Asian Pitch selects four projects to commission

August 28, 2012 by Barry Walsh

This year’s Asian Pitch competition – backed by Japan’s NHK, Singapore’s Mediacorp and Korea’s KBS – has selected four projects that it will commission to air next year.

The annual competition is designed to both find new Asian talent and also create new HD documentaries for the three public broadcasters to air in their regions. Winning directors receive full funding for their projects as well as the guarantee that their docs will air in Japan, Singapore and South Korea in the following year. Taiwanese pubcaster PTS will be part of the proceedings next year.

The winning documentaries for the 2012 Asian Pitch are: Sorrowgacy from India’s Ishani K. Dutta, which follows the journey of a surrogate mother from India; Defector from South Korea’s Lee Kil Do, which tells the story of the 24,000 North Korean defectors living in South Korea; Sanitary Towels Inc. from India’s Akanksha Sood, which recounts the story of the man who invented a low-cost sanitary napkin machine in India; and Wheatfield Sailors from Taiwan’s Huo Ning, which tells the story of two farm boys and their teacher, who is preparing them to become sailors.

The winners were chosen from a shortlist of nine films, which was whittled down from 100 proposals submitted from countries including China, India, Indonesia, South Korea, Malaysia, Pakistan, and Thailand. The directors of the shortlisted projects were flown to Singapore to pitch to executives from NHK, KBS and Mediacorp at the end of July.

Production for the winning projects will commence shortly, with the completed programs to be available internationally by next summer.

For more information about the Asian Pitch, click here.

Tags: Defector, KBS, Mediacorp, NHK, Sanitary Napkins Inc., Sorrowgacy, The Asian Pitch, Wheatfield Sailors