''Sultana's Dream'' () is a 2023 animated

drama film In film and television, drama is a category or genre of narrative fiction (or semi-fiction) intended to be more serious than humorous in tone. The drama of this kind is usually qualified with additional terms that specify its particular ...

directed by Isabel Herguera from a screenplay she co-wrote with Gianmarco Serra, based in part on the 1905 short story of the same name by Rokeya Hossain.

Premise

Inés, a Spanish artist living in

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

, travels throughout the country learning about the life of author Rokeya Hossain and the

utopian A utopia ( ) typically describes an imagined community or society that possesses highly desirable or near-perfect qualities for its members. It was coined by Sir Thomas More for his 1516 book ''Utopia'', which describes a fictional island soci ...

Ladyland she described in her 1905 short story ''Sultana's Dream''.

Cast

* Mary Beard * Miren Arrieta * Mireia Gabilondo * Maurizio Faraoni * Manu Khurana * Arunima Bhattacharya * Ranjitha Rajeevan * Paul B. Preciado

Production

In 2012, Herguera launched a

crowdfunded Crowdfunding is the practice of funding a project or venture by raising money from a large number of people, typically via the internet. Crowdfunding is a form of crowdsourcing and alternative finance, to fund projects "without standard financial ...

workshop series in India focused on ''Sultana's Dream'' by Rokeya Hossain. The director later received a screenwriting grant from the

Basque government The Basque Government (, ; ) is the governing body of the Basque Autonomous Community of Spain. The head of the Basque government is known as the '' Lehendakari''. The Lehendakari is appointed by the Basque Parliament every four years, after a re ...

to develop a film based on Hossain's work. Each of the film's three parts was created using a different animation technique. Portions of the narrative centered on Inés are animated with ink and watercolor, shadow puppets tell the story of Rokeya Hossain, and the fictional Ladyland is animated using mendhi.

Release

''Sultana's Dream'' screened as a work-in-progress at the 2023

Annecy International Animation Film Festival The Annecy International Animation Film Festival (, officially abbreviated in English as the Annecy Festival, or simply Annecy) was created in 1960 and takes place at the beginning of June in the town of Annecy, France. Initially occurring ever ...

. The completed film premiered on 24 September 2023 at the

San Sebastián International Film Festival The San Sebastián International Film Festival ( SSIFF; , ) is an annual FIAPF A category film festival held in the Spain, Spanish city of Donostia, Donostia-San Sebastián in September, in the Basque Country (autonomous community), Basque Countr ...

, where it was awarded the Basque Film Award and the award for the Best Basque Screenplay. The film was released nationwide in Spain on 17 November.

Reception

Box office

''Sultana's Dream'' grossed $7,867 during the film's theatrical release in Spain.

Accolades

References

External links

* *{{Rotten Tomatoes , id=sultanas_dream , title= Sultana's Dream 2023 films 2023 animated films 2023 drama films 2023 multilingual films Spanish drama films German drama films 2020s feminist films 2020s German films 2020s Spanish films Animated films based on short fiction Animated films set in India German animated films German multilingual films Spanish animated films Spanish multilingual films Basque-language films 2020s Bengali-language films 2020s English-language films English-language Spanish films English-language German films 2020s Hindi-language films 2020s Italian-language films Italian-language Spanish films Italian-language German films 2020s Spanish-language films Spanish-language German films