06-10-2009
My Daughter Directs: A Short Film Inspired by Swimming in the Monsoon Sea
Last semester my daughter, who was fourteen at the time, read Swimming in the Monsoon Sea, by Shyam Selvadurai, for her high school English class. She’s not really much of a reader, but she thought Swimming in the Monsoon Sea was a wonderful book: “It’s tragic and sad, yet beautiful. It makes you really think. A definite tear-jerker.”
Set in Sri Lanka, Swimming in the Monsoon Sea is a coming of age story about 13-year-old Amrith, who begins to feel the first stirrings of sexual feeling and comes to an understanding of his sexual identity after he meets and falls in love with his Canadian cousin Niresh, a loud and confident boy very unlike the people Amrith has grown up with.
My daughter was so taken with this book, she decided to base her Independent Studies Unit project on it. The following short film is inspired by Swimming in the Monsoon Sea; it’s her cinematic interpretation of what Amrith feels when he realizes he is in love with Niresh.
This is her first serious film: she wrote the script, and filmed, directed, and edited it. Her best friend plays the role of Amrith. She recently uploaded the film to YouTube, so I’m happy to have the chance to spotlight it in a post. Of course I’m biased about the film, but I was taken by how well the film evokes the boy’s feelings of angst.
Swimming in the Monsoon Sea was nominated for the Governor General’s Literary Awards in 2005 in the category of Children’s Literature; it also won the 2005 Lambda Literary Award in the Children’s/Young Adult category.
You can read a review of the book at:
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June 10th, 2009 at 10:25 am
Thanks for sharing that with us. Both your daughter and her friend did a fantastic job.
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June 10th, 2009 at 10:58 am
Oh, wow that’s great. Very well done. Definitely evokes a lot of emotion. Thanks for sharing.
I really want to read this book. I hear about it a few months ago. I’m glad to hear she liked it.
-lauren
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June 10th, 2009 at 11:20 am
An amazingly powerful short film. I’ll have to read the book. Thanks so much for sharing this.
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June 10th, 2009 at 12:22 pm
Wow! I’m speechless. That’s absolutely brilliant.
Nymeth’s last blog post..Swimming in the Monsoon Sea by Shyam Selvadurai
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June 10th, 2009 at 4:14 pm
Wow, Ms. Bookish. I agree with Nymeth, that’s absolutely brilliant. It’s well filmed, the sound is well done and the emotion evoked is incredible.
Thank you for sharing it.
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June 10th, 2009 at 4:25 pm
WOW! very good.
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June 10th, 2009 at 10:20 pm
Thank you, everyone! She just keeps getting better and better all the time. We’ve decided we might do something together over the summer, and take a scene out of a book I’m reading and develop a film clip from it. I’d write the script, and she’d do all the rest. It might be fun!
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June 11th, 2009 at 1:29 am
They are talented. The book must be really inspiring. I’d never thought of developing a film from a story. Nice job.
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June 11th, 2009 at 3:45 pm
I got all tingly (and goosebumps sprouted on my arms) when I watched that. Definitely a wonderful short film. You have quite a talented daughter, Belle. But, then I already knew that…how could she not be talented with you as her mom. :D
Now I must look into that book. It sounds moving.
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July 6th, 2009 at 5:50 pm
Wow that was really good. Thanks for linking to my review, I’ll add a link to this post from my review too. Kudos to your daughter for a job well done.
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August 24th, 2009 at 4:02 pm
Really impressive work here. Kudos to your daughter and her friend.
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