Freida Pinto is lending her voice to a new animated film project in honor of International Women’s Day.
She Creates Change is a new nonprofit-led animation and live action film project from global education organization Room to Read produced by Nexus Studios. The multi-media initiative, which spans a six-episode film series as well as books and audio stories, aims to promote gender equality through telling the stories of young women across the planet. It will initially be available in English, Hindi and Spanish with plans to translate it into dozens more languages and will be distributed across the world via Room to Read and educational partnerships. The project will also be released to general audiences in October.
The film series will be comprised of six animated shorts accompanied by live action mini documentaries. They will feature young women from Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Tanzania and Vietnam who are forced to advocate for themselves while confronting different challenges in their lives, from early marriage to food scarcity. The stories will also address menstruation, sexual harassment and financial literacy, among other topics.
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As well as Pinto, other talent contributing their voices to the project are Charithra Chandran, YouTube sensation Prajakta Koli (MostlySane), Dilshad Vadsaria, Adhir Kalyan, Amrita Acharia, and Quyen Ngo. Meanwhile Karun Mungai will perform original song “Who Am I?,” written by Warsan Shire and composed by Lucie Treacher specifically for the project.
Among the directors and artists who contributed to the series are Siqi Song, Hannah Lau-Walker, Bonnie Forsyth, Claudia Chinyere Akole, Neeraja Raj and Prashanti Aswani while Martha Adams (“We Will Rise: Michelle Obama’s Mission to Educate Girls Around the World”) is series director and producer. Brenda Chapman (“Brave”) and Jill Culton (“Abominable”) exec produce.
“For too long, the stories we have seen and heard through global media have not represented the voices of so many young women in the world,” said Adams. “The practice of sharing stories by women, about women and for women is an undeniably powerful way to help girls advocate for themselves and their rights.”
Julia Parfitt, executive producer at Nexus, added: “The results of this endeavour paint a truly emotional picture that binds the directors with their subjects to tell stories that resonate universally. I’m so glad we were able to do this using a variety of animation styles that elevated it and brought joy.”
