With over 10.8K followers on twitter and 1,21,215 likes on Facebook, Sirocco is a celebrity in New Zealand. He has a government job and an entourage of people to ensure that he eats right, sleeps well and looks good for all his public appearances.
Although Sirocco acts like a human, he is actually New Zealand’s official spokesbird for conservation.
Ashwika Kapur, an Indian student studying Science and Natural Filmmaking at the University of Otago, while looking for topics to make a film as part of her study programme chanced upon Sirocco’s story and made a film about him on a student budget of approximately Rs. 50,000.
The film ‘Sirocco: How a Dud Became a Stud’ not only helped her graduate but won her a Panda Award (also known as the Green Oscar) in the Global Category.
Sirocco is a rare bird, a Kakapo parrot. There are only 125 Kakapos left on the planet. They are nocturnal, flightless birds and are known to live for over a 100 years. Their numbers reduced drastically due to poaching and by the 1970’s there were only 18 of them left.
Ashwika’s film traces the journey of Sirocco from birth when he was forced to grow up with humans due to health problems. After being nursed back to health, he did not go back to mingle with his species and chose to live in close proximity to humans. This was a problem for conservationist as they needed Sirocco to breed. Sirocco was considered a dud until one day he shot to fame through an internet video that went viral.
“Shooting a bird that is nocturnal with a one-man crew on a student budget was quite a daunting task”, says Ashwika who believes in doing extensive research and coming up with a story before filming. A lot of archival footage came to her aid to tell the rags to riches story of the bird.
Ashwika was introduced to films as a child artist and was passionate about animals, so much so, that she had turned her bedroom on the 12th floor in Kolkata into a mini zoo with numerous pets. It was her love for animals and tryst with films that made her choose her career as a filmmaker.
“I believe that to be a good filmmaker about conservation you need to kill the conservationist in you or you will end up being preachy and make a film that appeals to people who already show empathy towards wildlife and nature. To lure an audience that is indifferent you need to tell a good story,” says the young filmmaker.
The film was screened at the New Zealand High Commission for a group of wildlife enthusiasts and other guests in the presence of the award winning filmmaker.
