- Apr 4, 2007
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SikhNet News Archive - "Ocean of Pearls" Premiering at The Miami International Film Festival - 02/08/2008
“Ocean of Pearls” is the first movie to be made out of Hollywood by a Sikh director, Sarab Singh Neelam. It will be premiering at the 25th Miami International Film Festival. The festival is being held during the first week of March 2008, and the showings of the movie will be on March 2, 5 and 7.
Please visit http://www.miamifilmfestival.com/pdfs/MIFF_Film_Guide.pdf (page 7 of film guide) for more details.
It has been a long road of over ten years for director (and physician), Dr. Neelam, who has wanted to make movies for as long as he can remember. His purpose in making this movie was two-fold. One was to bring awareness about Sikhs and Sikhism to the general public. He says “Growing up in Toronto, we went through a lot of discrimination. After 9/11, it got worse. I feel movies are a powerful medium to bring about awareness and hopefully reduce hate crimes.”
The other purpose was for Sikhs themselves. “Even though there are millions of Sikhs worldwide, there are hardly any films that depict us in our proper way. Usually, we are absent in Hollywood films or comic relief characters in Bollywood,” he states passionately. “It’s important for us to be involved in visual media to break down barriers as great African Americans such as Sidney Poitier, Oprah Winfrey, Denzel Washington, Spike Lee, Halle Berry have done for their community.” One small way to get “involved”, he states, is to come see the movie and bring a few friends. The test audiences, made up of mainstream Americans, enjoyed the movie so much that over 75% of them said they would recommend it to their friends.
Ocean of Pearls - Home
“Ocean of Pearls” is the first movie to be made out of Hollywood by a Sikh director, Sarab Singh Neelam. It will be premiering at the 25th Miami International Film Festival. The festival is being held during the first week of March 2008, and the showings of the movie will be on March 2, 5 and 7.
Please visit http://www.miamifilmfestival.com/pdfs/MIFF_Film_Guide.pdf (page 7 of film guide) for more details.
It has been a long road of over ten years for director (and physician), Dr. Neelam, who has wanted to make movies for as long as he can remember. His purpose in making this movie was two-fold. One was to bring awareness about Sikhs and Sikhism to the general public. He says “Growing up in Toronto, we went through a lot of discrimination. After 9/11, it got worse. I feel movies are a powerful medium to bring about awareness and hopefully reduce hate crimes.”
The other purpose was for Sikhs themselves. “Even though there are millions of Sikhs worldwide, there are hardly any films that depict us in our proper way. Usually, we are absent in Hollywood films or comic relief characters in Bollywood,” he states passionately. “It’s important for us to be involved in visual media to break down barriers as great African Americans such as Sidney Poitier, Oprah Winfrey, Denzel Washington, Spike Lee, Halle Berry have done for their community.” One small way to get “involved”, he states, is to come see the movie and bring a few friends. The test audiences, made up of mainstream Americans, enjoyed the movie so much that over 75% of them said they would recommend it to their friends.
Ocean of Pearls - Home
