The animation ‘Kelileh & Demneh’ has had its first international presence at the 13th Eurasia International Film Festival in Kazakhstan, July 22-28.
Participating in the children’s section of the festival, the work is directed by Alireza Tavakoli and produced by Zahra Hasehmi. The script is written by both Tavakoli and Hashemi, Mehr News Agency reported.
Kelileh and Demneh are two young jackals. The drama starts in the middle of a rainy night when a horrified owl pays a visit to the king of the jungle to report about the excessive hunting he had witnessed.
It is a well-documented study of the history of animal fables of Indian origin, composed in Sanskrit possibly as early as the third century BC.
The original ‘Kalile and Demni’, or Panchatantra (‘Five Principles’) is an ancient Indian collection of interrelated animal fables in verse and prose, arranged within a frame story (a literary technique that serves as a companion piece to a story within a story).
In India, it had at least 25 revised editions. It was first translated into Middle Persian during the Sassanid era in 570 CE. It became the basis for a Syriac translation as ‘Kalilag and Damnag’ and a translation into Arabic in 750 CE by Persian scholar Abdullah Ibn al-Muqaffa as ‘Kalilah wa Dimnah.’ The Arabic version was translated into several languages, including Greek, Persian and Spanish. So far, it has been translated in over 50 languages. It has been published in Iran several times by various publishers.
Farabi Cinema Foundation is responsible for the international distribution of the 80-minute animation.
Born in Tehran, Tavakoli, 55, studied computer-aided designing in the US and UK. He has directed several short films and TV series and published more than 40 children books. ‘Kelileh & Demneh’ is his debut feature-length work.
The Eurasia International Film Festival is a major film forum in Central Asia accredited by the International Federation of Film Producers Associations (FIAPF).
Its aim is to support the film industry in Kazakhstan and build a platform for closer cooperation between Asia and Europe.
