14th International Film Festival of Kerala -Programmes being finalised

The Department of Cultural Affairs and Kerala State Chalachitra Academy are planning to felicitate Music maestro A.R. Rahman , Oscar winners Resul Pookutty and Gulzar at the inaugural ceremony of the forthcoming IFFK -14th International Film Festival of Kerala from 11 to 18th December.Fourteen films, including two Malayalam films, Sufi Paranja Katha directed by Priyanandanan and Madhyavenal by Madhu Kaithapuram. are selected for the competition section. Do paise ki dhoop, char aane ki baarish by Deepti Naval and Road to Sangam by Amit Rai are the other two Indian films in the competition section.
There are seven films in the Indian Cinema Now section, including the award winning Marathi film Harishchandrachi Factory. Two other Marathi films, Gandh directed by Sachin Kundalkar and Vihir directed by Umesh Vinayak Kulkarni, have also found their place in this section. Bengali films Kaalbela directed by Goutam Ghosh and Maya Bazaar directed by Joydeep Ghosh, Telugu movie Sontha Vooru directed by P. Suneel Kumar Reddy and Hindi film Ek tho chance by Saeed Akhtar Mir are also included .Films from Latin America, Africa, Asia and Europe will also be screened at the festival. The country in focus for the current fest will be Cuba.

Indian panorama non feature list for 40th IFFI-2009 announced

The opening film in the non-features section will be "In For Motion" (English) by Anirban Datta in the Indian Panorama section of the 40th International Film Festival of India (IFFI) 2009 to be held in Panaji, Goa from November 23,2009 which will have 18 non features. Other films to be shown in the section are "Bilal" (Bengali and Hindi) by Sourav Sarangi, "Ekti Kaktaliya Golpo" (Bengali) by Tathagaba Sinha, "I'm the Very Beautiful" (Bengali) by Shyamal Kumar Karmakar, "The First Leap" (English) by Haobam Pabankumar, "The Latent City" (English) by Krishnendu Bose, Gautam Benegal's "The Prince and the Crown of Stones" (English), "What If?" (English) by V K Prakash, "Boond" (Hindi) by Abhishek Pathak, "Chilika Banks" (Hindi) by Akanksha Joshi, "Kya Main Qafir Hoon" (Hindi) by "Sandhin Flora", "Supermen of Malegaon" (Hindi and Urdu) by Faiza Ahmad Khan, "Swayambhu Sen Forsees His End" in Hindi, Malayalam and English by Debashish Medhkar, Arun Sukumar's "When This Man Dies" in Hindi and English, "Kelkkunnundo" (Malayalam) by Geetu Mohan Das, "Ilisa Amagi Mahao" (Manipuri) by Nighthouja Lancha, "Vitthal" (Marathi) by Vinno Choliparambil and "Nanam Oru Pen" (Tamil) V Ranganathan.
The non-feature films jury was headed by Manipuri filmmaker Aribam Syam Sharma with Paromita Vohra, Pushpesh Pant, Sameer Hanchate and Kapilas Bhuyan as the other members.

