FESTIVALS AND EVENTS
The World in India and India in the World
(The 5th International Film Festval in Calcutta, 1999)
The festival in Calcutta (at which the
films The Three Men of Melita Žgajner and Recognition by
S. Tribuson were shown) was organized for only the fifth
time, and the featured guest was American director Gus
van Sant. Ambitiously conceived, the festival, with a rich
and varied program, along with thematic discussions, drew
both the attention of young fanatical filmophiles and old
alike. A part of the popularity of the festival lies is
in the fact that authorial films from Europe, and India
for that matter, cannot be seen on the regular cinema repertoire
(eighty percent of cinemas show exclusively popular Indian
films, while the remaining twenty percent screen a combination
of Hollywood and European films). Domestic, so-called parallel
or art films, have over the years only found a place for
screenings at foreign cultural centers.
A retrospective of Paradjanov’s films had special significance
at this year’s festival along with many other special programs:
a retrospective of new Dutch film, a program of contemporary
French film, a review of Hollywood films from the thirties
(Lubitsch, Ford, Hawks, Welles, Lumet), a presentation
by the Gaumont film company, a retrospective of Mizoguchi,
Oshima, Fellini and Hitchcock, as well as program on technology
in the cinema revolution which was mostly dedicated to
Speilberg. Of the smaller national cinemas, Equador was
represented, while in the Canadian program, Sarajevo native
Davor Marjanović screened his The
Father’s Angel. Out of the Indian films, the most
impressive was Throne
of Death by young director Mural Nair and The Servant’s Shirt by
middle-aged alternative Bombay film maker Mani Kauli.
While Calcutta is an already well established international
film festival, there is the Bombay festival called MAMI,
organized by the Mumbai Academy of Moving Images and dedicated
to popular Hindu films. The festival was established with
the intention of endorsing popular Hindu films, i. e. love
stories, that do not enjoy the admiration of domestic intellectuals.
This is how popular Hindu film received its due respect
at an international festival held at »home«, especially
among international guests. Perhaps now the domestic »intellectual«
public will rally behind it as well.
Rada Šešić |
