A Samuh original film titled Gangnam Girls won the Best Debut Feature Film Award at the UK Asian Film Festival 2022 in London yesterday. This is the first time that a Bhutanese film has won an award at the UK film festival. UK Asian Film Festival is the world’s longest running South Asian film festival that celebrates the richness and vibrancy of South Asian culture, history, arts, story-telling and self-expression.
Directed by Charmi Chheda, Gangnam Girls is one of the few female centric films made in the country. The film shows the journey of four childhood friends, who go separate ways after a major fallout.
A decade later, they reconnect for a house-warming event over a weekend where they discover that they still have a lot of pain and anger to deal with.
“I am very happy that ‘Gangnam girls’ is doing well and accepted. I think it’s very encouraging and assuring that something has gone right and we are doing something right. I just hope to tell more stories from Bhutan and I hope these stories travel and touch hearts,” said Charmi Chheda.
The film was produced by Samuh to tell stories surrounding women and to encourage Bhutanese films that feature women directors and women in lead roles. The lead actors in the film are all women.
“We are very excited and honoured to have received the award at the UK Asian Film Festival for our film Gangnam Girls. This means that especially for Samuh there is an opportunity for Bhutanese films outside Bhutan and there is a lot of appreciation for films from Bhutan as well. So, we are very excited about this and the opportunities now in front of us. And we do hope that we will be able to take more films from Bhutan and more stories to the world through Samuh,” said Nyema Zam, the CEO of Samuh.
All the post-production works of the film, including sound design and colour, were locally done in the country.
Founded in 2020, Samuh is the country’s first media tech company and OTT platform that streams Bhutanese films, series, documentaries, short films, music videos and animation content. Currently, Samuh is accessed in more than 107 countries around the world.
Sonam Pem
