The Indian government is keen to showcase country's global ambitions through this year's 39th International Film Festival of India (IFFI) 2008, to be held in Goa from 22nd Nov- December 2, 2008. The Minister of State for Information & Broadcasting, Anand Sharma said that the Indian Cinema has over the years attracted global attention, and the events like IFFI-2008 should serve as a platform to evoke greater interest of global audience.
Mr. Sharma further mentioned that the IFFI should be organised in a manner befitting India’s position as the largest producer of films in the world.
The opening function will be held at Kala Academy, Panaji, capital of India's state Goa.
The System of daily registration has been introduced to enable the local film buffs to register themselves on daily basis by paying Rs. 100 and watch three films of their choice of the Indian Section.
Over 5000 delegates, from India and abroad are expected to attend the festival, which will have Cinema of the World, Competition Section, Foreign Retrospective, Film Heritage Section, and Indian Retrospective besides Indian Panorama as major attraction.
This time there are three country focuses – Russia, Switzerland and Iran.
Indian Panorama
The Indian Panorama will have 26 feature films and 21 non-feature films selected by Jury headed by K. N. T. Sastry and Anjan Bose respectively. ‘Yarwing’, a film in Kokborok language of Tripura, will be the opening film, the first ever in a North Eastern language of the country, of Indian Panorama. ‘Mahasatta’ (Marathi), ‘A Wednesday’ (Hindi) ‘Taare Zameen Par’ (Hindi), ‘Pulijanmam’ (Malayalam), among others, will be the highlights of Indian Panorama. Indian Retrospectives will showcase the films of L. V. Prasad, Bimal Roy, 75 years of Kannada Cinema and a Talk by Ms. Kishwar Desai on “Devika Rani and Himanshu Rai: Globalization of Early Indian Cinema”.
Another segment of the festival will be ‘Homages’ to eminent film personalities. This segment will have screening of films of doyens like G. P. Sippy, F. C. Mehra, Jaishree Gadkar, Mahendra Kapoor, The World Cinema will have 104 films of which 15 films would be competing for awards in Competitive Section. This Section has widely acclaimed films from Asia, Asia-Pacific, Africa and Latin America.
Film Bazar
A Film Bazaar will be organised by the National Film Development Corporation (NFDC) on the sidelines of IFFI-2008.
The Film Bazaar aims at creating opportunities for networking and business for producers, filmmakers and distributors from across the world. The “Work-in Progress Lab” for review of rough cuts of films in making, workshops on screen writing, projects on pre selected feature as well as documentary films and master classes by Shyam Benegal on nuances of his art of film making etc. would be new features at Film Bazaar.
NRI Cinema
A special non-resident Indian (NRI) film segment will make its debut at this year's festival. The organisers have short-listed NRI films, said Directorate of Film Festivals (DFF) director S.M.Khan, at a press conference in Panaji. "The films include those either with predominantly NRI-related content or those made by NRIs," Khan told the media.
The IFFI will also pay a cinematic tribute to three stalwarts of the Indian film industry - Dilip Kumar, B. Saroja Devi and Lata Mangeshkar.
Diploma films by FTII students
Two diploma films by ex-students of direction from the Film and Television Institute of India (FTII) are all set to make a cinematic statement.
Shraddha Pasi’s ‘Dhin Tak Dha’ and Umesh Kulkarni’s (of ‘Valu’ fame) ‘Three of Us’ will be featured in IFFI’s Indian Panorama section.
‘Three of Us’ premiered at the Berlin International Film Festival this year. It has also earned accolades at a number of international film festivals including the 14th Festival on Wheels, Turkey and The 15th Barcelona Independent Film Festival, Spain among others.The film has been shot by FTII's graduate of cinematography, Shariqua Badar Khan.