''The Glassworker'' (

urdu Urdu (;"Urdu"
'' Pakistan Pakistan ( ur, ), officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan ( ur, , label=none), is a country in South Asia. It is the world's fifth-most populous country, with a population of almost 243 million people, and has the world's second-lar ...

, and features anime-influenced visuals. It is also the first hand drawn animated feature film produced in Pakistan. Producer Manuel Cristobal joined the project in early 2022. During production, Mano Animation Studios was invited by the

Annecy Animation Festival The Annecy International Animation Film Festival (french: Festival international du film d'animation d'Annecy, officially abbreviated in English as the Annecy Festival, or simply Annecy) was created in 1960 and takes place at the beginning of J ...

in 2022 to be one of eight projects to present in their Work in Progress section. In 2023, film executive Apoorva Bakshi boarded the project as executive producer. ''The Glassworker'' is scheduled to be theatrically released in summer 2024.

Voice cast

The English version of voice actors include: * Athar ul-Haque Malik as Tomas Oliver *

Sacha Dhawan Sacha Dhawan (; born 1 May 1984) is a British actor from Greater Manchester. He is best known for playing Akthar in the play '' The History Boys'' (2004–2006) and its film adaptation (2006), Paul Jatri in the BBC One comedy drama series '' Las ...

as Vincent Oliver *

Anjli Mohindra Anjli Mohindra (born 20 February 1990) is a British stage, screen and voice-over actress and writer. She is best known for playing aspiring journalist Rani Chandra in the ''Doctor Who'' spin-off series ''The Sarah Jane Adventures'' (2008–2011) ...

as Alliz Amano * Tony Jayawardena as Colonel Amano *

Teresa Gallagher Teresa Gallagher is an American-born British actress. Career Gallagher is known for her role as Ellen Smith in ''The Bill'', for her appearances on radio in ''No Commitments'', ''Salem's Lot'', and ''Memorials to the Missing''. She playe ...

as Young Vincent *

Mina Anwar Mina Mumtaz Anwar (born 20 September 1969) is a British actress and singer. Early life Anwar was born in Church, Lancashire in 1969. She was educated at Accrington Moorhead High School, and gained an A level in Theatre in Performance at the Acc ...

as Nadia Amano * Sham Ali as Malik Khan * Maya Saroya as Penni * Nila Aalia as Principal Bhatti * Alex Jordan as Professor Ansari / Additional voices * Bex Wood as Mrs. Popolzai / Additional voices * Dnita Ghohil as Additional voices * Nicholas Khan as Additional voices * Marcel McCalla as Additional voices The Urdu cast announcement is expected in April 2024.

Development

A Kickstarter campaign to produce a pilot for the film was launched in February 2016. The project raised $116,000, more than double the original goal. The pilot was completed in 2018 to much acclaim and articles were published in Wired, Konbini and Vice praising the concept and quality of the project. The original story by Usman Riaz was taken forward by Moya O"Shea, who came on board to write the screenplay for the film which was completed in December 2018. Since there is a dearth of any animation infrastructure in Pakistan, the team at Mano Animation Studios in

Karachi Karachi (; ur, ; ; ) is the most populous city in Pakistan and 12th most populous city in the world, with a population of over 20 million. It is situated at the southern tip of the country along the Arabian Sea coast. It is the former c ...

had to build everything from scratch in order to create a hand drawn animated film. This included training artists on how to animate in the traditional style, paint backgrounds with the film's specific aesthetic in mind and create production pipelines to ensure everything was created efficiently, on time and of the highest quality. The pre-production teams studied various aspects of Pakistani and South Asian culture to depict daily life in the film. Many buildings in the movie are inspired by the colonial buildings of the city of

. The bazaar and surrounding buildings are inspired by the

Empress Market The Empress Market ( ur, , Sindhi: ايمپريس مارڪيٽ) is a marketplace situated in the Saddar Town locality of Karachi, Pakistan. The market traces its origins to the British Raj era, when it was first constructed. Today, it is among ...

and other colonial architecture located in Karachi. The skin tones, clothing and food in the movie shares similarities with local Pakistani culture. The animation team created a style inspired by Japanese animation studios and studios from the West.

Production

The success of the pilot allowed the studio to raise funding and begin full-scale production of the film in January 2019. Pre-production and storyboarding took place concurrently. The storyboards were completed during the COVID-19 pandemic in October 2020. Production was a mammoth task for a studio creating its debut feature. Even though most of the film was produced in Pakistan, some animation outsource services were used from studios in Korea and Philippines. Some background art outsource services were used from studios in Lithuania and Thailand. Sound post-production was finalized in Spain. English dialogues were recorded with

David Freedman David Freedman (April 26, 1898 – December 8, 1936) (aged 38) was a Romanian-born American playwright and biographer who became known as the "King of the Gag-writers" in the early days of radio. Biography David Freedman was born in Botoşan ...

in the UK and Urdu dialogues were recorded at EMI Pakistan. Production wrapped in June 2023 and post production wrapped in end 2023.

Release

The film will release in Pakistan in summer 2024. The film is scheduled for a world premiere in mid 2024.

References

External links