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If Khuda Kay Liye was a fine example of fledgling independent cinema from Pakistan – distinct from the Lollywood’s mindless masala – then Ramchand Pakistani by debutante director Mehreen Jabbar is sure sign that quality cinema from our neighbours are surely getting revived, thanks to a young breed of filmmakers who have largely cut their teeth through television and are socio-politically conscious.

Ramchand Pakistani had its first public screening in the Subcontinent at the 10th Osian’s Cinefan Festival of Asian Cinema in New Delhi on 12th July – three weeks before it becomes the first Pakistani film to have simultaneous release on August 1 in both the countries – and wowed viewers with its sensitive storytelling shorn of any melodrama.

Based on a true incident of a young Hindu Dalit boy from a village across the border from Gujarat, who had inadvertently crossed the international border along with his farmer father at …

The 54th National Film Awards for the year 2006 were announced today. The whole awards & entries list is here:

http://pib.nic.in/archieve/others/2008/jun/54th_nfa.pdf.

However, some salient features:

1. At last, Soumitra Chatterjee has won a national award for the best actor - for the Bengali film Podokkhep. In 2001, he had won a special jury award for Goutam Ghose’s Dekha, but he had declined it. That year Anil Kapoor had got the award for Pukar. The best actress award goes to Priyamani for Paruthi Veeran (Tamil).

2. Priyanandan’s Malayalam film Pulijanmam has got the best feature film award.

3. Kabir Khan’s Kabul Express (Hindi) and Madhu Kaithapuram’s Eakantham (Malayalam) share the Indira Gandhi Award for the Best First Film of a Director.

4. Lage Raho Munnabhai has won the Best Popular Film Award, best screenplay (Abhijat Joshi, Raj Kumar Hirani & Vidhu Vinod Chopra), best lyrics (Swanand Kirkire for Bande Mein Tha Dum).

5. Care of …

Hum Panchhi Ek Dal Ke. No, not the 1957 film or the 2006 one. It is a short film made this year. Just 9 minutes long, dialogue less, in colour & B&W. Directed by Manoj Srivastava, who is known more in his avatar of a Deputy Director with the Directorate of Film Festivals of Government of India in Delhi, it was one of the Indian films that were entered in the Short Film Corner section of the Cannes Film Festival this year. It was the only Indian film in the shortlist of 14 that were in the competition within the segment. The Short Film Corner section was started five years ago, to encourage filmmakers to create interesting work, and the buzz is that it could in the near future be hived off as a completely separate stand-alone festival. The prize money of Euro 10,000 and an offer from Fonds …

There are five Indian films in one of the sections of Cannes this time, after all. All in the Short Film Corner section, which is one of the side-bar sections of the festival.

This, apart from Vijay Anand’s Guide which is being screened in the Classic section.

The five films, to be screened in the Short Film Corner section. are Hum Panchhi Ek Daal Ke (Of Haves and Havenots, 9 mins) in the Experimental Documentary sub-section, written & directed by Manoj Srivastava (currently a deputy director with the Directorate of Film Festivals in New Delhi), In the Land of the Nagas (30:05 mins) in the Documentary sub-setion, directed by Jaishankar Singh, Akela (Alone, 7:13 mins) in the experimental fiction sub-section (It’s an India-France-Singapore co-production), directed by Alka Mehta, Retirement (5:30 mins) by Tushar Joshi, and Viva Sunita! (3:45 mins) by Amitabh Sinha and Lolita Sarkar, in the fiction sub-section.

The Cannes …

It’s Cannes time again. And it is time for some of our filmmakers to go and screen their films in the “market”, on space and time bought against hefty sums, outside the festival’s official sections, and then come back and claim through their PR companies – and the ‘anything goes’ media is only too happy to reproduce these claims – that their films have been “screened at Cannes”. (Closer home: would anyone claim that his or her film has been screened at IFFI if it is screened at the market section? The glamour of Cannes is to blame, I guess!)

It is these claims that prompted me to go to the Cannes website archive two years ago, and prepare an exhaustive list of all Indian films screened (in any official section) in Cannes since its first edition. Here it goes – in alphabetical order, and updating for 2007 & 2008 …

It would be apt to say that IFFLA is probably the most reputed Indian Film Festival outside of India. Its growing at a phenomenal rate. I remember when I had moved to LA around 3 years back & I met this Indian Guy Gautam Mishra in my Cinema class. He suggested that I should volunteer at IFFLA as I was new to the city/country, it would be a great opportunity to make some friends. And I did. Since then the 3rd week of April has been the best week of the year in LA for me.
Gautam also gave me his gyan from having volunteered before. He suggested that we volunteer in transportation. That was the second best advise he gave me. 2005 was much smaller in scale compared to this year. Madhur Bhandarkar was probably the only famous guy …

Sorry about a late Sunday 100… took time to recover from the self flagellation of the weekend movie watching.

First Krazzy4, then Jalsa, and then U, Me aur Hum.

So this Sunday 100, which could have been crazy or kinky now gets mushy.

So here goes…

(you know something? it’s not my mistake - because our dear Honhaar Goonda’s AWOL is messing the series).

So this week the topic is :

Remember those Archies/Hallmark cards you have fastidiously handpicked, remember those love track CDs you have painstakingly compiled, remember those poor attempts at being Keats… and, you know something? The topic is —

First Love

Most of you would have been relieved that there is no Sunday 100 today, but as I have said previously that I will keep posting Sunday 100 till it is a successful phenomena. That is one of my target.

