Cannes in India

Alliance Française de Trivandrum in association with the Embassy of France in India and Kerala Chalachitra Academy are organising Cannes in India, a selection of Indian films which were selected by the Cannes Film Festival. The festival pays tribute to the 7th Art by offering ‘another look’ at Indian cinema, a cinema by mainly independents and was selected by the Cannes Film Festival.

Most of the 10 films here are FIRST FILMS–…and three are winners of the Camera d’Or (Golden Camera) for best debut feature film.

The package includes features, short films and an animation film from various parts of the country—in Hindi, Bengali and Malayalam. Shaji Karun’s Piravi (The Birth, Malayalam), on a father whose son goes missing, won a Camera d’Or Special Mention in 1989. Murali Nair’s Marana Simhasanam (Throne of Death, Malayalam), a satire on death by electrocution, won the Camera d’Or in 1999. Mira Nair’s Salaam Bombay (Hindi), a heart wrenching portrait of Bombay’s street children, won the Camera d’Or in 1988. Rituparno Ghosh’s Dosar (The Companion, Bengali), an incisive snapshot of marital infidelity, was in Cannes in 2007.

The shorts–Anirban Datta’s Tetris, Raka Dutta’s Chinese Whispers and Tridib Poddar’s Khoj (In Search)–are all strong student diploma films from the Satyajit Ray Film and Television Institute, Kolkata, shown at Cannes’ Cinefondation section for film school entries. Gitanjali Rao’s Printed Rainbow, a little animation jewel, won three prizes in the International Critics’ Week section for first and second films, and Rao returned on the Cannes’ International Critics’ Week jury in 2011.

Shaji Karun’s Piravi and Mira Nair’s Salaam Bombay will be screened in 35mm.

The curator of the Cannes in India Film Festival is Meenakshi Shedde.
Registration for the festival is free.

The schedule:

7 October

5.00pm- Inauguration

A very very Silent film /5’/ Manish Jha

Piravi /110’/ Shaji N. Karun

8 October

4.30pm
Printed Rainbow /15’/ Gitanjali Rao

Khoj /26’/ Tridib Poddar

Chinese Whispers /28’/ Raka Dutta

7.00pm
Tetris /30’/ Anirban Datta

Marana Simhasanam /57’/ Murali Nair

9 October

4.30pm
Salaam Bombay /110’/ Mira Nair

7.00pm
Dosar /135’/ Rituparno Ghosh