Kamar Ahmad Simon
Kamar Ahmad Simon is a new generation Bangladeshi filmmaker whose works centre existential themes of the subaltern and style challenges the border between fiction and non-fiction. Kamar came to fame with his critically acclaimed debut ‘Are You LIstening!’ for which he won the Grand Prix at Cinéma du Réel at the Centre Pompidou in Paris and Golden Conch at the Mumbai International Film Festival. ‘Are You Listening!’ was also the curtain-opener of Locarno Open Doors Screening and Dok-Leipzig in Germany. Kamar was featured as the red carpet Director at Locarno Piazza Grande after winning  the best project award in Locarno Open Doors Hub for the 2nd part of the water trilogy ‘Day after…’, which was in the main international competition of IDFA 2021. It was also invited to La Atelier "Cinéfondation" of Cannes where only the organizers reserve the right to invite the upcoming very best of world cinema. Kamar received WCF from Berlinale for his upcoming feature ‘Iron Stream’.’ La Bibliothèque publique d’information (BPI) France, Johns Hopkins University USA has acquired his film and Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland (RAI) have exhibited his work. Early life. Kamar was born and  brought up in an orthodox Muslim family of the old part of Dhaka, Bangladesh. Growing close to the stray dogs and pigeons in the sky, Kamar's refuge was the old alleys, the fallen kites and the boats waiting to leave the port. Reading books and making paper houses of wedding cards became his hobby, playing around the masons and the carpenters was his favorite pastime. Chasing an old dream, Kamar passed one of the most competitive exams at Bangladesh University of Engineering & Technology, the leading university of the country and enrolled in under-graduate program studying architecture. Repeated encounters  with international cinema running in local festivals opened a new window and Kamar started exploring the ethos of artistic film-making. After graduating as an Architect, Kamar started his career as a Creative Director to gather in-depth knowledge about audio-visual production. For all the technical skills Kamar explored online and built a basic studio setup of camera, sound, gears and an alternate projection setup on his own. To advance his learning with no film school in the country, Kamar enrolled into programs like Berlinale Talents, European AudioVisual Entrepreneurs (EAVE) workshops (Croatia, Luxembourg and Amsterdam), IDFAcademy Summer School (Amsterdam , Netherlands), Produire au Sud (Nantes, France) and Asian Film Academy (Busan, South Korea). Filmography. Section::::"Shunte Ki Pao! (Are You Listening!) 2012". Kamar's first feature creative non fiction film is "Are You Listening!" "Are You Listening!" was the ‘Curtain-Opener’ of 55th DOK Leipzig in Germany (2012), the oldest documentary festivals of the world. Later the film won the ‘Grand Prix’ in the 35th Cinéma du Réel held in Paris (2013) and Golden Conch Award on 9 February 2014 at the Mumbai International Film Festival (MIFF). Kamar also won the award for “Best Cinematography” for the same film. It was  also the opening film of Open Doors Screening at Locarno Film Festival. First of Kamar's "Water Trilogy", the film was awarded twice by Jan Vrijman Fund from IDFA and also by Visions Sud est from Switzerland. It was awarded as one of the best Pitches at the Asian Forum for Documentaries and it is invited to Berlinale Talent Campus Studio Lab for editing. The film won 2015 Bangladesh National Film Award for Best Documentary Film. The film theme is selected among the top ten lists out 125 in the "La Cinema Du Monde" (World's Cinema) in Cannes Film  Festival and it is the first of this sort of achievement for Bangladesh. Section::::"Ekti Sutar Jobanbondi (Testimony of a Thread)" 2015. Testimony of a Thread was his first television documentary which was co-produced by four leading Asian Broadcasters NHK (Japan), KBS (Korea), Mediacorp (Singapore) and PTS (Taiwan). This film won the Asian Pitch for its screenplay. According to the director, "Testimony of a Thread" is a monologue collage inspired by Akira Kurosawa’s "Roshomon", in search of a face behind the numbers of the deadliest structural failure accident in modern human history. Section::::"Neel Mukut" 2021. Co-produced by four  leading Asian Broadcasters NHK (Japan), KBS (Korea), Mediacorp (Singapore) and PTS (Taiwan), Neel Mukut was set for theatrical release on March 27, 2020 but then halted due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Although, initially nothing had been shared about the film's story or lineup but the poster of the film drew much attention. The film also received an uncut censor certificate from Bangladesh Censor Board. Finally the film was released in Bangladeshi OTT platform Chorki on 8th August, 2021. Being a docu-fiction, a genre not much explored in Bangladesh, the film received a positive response from both the critics  and audience. Section::::"Anyadin... (Day After...)" 2021. "Day After..." is the second part of "Water Trilogy" by Kamar after Are You Listening!. The film had its world premiere on 20 November 2021 at the Pathé Tuschinski in Amsterdam, Netherlands after being nominated at the International Competition of IDFA that year. The project was invited to La Atelier in Cannes 2017 as one of the 15 promising scripts. For this work-in-progress Kamar was awarded ‘Best Project Award’ & ‘ARTE International Prix’ in Locarno Film Festival (Open Doors) 2016. Co-produced by Barents Film and DW Film, earlier the project also received  grant awards from Sundance Film Festival and International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (IDFA). Section::::"Shikolbaha (Iron Stream)". "Iron Stream" is Kamar's first fiction project. It was the only non-European selection out of 24 projects which were invited to European Producers Workshop. Iron Stream received script development grant from Goteborg International Film Festival, Sweden. It was also invited to European Post-Production Connection (EP2C) and Produire au Sud a co-production platform of Festival of 3 Continents in Nantes, France. This script also won World Cinema Fund (WCF) from Berlin International Film Festival twice and National Film Grant of Bangladesh . The film is co-produced by Germany's Weydemann Bros. The project was initially titled as "Shongkhodhoni (Silence of the Seashell)."