shorts Film Festival held in October 2004. It was screened in Program A: Short Shorts: Ghost Short Shorts.

His 30-minute film Transference won the Best "Silver TEN Award" in the Short Films category at the Mumbai International Sport Movies & TV (FICTS) Festival, first held in Mumbai, India, in 2006, and was also screened at the South Asia Film Festival and other festivals that year.

Today, another short film, which he made while at the Akademie Schloss Solitude in Germany, was selected to compete in "the final round of CinemadaMare Film Festival in Italy" in the summer of 2008; it competed "with over 150 directors around the world at the semi final round" (10–14 August).

His article on the "Sri Lankan Experience of the Short Film", published in the First Quarter 2009 issue of the Colombo Film Circle's Cineist Magazine, states, somewhat less unequivocally than he may have suggested in his earlier Sri Lanka Sunday Times interviews: "Recently, after I presented two of my short films titled 'Life Circle' and 'Exchange' in Tel-Aviv Student … Festival (2004), and Short shorts film festival Tokyo (2005), respectively, the dialogue about the short-film in Sri Lanka has resurfaced to a certain extent"; he goes on to focus on what having his films included in such student festivals meant to him personally and develops his own perspective on short film as an art form and an industry in Sri Lanka.

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