According to Nature magazine, about 15 billion trees are cut every year throughout the world
Inspired by a true event, “The Tree” is an experimental short film written and directed by Kalpna Singh-Chitnis. The film is based on a work of poetry that tells the stories of millions of trees and endangered forests through the story of one tree, which inspired the film. The movie meditates on the life and purpose of a tree and draws attention to environmental concerns such as deforestation, climate change, and their effects on wildlife and our ecosystem.
Director’s Statement
Despite all my efforts to save “The Tree,” the only one by my side during the pandemic was chopped down limb by limb before my eyes one summer morning in 2020. I had not experienced such trauma by witnessing a tree felling before. Losing the tree was no less traumatic than losing a family member. I couldn’t save the tree but wanted to make it immortal. For days I meditated on the life and purpose of a tree and imagined its rebirth to find comfort. And The Tree reincarnated in a sequence of poems I wrote to tell its story that later became the script of the film I made in its memory. “The Tree,” tells the stories of millions of trees and endangered forests through the story of one tree, which inspired the film. It draws attention to environmental concerns such as deforestation, and climate change, and their effects on wildlife and our ecosystem.
AWARDS
“The Tree” won the Best Experimental Short Film Award at the 2022 North Dakota Environmental Rights Film Festival which took place from April 20 – 23, 2022 at the historic Fargo Theatre in downtown Fargo, North Dakota. It has also won the Best Environmental Film Award in April 2022 at Crown Wood International Film Festival in Kolkata, the Best Experimental Short Film Award in June 2022 at the Gangtok International Film Festival in Sikkim, and Special Mention Award in July 2021 at Madras International Film Festival in India.
OFFICIAL SELECTIONS AND SCREENINGS
The Tree in Translation
“The Tree” poem published in World Literature Today in January 2022 has been translated from the original English into Arabic by Palestinian poet Mohammad Helmi Rishah; into Spanish by Peruvian poet Martiza Luza Castillo (published in SpillWords); into French by Indian-Canadian poet Kavita Ezekiel Mendonca; into Italian by Mario Rigli; into Nepali by Suman Pokhrel; into Portuguese by Brazilian Poet Francis Kurkievicz, and into Malayalam by Indian poet Ravi Shankar N (Published in Athma).
The Tree will release with subtitles in all languages after festival rounds.
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