FTII student’s Indian short wins La Cinef Award at 77th Cannes Film Festival

MUMBAI — The Indian film ‘Sunflowers were the first ones to know’ has been crowned the winner of the La Cinef Award for Best Short Film at the ongoing 77th edition of the prestigious Cannes Film Festival

‘Sunflowers were the first ones to know’ is a student film, directed by Chidananda S Naik, who studied at FTII, Pune.

The short film is based on a Kannada folk tale about an old woman who steals a rooster, and this pushes her village into perpetual darkness.

Taking to X, FTII wrote: “FTII brings big honour to India. Our Student film ‘Sunflowers were the first ones to know’ is the winner of La Cinef Award at the 77th Cannes Film Festival Student director Chidananda S Naik received this prestigious award at Cannes on May 23.”

The winner was awarded a prize money of 15,000 euros. The second prize was shared by ‘Out of the Widow Through the Wall’, directed by Asya Segalovich, and ‘The Chaos She Left Behind,’ directed by Nikos Kolioukos from Greece.

The third prize in the La Cinef competition went to another Indian film, ‘Bunnyhood’ directed by Mansi Maheshwari.