Jim Birmant of Paris-based Bliss and Mathias Schwerbrock of Film Base Berlin have boarded Indian-born director Prashant Nair’s new project Umrika as co-producers.

Birmant produced French-Swedish comedy Sound Of Noise, which premiered in Cannes’ Critics Week in 2010, while Film Base Berlin co-produced Farhan Akhtar’s Don 2 in 2011.

A Hindi comedy set in a small Indian village, Umrika follows the story of two brothers. When the elder one abandons his native village for a bigger and better life in the US, leaving behind only a mysterious trail of letters, the younger one must follow in his footsteps to find out what truly happened to his brother.

Umrika will Film Base Berlin’s first German-French-Indian co-production,” said Schwerbrock. “It is a strikingly strong and powerful story and I trust Prashant to make it into an extraordinarily moving and emotional picture with a universal appeal reaching out to a big international audience.”

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The film is expected to start shooting in India by May 2013. Its script was selected for the Mumbai Mantra Sundance Lab 2012 and the project was also a finalist for the Mahindra Sundance Global Filmmaking Award this year.

Umrika is a heartwarming look at the mythology and lure of America and its impact on the lives of a village family,” said Nair.

Nair won the Director’s Vision award at the ninth Indian Film Festival of Stuttgart for his debut film Delhi In A Day. It was released in India by PVR Directors’ Rare earlier this year.