How Ishan Shukla realised 'Schirkoa'

This animated feature with shades of 1984’ has a wild sci-fi palette and an eclectic voice cast

- Uday Bhatia

This week, Ishan Shukla's Schirkoa premieres at the International Film Festival Rotterdam. It's not often you get Indian animated features on the global festival circuit-and this one is a unique creation: Orwellian gloom with a cyberpunk edge and contributions by Golshifteh Farahani, Asia Argento and Gaspar Noé. Shukla, who lives in Vadodara, made a 2016 short, also titled Schirkoa (it's free on Vimeo), which he then expanded into a full-blown vision. In a highly regulated dystopian future society, everyone wears paper bags over the heads.

But rumours of a free world circulate, and an encounter with a mysterious girl sends the film's central character, a rule-following everyman, on a journey of discovery. We spoke to Shukla over Zoom about his inspirations and his heady, shape-shifting animation style. Edited excerpts from the interview:

How did 'Schirkoa' originate?

I started my career in Singapore. Around 2010, I started working on this universe called Schirkoa. At the time it was a graphic novel. I was drawing in my diary on the commute to office everyday. I was inspired by the people on the commute I saw my reflection and thought, I am one of the faceless people going to office.

When the Schirkoa world became very big, I took a long sabbatical and came to India. I worked on the short film myself for two-three years. Once it did very well on the festival circuit, I pitched it as a feature. In my head it was always a big universe; I just realised it in a short film first.

Is the animation process different in the short and the feature?