Indian panorama list for 40th IFFI - 2009 announced

Konkani movie "Paltadacho Munis" will be the opening film in the Indian Panorama section of the 40th International Film Festival of India (IFFI) 2009 to be held in Panaji, Goa from November 23,2009 which will have 26 feature films .As the Kerala High Court has lifted a stay on the publication of results of films selected for the Indian Panorama, the Information and Broadcasting Ministry announced the list of films to be shown in the Indian panorama .There will be six Bengali, three Kannada, two English ,two Malayalam, two Tamil, one Tulu , one Konkani ,three Marathi, one Rajasthani and five Hindi films.Hindi films include recent Bollywood releases "Dev. D" (Anurag Kashyap), "Firaaq" (Nandita Das), "Kaminey" (Vishal Bhardwaj), "Oye Lucky-Lucky Oye" (Dibakar Banerjee) ,and "The White Elephant" (Ajiz Khan). other films included in this basket are Bengali films, "Aainaate" (Dulal Dey),"Angashumaner Chhobi" (Atanu Ghosh), "Antaheen" (Aniruddha Roy Chowdhury),"Dwando" (Suman Ghosh), "Janala" (Buddhadeb Dasgupta), and "Shob Charitro Kalponik" (Rituparno Ghosh) and "For Real" by Sona Jain in English, "Land Gold Women" in English and Urdu by Avantika Hari,"Beli Matthu Hola" (Kannada) by P R Ramadasa Naidu, "Ijjodu" (Kannada) by M S Sathyu, "Shankara Punyokoti" (Kannada) by G Murthy, "Keshu" (Malayalam) by Sivan,"Kutty Shrank" (Malayalam) by Shaji N Karun, "Ek Cup Chay" (Marathi) by Sumitra Bhave and Sunil Sukhtankar, "Gabhrjcha Paus" (Marathi) by Satish Manwar, Harishchandrachi Factory ( Marathi) Paresh Mokashi , "Haat: The Weekly Bazaar" (Rajasthani) by Seema Kapoor, "Achchamundu Achchamundu" (Tamil) by Arun Vaidyanathan, "Pasanga" (Tamil) by Pandi Raj ,"Gaggara" in Tulu by Shivadhwaj Shettyand Paltadacho Munis (Konkani), by Laxmikant Shetgaonkar.
Muzaffar Ali chaired the jury of the feature films section which had Bobby Bedi, Joseph Pulinthanath, J Mahendran, Gautaman Bhaskaran, Leslie Carvalho and Raja Mitra as members.

Panorama Films for IFFI 2009: interim stay lifted

A Division Bench of the Kerala High Court comprising Chief Justice S.R .Bannurmath and Justice A.K.Basheer on Tuesday stayed a single Judge’s order restraining the Government of India in the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting and the Directorate of Film Festivals from publishing the results of the selection of films made to the Indian panorama for the 40th International Film Festival of India, 2009, to be held in Panaji, Goa from November 23. In the appeal the Directorate contended that as per the existing regulations any dispute arising between the producer and the Directorate of Film Festivals shall be referred to the Secretary , Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Govt.of India whose decision shall be final. In this case instead of approaching the Secretary I&B first, the petitioner had filed a petition before the High Court directly.

40th IFFI to begin in Panaji ,Goa on November 23,2009.

Best Director and Best film award
introduced
200 films from India and abroad to be showcased

40th edition of International Film Festival of India (IFFI 2009), promises a wide selection of 200 films both from India and abroad.. IFFI 2009 will be inaugurated on November 23, at the Kala Academy in Panaji, Goa and ten filmy days till 3 rd December, 2009.
"In a departure from previous years, we will have a best director and best film award this year” said Festival Director S M Khan at a press meet in Mumbai on Monday. “the best film award will be jointly shared by both the director and the producer of the film,'' he added. The winner gets the prestigious Golden Peacock award and Rs 40 lakhs (Rs 4 million) as cash prize. The Best Director and the winner of the Special Jury Award will get silver peacock and cash prizes of Rs 15 lakhs (Rs1.5 Million) each.
The Indian Panorama will showcase 47 films – 26 feature and 21 non-feature films selected by the jury. In addition, the National Film Archives of India, Pune will screen five vintage musical hits and three National Film Award winning movies – Do Ankhen Baara Haath (1957), Sagar Sangame (1958) and Apur Sansar (1959). Tributes to Indian film personalities include Neelu Phule, Prakash Mehra, Shakti Samanta, Feroz Khan, Leela Naidu among others. The Films Division, Mumbai will show documentaries on Indian music and musicians covering Pandit Bhimsen Joshi, Ustad Bismillah Khan, Ustad Amjad Ali Khan, Pandit Jasraj, Naushad, K L Saigal, Begum Akhtar and Mohammad Rafi. Retrospective in the Indian section will be of films from Assam, as the Assemese Film Industry is celebrating the diamond jubilee. The films of Jahnu Barua, Bhabhendranath Saikia, Santwana Bardoloj and Sanjeev Hazarika will be showcased.
Retrospective will also feature films of those artistes who have completed 50 years in the film industry. Two movies each of Kamal Hassan, Asha Parekh and Saumitra Chatterjee will be screened.In the Cinema of the World, about 65 films from 45 countries have been selected by the Preview Committee. The continent focus is on Africa and Latin America, while the country focus is on cinema of Italy, France, Poland, Croatia and Estonia. Films made by Indians abroad on NRI issues will be part of the ‘Film India Worldwide’ section. Retrospectives in the foreign films category will include Gurinder Chadha, UK, Manuel De Oleivera, Portugal and Nonzee Nimibutr, Thailand. In addition, five anti-war films will also be shown. Spoof Cinema, mocking popular cinema is the new entrant in this edition of the festival. Films such as “Malegaon ka Superman’ and ‘Gabbarbhai MBBS’ are part of this package. Among the parallel activities, Shiamak Davar will present a lecture demonstration on ‘Evolution of Dance in Hindi Cinema’ while Kishwar Desai will speak on ‘Hindi Films based on book adaptations.”

