Though Suriya's Jai Bhim and Mohanlal's Marakkar: Arabikadalinte Simham did not make the cut in the 94th Academy Awards, not all hope is lost for India. The documentary film, Writing with Fire, bagged an Oscar nomination and is the first all-India independent production to make it to the final nomination in this category. In December, it had made it to the Oscars shortlist — among 15 films from a pool of 138. Directed by filmmakers Sushmit Ghosh and Rintu Thomas and produced under their Black Ticket Films banner, it focuses on the journalists running the Dalit women-led newspaper Khabar Lahariya, as they shift from 14-years of print to digital journalism using smartphones.
True story - your Documentary Feature nominees are... #Oscar pic.twitter.com/wCvJ0Ao6Jr
— The Academy (@TheAcademy) February 8, 2022
Writing with Fire is the first Indian feature documentary to be nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature and is about how a cluttered news landscape dominated by men emerges to become India's only newspaper run by Dalit women. Chief reporter Meera and her journalists break traditions, redefining what it means to be powerful. Apart from the much deserved Oscar nomination, following its release, Writing with Fire was showcased at numerous film festivals and won 28 awards, including the World Cinema Documentary Special Jury Award: Impact for Change and the World Cinema Documentary Competition Audience Award at the 2021 Sundance Film Festival. Winner of 6 Audience Awards and 11 Best Documentary awards, Writing with Fire has been nominated for the 2022 IDA Best Feature Documentary Award and is also a 2022 The Producers Guild of America Best Motion Picture nominee. The film has also garnered two Cinema Eye Honors nominations.
The four other finalists in the same category that are competing against Writing with Fire are Chinese-American Jessica Kingdon’s film, Ascension, which explores the pursuit of the Chinese Dream in modern society and China's vision of prioritizing productivity and innovation above all.; Traci A Curry and Stanley Nelson’s Attica about the 1971 rebellion at Attica prison in New York State; Jonas Poher Rasmussen’s Danish animated Afghan refugee story Flee; and Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson’s Summer of the Soul (…Or, When the Revolution Could Not be Televised) on the 1969 Harlem cultural festival where thousands came together to celebrate black history, culture, music, and fashion.