Film India
Worldwide section at this
year Mumbai Film Festival, October 17 to 24, 2013
Year after year, Film India
Worldwide (FIW)at the Mumbai Film Festival has showcased films that are international in
character but linked to a recognizable Indian idiom. This year, FIW presents
six select films from countries spread far and wide – UK, Nepal, France, Canada, Pakistan and Spain. Some among them have
already been lauded at film festivals. Others make an assured entry as
premieres. Together they embrace the gamut of what India denotes to creative
cinematic minds on the world scene.
These films are by filmmakers
originating from India and now living elsewhere, whose heart and art echo back
to their homeland. Or they are by international filmmakers who come to India’s
locations to reflect its reality with new eyes.
Screenings are at Liberty Cinema
and Metro Big Cinema, Marine Lines, as well as at Cinemax, Versova.
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Film
India Worldwide 2013
Amit
Kumar’s Jadoo
EelumDixit’sPailahuru
León
Siminiani’sMAPA
Pan
Nalin’sFaith Connections
SabihaSumar’sGood Morning Karachi
Richie
Mehta’s Siddharth
Opening Film
Jadoo
(Magic)
Amit
Kumar
UK/2013/Hindi/DCP/84mins
Asian
Premiere
Attending
Actor Harish Patel (Mumbai); actor Amara Karan (UK)
Jadoo,a British
film set in Leicester, had a world premiere screening in the side-bar Culinary
Films section at 2013 Berlinale. AmitKumar has written/directed the film (his
debut film Resistancegarnered him the Writers Guild’s Best
First Film Award nomination). Jadootells the story of two
brothers, Raja and Jagi, both wonderful chefs, who fall out and tear the fabled
family recipe book in half. One brother gets the starters and the other gets
the main courses. Setting up rival restaurants on opposite sides of the road,
they spend the next ten years trying to outdo each other. Each one can cook
only half of the perfect Indian meal, which drives them mad. The daughter of
one of the bothers, a successful London lawyer, is getting married. She goes to
Leicester to try and reconcile her father and uncle so that they are one family
again, and besides, their combined talent can come together to serve the
perfect Indian feast at her wedding, food here a metaphor for family. The DOP
is Roger Pratt (Inkheart,The Karate Kid), and
the music score is by Stephen Warbeck (Shakespeare in Love, Billy
Elliot). The film stars Amara Karan (The Darjeeling Limited),
Harish Patel (Run Fatboy Run), KulvinderGhir (Bend It
Like Beckham), and Tom Mison (One Day, Parades
End), with celebrity chef/actress, Madhur Jaffrey. Jadoois
produced by Richard Holmes, Amanda Faber (Resistance) Isabelle
Georgeaux (Resistance) and Nikki Parrott (The Market:
a Tale of Trade).
Festivals
& Awards
64th
Berlin International Film Festival, February 6 to 16, 2013 - Culinary Cinema
section
61st
San Sebastian International Film Festival, September 20 to 28, Culinary Zinema
3rd
Indian Film Festival at the Hague, October 2 to 6, 20113
Festivalof
British Cinema,Dinard: 2-6 October 2013
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Pailahuru
(Red Monsoon)
Eelum Dixit
Nepal/2013/Nepali/Digibeta/90
mins
World Premiere
Attending
Director Eelum Dixit
Set in
the complex caste system of Nepal’s Kathmandu Valley, this classic love
triangle story is a reflection on female empowerment and the hard choices
required to bring about change. As the Valley awaits the rains, the citizens of
the inner city of Patan seek deliverance through affection, empathy and
subterfuge. Against the traditional backdrop of the Machhendranath chariot
festival, a drama plays out in its by-lanes and courtyards. Karuna has eloped
from her tyrannically traditional father to live in much humbler circumstances
with Krishna. Her more liberated neighbour taunts Karuna as she suffers
neglect, advising Karuna to seek her own gratifications. Krishna, fighting his
own demons, finds solace in the company of a well-to-do young widow he had
rescued one eventful evening. Karuna’sattempts to reconcile with her family is
harshly denied, with only her brutally hemmed-in brother as a stoic ally. We
see the wood-and-brick society emerging from tradition’s stranglehold as the
characters try to fend for themselves in the absence of elders, amidst a
failing economy and political chaos. The air is pregnant with hope for respite,
but the rains do not arrive in Red Monsoon. This first film from Blue Bug
Productions is produced by AjayaUpadhyaya, Ruth Moe and Douglas MacHugh. Its
DOP is Brian Emery, the location sound/sound design by BinayakAryal. The cast
includes SandipChhetri, ShristiGhimire and Himali Dixit. It is written and
directed by Eelum Dixit, who has been active in Nepali theatre with productions
such as West Side Story, OthelloandVagina Monologues, and
more recently, Nepali language productions, The Glass Menagerie and A
View from the Bridge.
