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Searching 4 Sandeep is a 55-minute documentary that charts the story of Sydney filmmaker Poppy Stockell in her search for love online. Australian television audiences will see the film for the first time at 9.25pm on Thursday 13 November on ABC TV.

Searching 4 Sandeep premiered at the 2007 Sydney Film Festival, taking out a World Movies Channel Audience Award and receiving the highest audience vote of any of the 209 films in the program. It has since been screened by the Melbourne and Brisbane International Film Festivals, queerDOC and WOW (receiving the Audience Award and Best Documentary Award at the latter), as well as countless other domestic and international festivals, from Dungog, NSW to Bergen, Norway.

Poppy was nominated for a 2007 IF Independent Spirit Award for her work on the project and the film more recently received nominations at the prestigious 2008 Hot Docs documentary festival and the BANFF World Television Awards in Canada. Alongside Summer Heights High, it was one of just three projects chosen to represent Australia at the INPUT (INternational PUblic Television) Broadcasters Festival in Johannesburg earlier this year. It has since been sold to broadcasters in Germany, Sweden, France, Israel and the US.

THE STORY:

Despite living in one of the gay capitals of the world, 28-year-old Sydney filmmaker Poppy Stockell is forced online in her search for love. When she meets 31-year-old Anglo-Indian Sandeep Virdi, she thinks she's found the one. Unfortunately, Sandeep lives at home in the British Midlands with her conservative Sikh parents and three younger sisters. Oh, and she's not out to any of them...

Through raw, incredibly frank footage, Searching 4 Sandeep follows Poppy and Sandeep's relationship across two years and three continents.

POPPY STOCKELL - WRITER/DIRECTOR

Poppy began her career at Sydney's 2SER FM whilst completing a degree in zoology at the University of New South Wales. She has since had extensive experience in radio as a freelance producer and program-maker, particularly for the ABC's national youth station, triple j.

In 2004 Poppy made the leap to film and television, studying cinematography at North Sydney TAFE. Her camera credits since have included Walk Like a Man, Suburban Mayhem and The Silence. Her film credits as writer/director include the short Alight Touch and music video Foolscap and she is regularly commissioned to create travel stories for Lonely Planet.

Poppy’s love of the Gulf of Carpentaria area of Australia has led to a wealth of experience with indigenous content. Credits include Ghost Nets, Road to Gove, Freedom Ride 2005 and Kubin Community, Moa Island Torres Strait.

Poppy currently lives by the beach in Sydney and works for the ABC.

CECILIA RITCHIE - PRODUCER

A regular contributor to Inside Film Magazine, Cecilia's credits include the 2006 Tropfest finalist Pacific, by September writer/director Peter Carstairs.

Between 2002 and 2005 Cecilia was the writers' and directors' agent for Sydney theatrical agency Shanahan Management. Prior to that, she worked as a fulltime screenplay assessor. Cecilia has also held roles with the Sydney Film Festival and Maria Farmer Public Relations. She has a BA in Performance Studies and Australian Literature from the University of Sydney and is about to graduate with a Masters from AFTRS.

POPPY'S THOUGHTS ON THE FILM

I started making this film in October 2005 – a time when I’d decided to stop licking the wounds from my previous relationship and move on with my life. Disheartened with the Sydney ‘scene’, I started using an online chat site called Pink Sofa. It was a pretty weird experience but I found the process of creating connections with virtual strangers totally fascinating. Such was the motivation for picking up my camera and recording the beginnings of this film.

What was to be a generic story about internet dating quickly became a very personal one when I stumbled upon the profile of one Sandeep Virdi, a girl who was perfect for me in every way…except for the major cultural, social and geographical distances between us! Right from the beginning, I was honest with Sandeep and told her that I wanted to make a film. To my amazement, she was into the idea, and so just as our online relationship was blossoming I sent a camera to her home on the other side of the world. While I was recording my video diaries in the summer heat, she started to record hers in a bitter UK winter.

I’ve always tried to record my story in a warts and all way. In this I was particularly inspired by Robert Gibson’s 1995 documentary Video Fool for Love. Gibson is so brave in that film – he’s not afraid to show himself in a bad light or to reveal his vulnerability – and even though it’s pretty lo-fi filmmaking, that’s what makes it so engaging. It’s what I like about Susan Buice and Arin Crumley’s Four Eyed Monsters too. So even though it’s been a pretty confronting experience in the edit, I hope Searching 4 Sandeep also has those qualities.

When we first pitched this project I said I wanted to make a film about the way in which new forms of communication like the internet and SMS have changed the way our generation relate to one another. Searching 4 Sandeep does follow that theme – how technology can help us find other people but can also hinder our intimacy – and it’s also the story of a pretty serious dose of culture clash. Ultimately though, Searching 4 Sandeep is about how love is the most important element of life, and that it’s worth fighting for. I believed that before I started making the film but the process of making it – and particularly Sandeep’s generosity in helping me make it – has really crystallised the idea for me. Now that it’s finished, I can see that Searching 4 Sandeep is really a kind of love letter to her.

Poppy Stockell