‘Lucia’ reaches out to Pakistan, meets rave reviews

Kannada movie ‘Lucia’, which was recently screened in Pakistan, has grabbed a lot of attention and praise from the audience. This Pawan Kumar directorial was released in Karnataka in 2013. The film is the first Kannada movie to be screened in Pakistan.

The film had been screened in London, Zurich, Paris, Singapore, Australia, and the U.S., but according to Pawan, sending a copy to Pakistan was a huge challenge. "All screenings outside India have been through invitations. We never applied anywhere. Word spread slowly over the last two years about the movie. A number of Indie filmmakers wrote to me on Facebook. It was one such FB connection from Pakistan that initiated the screening to that neighbouring country. They asked for a screening of the film and even offered money. But I was more than happy to get the film screened there than the money it would bring us", said the director.

Pawan, who is currently working on ‘C10H14N2’, also added, "They wanted a hard disk or DVD to be sent over. That was when I realised I could not courier to Karachi from Bengaluru. There is no postal or courier service that does this. Technology came to our rescue. I put the film in my mail drop box and they downloaded it there".