Indian Panorama (IFFI - 2009) list stayed

The High Court of Kerala forbidden the Information and Broadcasting Ministry of Govt of India and the Directorate of Film Festivals from publishing the list of films selected for the Indian Panorama section of the IFFI 2009- International Film Festival of India, 2009- to be held in Panaji ,Goa from 23rd November this year. The order came on a writ petition filed by Renjith, film producer and director. According to him, though the Directorate had not announced the selections made by the jury, the names of the films had been posted on a website run by Gauthaman Bhaskaran ,one of the jury members.
On hearing the news appeared in the website ,the producers and directors in the Malayalam film industry opine that the selection of films to the Indian Panorama category was arbitrary and biased and most of the films entered from Malayalam were of outstanding quality with aesthetic appeal. They pointed out that the film Pazhasi Raja depicting the life of a Patriot King excels with any other film chosen for the Panorama. Films like Rithu ,Thalappavu ,Bhoomimalayalam,Soofiparanja katha, Keralacafe and Ramanam were far better than the films “selected”, they said. They have the strong feeling that the Malayalam films had been sidelined, with only one being chosen, the other one being the nomination of trade body . The petitioner sought a direction to the Union Government to conduct a detailed inquiry into the process of selection of films and take action, including making a fresh selection. The Court ordered that the interim stay order would be in force until the writ petition is disposed of.

Michael Haneke’s "The White Ribbon" will receive the FIPRESCI Grand Prix 2009 at San Sebastian

Michael Haneke's The White Ribbon (Das weisse Band) will receive the FIPRESCI Grand Prix 2009 for the Best Film of the Year at the opening ceremony of the San Sebastián International Film Festival.Michael Haneke (Munich, 1942) is one of contemporary cinema’s most greatly admired directors and a recipient of multiple plaudits for his work. Winner of the Golden Palm and the FIPRESCI at Cannes 2009 for The White Ribbon, Haneke has garnered countless accolades, including the Best Director Award for Caché (1995) and the Grand Jury Prize for La pianiste (The Piano Teacher, 2001), both at Cannes Festival. He has also carried off the Fipresci Prize at various festivals, and the award granted by the Federation at the European Film Awards, the first of which went to Benny’s Video (1992).
The White Ribbon was chosen the Best Film of the Year by the 223 critics throughout the world that took part in the poll for Grand Prix. The award will be handed out on Friday, September 18th, during the opening ceremony of the San Sebastian International Film Festival, which hosts the Grand Prix since its creation in 1999.
The Grand Prix, which distinguishes a film from the current season (any feature-length film premiered since July of the previous year) for its overall artistic quality, has already distinguished Pedro Almodóvar (All About My Mother, 1999, and Volver, 2006), Paul Thomas Anderson (Magnolia, 2000 and There Will Be Blood, 2008), Jafar Panahi (The Circle, 2001), Aki Kaurismäki (The Man Without a Past, 2002), Nuri Bilge Ceylan (Uzak, 2003), Jean-Luc Godard (Notre musique, 2004), Kim Ki-Duk (Iron 3, 2005), and Cristian Mungiu (4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days, 2007).