Soniya Kirpalani wins the 7th Annual Co-Production Challenge

“17 Not Required Indians,” a tale of injustice in a foreign land by Soniya Kirpalani of Sprocket Science Films, has won this year’s MIPDoc Co-Production Challenge. A jury headed by Hamish Mykura of the UK’s Channel 4 selected “Indians” from an inspiring line-up of documentary projects.

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This year’s winner

17 Not Required Indians

Production company: Sprocket Science Films (India)
17 Indians Receive Death Sentence for Murdering 1Pakistani- without proper trial, judged on doctored evidence. Forced to sign confession this case highlights the fate of approximately 2000 Indians languishing behind UAE prisons, whilst the Indian embassy looks away, citing NO MANDATE for their protection. This case will benchmark change. A litmus test for UAE’s Courts to guarantee fair trial, local police’s to prove `credible evidence’, the faith of 40% Indian Expatriates, living by diktats of 20% Emirati population UAE hangs by this case.

The full Challenge line-up

A Spy in Love

Production company: Ladybirds Films (France)
This documentary film is a Machiavellian psychodrama that will reveal, from a true story, what an ordinary life of a spy is like. A young French civil servant, Bernard Boursicot, is manipulated by Chinese Secret Service and becomes a spy for love. How come that someone switch overnight on betrayal, manipulation and lies? What is the price to pay? What does it really mean to be a spy? For the first time ever, Boursicot accepts to tell his extraordinary story.

Baltoro Passage

Production company: The Andrzej Wajda Master School Of Film Directing (Poland)
Three young people climb to reach the K2. Once, their parents walked this path and they never returned home. Baltoro Passage is a story about love, passion and forgiveness. About love to one’s parent, child and mountains. Is it worth to love like this...?

Desert Cantos

Production company: Off World (Belgium)
Desert Cantos is a documentary western. In this film, the western film genre is analysed to portray modern day America in a relevant and intriguing manner. It is a tale of a country on the verge of history and current events, of myth and reality.

Padre Fortea: The Exorcist

Production company: Gammaglimt AS (Norway)
"Padre Fortea: The Exorcist" is a portrait of the Spanish exorcist Jose Antonio Fortea. By following him around the world, the viewer will be taken into a mysterious world that very few people have seen before.

Wild One

Production company: Film IT (Slovenia)
An orphaned child of forbidden love born with a Rubinstein-Taybi Syndrome becomes a professional climber and, after 30 years, searches for his natural mother and the meaning of love.
The Co-Production Challenge Jury

President of the jury:
- Channel 4 Head of Documentaries, Hamish Mykura (photo), chaired the 2011 edition of the MIPDoc Co-production Challenge.

Jury members:
- Axel Arno, Commissioning Editor for SVT - Sveriges Television AB
- Nick Cohen, Multiplatform Commissioning Executive, Knowledge, BBC
- Karen Michael, Commissioning Editor for ARTE France
- Iikka Vehkalahti, Commissioning Editor, Documentary for YLE TV2