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MAPA
León Siminiani
Spain/2012/Spanish,
English/DCP/85mins
Asian Premiere
In this engagingly intriguing film,
Spanish director León Siminiani allows the viewer to peak into his troubled
existence and subsequent escapism. On losing his TV job and his girlfriend,
Siminiani heads for India, initially aiming to recce his new feature film.
Instead, he soon finds that he is shooting a documentary that is mapping his
mind. From Delhi to Calcutta with stops in between, his bemused voice-over
conveys what he sees and feels, connecting his past to the present. Seeing a
photograph of Pasolini and Italian
novelist Alberto Moravia and his wife Elsa Morante while on their Indian
travels, Siminiani feels he needs a female companion and looks awkwardly for
one. Overwhelmed by a frenzied country whose poverty hits him, he returns to
find his own country in financial turmoil. He meets with a car accident and
that seemingly shakes him into a better perspective of what he wants out of
life. His self-absorption leads him to ask, “Who am I to make social films?”
and he tries to replace the girl he lost with a new one. This 85-minute
internalized travelogue uses the director’s Indian experiences to look into the
intertwined concerns of filmmaking and love. Matthew Sweet’s pop song, “When
you look in the mirror” is one of its many underlying refrains. Siminiani
majored in Spanish Literature and Film Direction at Columbia University, New
York. His notable fiction films include Dos más (2001), Archipiélago (2003) and
Ludoterapia (2007). His notable non-fiction films include the mini-documentary
series, Key Concepts from a Modern World, the first four winning over 100
international awards. Produced by Avalon P C, PantallaPartida and himself, MAPA
is his first feature film where he continues his artful interplay between
fiction and non-fiction. The film is distributed by Sin Fin Cinema.
Festivals & Awards
International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam,
November 21 to December 1, 2012
3rd London Indian Film
Festival, July 20 to 24, 2013.
34th
Festival of 3 Continents, Nantes 2012
ALCINE, November
10 to 16, 2012 "New Filmmakers" Section
BAFICI 2013
Section Panorama
GöteborgInt Film
Festival, November 15 to 25, 2012 Section "Visionaries"
Mar del Plata
international Film Festival November 5 to 13, 2012 section Panorama-Altered
States-
17thCinespaña
Toulouse September 27 to October 6, 2013
61st Donostia /
San Sebastian Film Festival, 20-28th September 2013 - "Made in Spain"
section
Awards
31stInternational
Film Festival of Uruguay, 23rdMarch to April 6, 2013, Best Feature
Film "New Filmmakers" Documentary and Mention FIPRESCI Award
Sevilla European Film Festival,
2013 November 2 to 106, 2012 - - Best European Documentary (shared)
Tarragona International Film Fest 2012, Best First Feature Film
13th Rome Independent Film Festival, April 4th to 10th. 2012 Best
International Documentary.
IBAFF Festival
March 4 to 9, 2013 - Audience Award
27th Goya Awards, Madrid, February 17, 2013 - Nominated for Best
Documentary Feature
Faith Connections
Pan Nalin
France-India/2013/Hindi/Digital/115
mins
Asia Premiere
Attending Director Pan Nalin
The KumbhMela, one of the most
extraordinary displays of faith on earth is a spectacular journey drawing tens
of millions of people. And it takes place once every twelve years. One such
year is 2013.This Hindu pilgrimage is held over roughly six weeks at the
TriveniSangama. In Hindu tradition, TriveniSangama is the“confluence” of three
rivers. Filmmaker Pan Nalin travels to this 2013 mega event and encounters
remarkable men of mind and meditation, some facing an inextricable dilemma, to
embrace the world or to renounce it. Faith
Connections explores such diverse and deeply moving stories as a young
runaway kid, a Sadhu, a mother desperately looking for her lost son, a yogi who
is raising an abandoned toddler, and an ascetic who keeps his calm by smoking
cannabis. They are all connected by one faith against a spectacular display of
devotion. On a script by Pan Nalin, the film has Raphael Berdugo, GauravDhingra
and Virginie Lacombe as producers. The cinematography is by
AnujDhawanSwapnilSonawane and Pan Nalin, editing by ShreyasBeltangdy and Julie
Delord with music by
Cyril Morin. Pan Nalin, born in a
remote village in Gujarat, is a self taught filmmaker. He started his career
with creating TV series, shorts and documentaries, before he reached the
limelight with his debut feature film Samsara, a huge commercial and
critical success which won him some thirty plus awards. Nalin's feature
documentary Ayurveda: Art of Being also won many awards and was
theatrically released worldwide. Nalin's epic Valley Of Flowers, filmed
in high altitude Himalayas and in Japan, was a major underground hit. Nalin has
worked as screenwriter for major international productions. Forecast Picture
has him on board to write RACE, on the incredible story of Jesse Owens
and Adolf Hitler. He has also been scripting the Paris set spy-thriller Codename:
Madeleine for Cité Films and Virginie Films France. He is attached to
direct the forthcoming India-New Zealand project, Beyond The Known World for
The Reservoir Films NZ and Arsam International France.
