![Reel dreams: ‘‘Before the end of this year I’m going to India to make a feature film based on my life and how I suffered in Sri Lanka during the [2009] riots,’’ said Eelam Elanko, pictured with his wife Subashini. Picture: Mike Sea](/static/1369281537/images/1x1-placeholder.gif "Reel dreams: ‘‘Before the end of this year I’m going to India to make a feature film based on my life and how I suffered in Sri Lanka during the [2009] riots,’’ said Eelam Elanko, pictured with his wife Subashini. Picture: Mike Sea")
Reel dreams: ‘‘Before the end of this year I’m going to India to make a feature film based on my life and how I suffered in Sri Lanka during the [2009] riots,’’ said Eelam Elanko, pictured with his wife Subashini. Picture: Mike Sea
AUSTRALIA'S first Tamil feature film has been picked for an international film festival.
But its Pendle Hill creator, Eelam Elanko, was among the last to find out.
"My brother-in-law in India posted 'congratulations' on my Facebook and I had to say 'what for?"' Mr Elanko said.
"He sent me a link.
"It [the news] was all over the Indian newspapers, that my film had been selected for the [fourth] Norway Tamil Film Festival in April."
A seven-member jury panel unanimously accepted the selection of 15 movies for screening in the festival.
"At the screening, ours will receive the award for Best Tamil Movie Made by Tamils Overseas," Mr Elanko's wife/marketing manager Subashini Elanko said.
The English-subtitled film Iniyavale Kaaththiruppen, which translates to Sweetheart I'm Waiting for You, portrays the relationship between two Australian Tamil families and the cultural challenges they face in their adopted homeland.
Mr Elanko wrote, directed and acted in it.
"It is the first movie to be made by Australian Tamil people with local artists and technicians," Mrs Elanko said.
The film is written in the Tamil language, a language spoken predominantly by Tamil people of south India and north-east Sri Lanka.
It is English subtitled and features two original Indian-style songs — sung by Indian singers Unnni Krihnan and Su Jatha — and poems by Mr Elanko, who was a victim of war in his homeland of Sri Lanka.
‘‘I’m very proud that I will be representing the Australian Tamil community overseas,’’ Mr Elanko said.