Alipur Films

Based out of the UK and India, Alipur Films is a multi-award winning, boutique film-production company founded by Oscar® nominated and two-time National Award winning writer/director/actor & editor Ashvin Kumar in 2004. Alipur Films has crafted shorts, documentaries and feature films rooted in the Indian subcontinent but with global, universal appeal. Right since 2003 our films have been creative co-productions bringing cinematic and aesthetic talents from divese countries such as UK, France and the USA to Indian stories. Our films have travelled to over 200 international film-festivals winning top prizes and nominations; we have been reviewed and featured by the BBC, Sight and Sound, Sunday Times, Total Film, Time-Out London, Huff Post, First Post, Economic Times, Rediff, The Wire, Quint, The Week, NDTV, Indian Express, Hindustan Times, Times of India among others. Our films have been distributed theatrically in India, UK and France. And, in recent years, on Netflix, Amazon Prime.

Oscar® nomination for “Little Terrorist” (2005) also, nominated for European Film Academy | honourable mention BAFTA/LA, Aspen | Grand Prize,  Tehran Film Festival | 1st Prize, Montreal Film Festival | Best Film - Docufest FF, Flanders FF, Manhattan FF | Audience Award, Almeria En Corto | Winner, Best Short Film, Satyajit Ray Film awards | Bell Expressvu Award, Reelworld FF, Canada | Silver Conch, MIFF (Mumbai) | Winner, Montreal, Sao Paulo, Luciana (Italy), Salento, Sousse (Tuniese), Temecula Valley, Alternative Film Festival (Romania) | in competition Tribeca, Telluride, Sydney, Bangkok, Palm Springs, London, Chicago Children’s FF, Berlin Shorts FF, Motovun FF, Odense, San Francisco, Tampere, Tobor, Asiana | and over 150 other film festivals.

“No Fathers in Kashmir” Alumni, Sundance Lab / Development Grant, Asia Pacific Screen Awards released theatrically in the UK (2020) to reviews from Hollywood actor Joanna Lumley, BBC’s Mark Kermode, Sight & Sound, Time Out UK (4 stars), Total Film (4 stars), Daily Express. Its Indian theatrical release (2019) saw critical acclaim from Mira Nair, Shabana Azmi, Shashi Tharoor, Aparna Sen with reviews in Huff Post and Rediff (4.5 stars),Times of India (4 stars), Republic World (4 stars).

“Inshallah, football” (2010) Jury Prize winner Dubai FF | winner AND grant - Busan Film Festival | official selections of  Chicago & Pusan | Netflix and Amazon Prime

“Inshallah, Kashmir” (2012) also, Al Jazeera Doc Film Festival | Netflix and Amazon Prime

“Road to Ladakh” (2004) official selections, Raindance & Vancouver Film Festivals | 2004 starring Irrfan Khan | | Netflix and Amazon Prime

“Dazed in Doon” (2010), an educational-participatory film, a one-of-a-kind project in which we created an entire feature film with the combined talents of 60 school-going teens of Doon School, India.

“The Forest” (2009), Raindance & Stiges Film Festivals released theatrically in India in 2012 | | Netflix and Amazon Prime

“I am Not Here” (2015) about undocumented migrants in Switzerland, USA and Malaysia, commissioned by the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights

“4 Daughters in Kashmir” (2022) | awaiting premiere on Zee5

Ashvin Kumar

Writer | Director | Actor | Producer 

Ashvin founded Alipur Films in 2003. He is an Oscar nominee and 2 time national award winning writer / director / actor / producer. For the past ten years Ashvin has worked extensively in the valley of Kashmir. He lives and works out of Goa, India.

Up next is a comedy set in Goa during the lockdown about his dog and himself, called “Feni” which will be followed by a romantic comedy “Swift Desire”, also set in Goa. He is in development with a webseries and a feature film set in India, Britain and France, in the late 1700 and1800s. In his spare time he likes to teach film making, a series of short film-making classes which are avilable on his Instagram handle.

Before he took to making films, Ashvin worked as an actor and director in theatre appearing in productions like Harold Pinter’s One For The Road, Moliere’s A Physician Inspite of Himself, Beckett’s Krapps Last Tape, Ionessco’s The Lesson and founded one of the first digital post-production studios in India in 1996. He is a voting member of the European Film Academy and TEDx speaker. He mentors aspiring film-makers, inviting them to be a part of his film-crew and sharing his passion for filmmaking.