Festivals & Awards
38th Toronto International
Film Festival, September 5 to 15, 2013, TIFF Docs section
Good Morning Karachi
SabihaSumar
Pakistan/2013/Urdu, English/DCP/85 mins
Asian
Premiere
Attending
Director SabihaSumar, Executive Producer Anjali Punjabi
Independent Pakistani filmmaker
SabihaSumar, studied Filmmaking and Political Science at New York’s Sarah
Lawrence College and History and Political Thought at Cambridge University. Her
debut documentary, Who Will Cast the First Stone earned high critical acclaim,
winning the San Francisco International Film Festival’s Golden Gate Award. Her
first feature, KhamoshPani (Silent
Waters) won Locarno International Film Festival’s Golden Leopard for Best Film
and Bronze Leopard for Best Actress besides 17 International awards thereafter.
Good Morning Karachi, her second
feature, is a coming-of-age story of a young woman, Rafina. Chance and
willfulness propel her rise as a runway and billboard model. As she climbs the
social ladder, she is caught between two men with very different visions of
Pakistan and the role of women. Arif, a politician, dreams of a better world
through political action; Jamal, urbane and ambitious, is convinced the fashion
industry can help women and lead Pakistan into the new world. Rafina’s story
becomes the story of the people living in Karachi who try to reconcile
tradition and modernity. The film captures this contradiction not only through
its characters and their turbulent lives but also through the landscape of Karachi, where political extremism and
fashion, convention and novelty can and do co-exist. On a script written by
Malia Scotch Marmo, SabihaSumar and SamhitaArni, the DOP is Claire Pijman; the
original score is by Robert Logan; song by ShafqaatAmanat Ali; and editing by
Maurice Bedaux, Rob Das and Bart van den Broek. The lead cast comprises
AmnaIlyas, BeoRaanaZafar and YasirAqueel. The film, slated for theatrical
release in Europe in November 2013, is a Vidhi Films production in association
with Sarah Radclyffe Productions Limited, ZDF and Blue Elephant Films.
Festivals& Awards
Goteborg Film Festival, Sweden, Jan
2013
Raindance Film Festival London,
Sept- Oct 2013
3rd i Film Festival San Francisco,
November 2013
Terre de Femme Germany November
2013
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Siddharth
Richie Mehta
Canada-India/2013/Hindi/ HD/ 96
mins
Asian Premier
Attending director Richie Mehta, actor Tannishtha Chatterjee
In the crowded backstreets of
Delhi, Mahendra fixes zippers to make what little money he can. He lives with
his feisty wife Suman, his little daughter and 12-year-old son. Hitting a low,
he sends his son to another city to work for a friend’s relative. But they
worry when he fails to return home as agreed for the Diwali festival. Their
illiteracy does not help. They don’t even have a photograph of their boy. Their
anxiety escalates as they seek answers from the friend whose relative their son
worked for, from the neighbours and then the police, with no luck. All they
glean are unseemly rumours, the strongest being that their son could be a
victim of child-trafficking. With little money and no connections, Mahendra
travels across India in pursuit, hoping that whatever force arbitrarily took
his child will return him unharmed. Richie says, “In 2010, I met a man on the
streets of Delhi, who asked me for help in finding a place called Dongri. I
asked him what it was. He told me he thought it was where his lost son was. He
went on to tell me his story –that he sent his 12-year-old boy away to work,
and never saw him again. This film is my attempt to reconcile my extremely
layered relationship with this circumstance. It’s a story made up in equal
parts by tragedy and optimism. I hope what we’ve done here transmits even a
fraction of the confusion, sorrow, helplessness, and ultimately hope, that I
felt in meeting this man.” Richie has directed, written and edited the film.
With Bob Gundu as DOP, the extended cast is led by Rajesh Tailang and
Tannishtha Chatterjee. The music is by Andrew Lockington. The film is produced
by Steven N Bray and David Miller of Poor Man's Productions, both of whom were
nominated for the 2009 Genie Award for their work in Richie’s acclaimed debut
feature, Amal. Richie Mehta’s first feature film, Amal, has won
over 30 international awards, was nominated for six Genie Awards, including
Best Picture, Director, and Adapted Screenplay, and was named one of the top
ten Canadian films of the decade by Playback Magazine. Mehta recently completed
the sci-fi feature film I’ll Follow You Down, starring Haley Joel
Osment, Gillian Anderson, Rufus Sewell and Victor Garber, for Resolute Films
and eONE films, to be released in 2014.
Festivals
2013 Venice International Film
Festival, section Venice Days
38th Toronto International Film
Festival, September 5 to 15, 2013, section Contemporary World Cinema
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