Sindhu Sreenivasa Murthy

Sindhu’s breakthrough project is the film Aachar & Co.

Breaking out of your perceived lane can be difficult in the screen industries. Sindhu Sreenivasa Murthy did just that with her debut film as writer-director, Aachar & Co. (2023, streaming on Amazon Prime).

Sindhu had an established career as a performer before stepping behind the camera, she made her debut as a performer in Netflix Original’s Brahman Naman (2016). Interested in other avenues for storytelling, she was selected for the AIB First Draft writing workshop. Out of this, Aachar & Co. was born, a Kannada language coming-of-age story, which Sindhu co-wrote, directed and stars in. It went on to earn her two South Indian International Movie Awards nominations, one for performance and one for directing.

Sindhu is currently developing her next Kannada feature, 13 Days, which won the Screen Writers Association Script Lab in 2022 and was selected for The Storiculture Company’s South BRIDGE initiative, a root.ax accelerator programme designed to maximise the potential of creative projects. Sindhu continues to stretch her acting muscles, too, including in the recent Family Drama (2024).

In their own words…

“It is an absolute honour to be a part of this year’s BAFTA Breakthrough programme. Being a debutant writer and director, I believe that this would add a lot of value while increasing my exposure to industry experts from across India and beyond. Coming from the Kannada film industry has its own challenges, around language visibility in a predominantly Hindi speaking country, a lack of female voices and growing anxiety around the future of content. I believe that this initiative has come at the right time to help me grow as a filmmaker and expand my horizons, while giving back to the industry here.”