So, I was doing some brain storming, to make this a bit interesting and ‘Money’ came to my mind first. If I give One Rupee to everyone who submits a Sunday 100 story, then would I get a lot of responses? I don’t know. First of all, One Rupee, is nothing in today’s term. Why do we still have a One Rupee coin? Perhaps, it does have a value. To make a 100 rupees, you will need one hundred one rupee coins. And secondly, this is for fun, not for…

But Money can make people do weird stuffs. It can make you write a Sunday 100, egoistic, forget your tradition/values, etc, etc. …

Indian Film Festival of Los Angles(IFFLA) is a festival that probably comes closest to PFC’s own aspirations as platform to showcase movies par excellence without money, power and politics and only talent and creativity being the buzz words.

Like 2007, PFC promises to give an indepth and close coverage of the entire event with very very exclusive updates, interviews and more than anything else, an unique insight into what goes into making movies and its festivals the greatest shows on the planet.

Not failing the movie faithfuls like ever, Christina Marouda and the entire IFFLA team has put together an event that will be nothing like ever witnessed combining soemof the best movies from mainstream Indian Cinema to the discreetly creative independent cinema of Indian origin. Be it the unique platform to capture shorts where PFC’s very own Srinivas is running for honors for the second year in succession or be in …

Let me make it easy for your guys, this week. I will give you a head-start by giving a sentence rather than a word. If still you find it hard, then I give up - and will conclude that…… Nah, I will keep perservering….

Albele Din Pyaare Mere Bichhde Saath Sahaare
Haye Kahan Gaye Haye Kahan Gaye
Aankhon Ke Ujiyare Meri Sooni Raat Ke Taare
Haye Kahan Gaye

Koi Lauta De Mere Beete Hue Din
Beete Hue Din Woh Mere Pyaare Palchhin

The title for this week is:

It ain’t meant to be like old times.

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I know it is on Tuesday, but on last night K For Kishore show Amit Kumar, Bappida and Sudesh Bhosle played an April Fool prank. I could not believe it. Well, actually the show played a prank on its audience and contestants. But still, I still cannot believe those three were part of the prank.

April fool banaaya to unako gussa aaya
Toh mera kya qasoor zamaane ka qasoor
Jisne dastoor banaaya
April Fool banaaya

So without further ado, the title for this week is:

April Fool

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This Friday evening, I climbed onto the plane to Paris. The take off was so bad that to take off my mind from the uneasy sensation in my stomach and head, I picked up the Air-france magazine. I was turning pages looking at pictures, cursing the pilot and the weather when I stumbled upon advertisements of these two interesting film festivals.

Unfortunately the first one is over by now but I guess there’s no harm in mentioning it:
10th Aisan Fim Festival in Deauville(www.deauvilleasia.com) featuring movies by Im Kwon-Taek, Jiang Wen, Jia Zhang. The small write-up said that the festival was to pay tribute to Chinese, Japanese and South Korean cinema through the works of aforementioned directors.
Where was India? Are we not a part of Asia? A part where the biggest movie industry resides!

Quickly coming to other one. The 19th french film festival is going on in Aurtralia. It started on …

I had thought of a brilliant title, which I was going to post this week, but I have forgotten that. I have other titles in mind, but I wanted to use that title, cos it was an interesting title and now it is bugging me. Being inactive is not a good thing for your memory and I should eat loads of almonds! I haveta find out the title otherwise…..

So without further ado, the title for this week is:

Time Machine

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Lately not much has been happening in the cinema my World. Nothing exciting happening, so don’t have much to say, however, I wanna state that I was disappointed about not getting even one reply to the last week’s Sunday 100. Only Ghosts were lurking about it. I will have to come up with some cheesy titles. Nah.

Bhooooooot bungalaaaaaaaaaa
Bhooooooot Bungalaaaaaaaaaa
Bhooooooooooooooot ha-ha-ha
Kaha Ke lo Hum Dono
Kaha ke lo Hum Dono
Kaha ke lo Hum Dono
Yeh Narag Mein Phasen
Be Maut se Mur gaye
Idhar Bhidar Udar Bhidar
Ke Jaye Hum bhala Kidhar
Idhar Bhidar Udar Bhidar
Ke Jaye Hum Kidhar
Bhooooooot bungalaaaaaaaaaa
Bhooooooot Bungalaaaaaaaaaa

So without further ado, the title for this week is:

(Stuck in) Ghost Town

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Recently RK saab wrote an article - “Riots :: Time to Adapt Manto’s stories on screen!” - encouraging filmmakers to do an adaptation of the author’s stories. And, I also encouraged people to make an old skool action film in my article “I wanna be deaf”. And I have mixed those two articles - added a bit of hot powder, to come up with this week’s Sunday 100 title.

So without further ado, the title for this week is:

Rebel Hero

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Hi friends. The following info I received on my mail could be useful
to many among us. The more short film fests, the merrier! —-:)

We take great pleasure in inviting your participation in FulMarxx
Shorts Fest. Here is a once in a lifetime opportunity for you to
showcase your talent and grab the lime light in the largest short film
festival India has ever witnessed.

Call for Entries: India ’s largest Short Film Festival
FulMarxx Shorts Fest

India’s Largest Short Film Festival, 26-27 April 2008, Ahmedabad

Submissions open till March 25,2008

Festival competition is in 4 categories:

1. Micro Shorts: run time upto 10 minutes.

2. Mini Shorts: run time upto 20 minutes.

3. Long Shorts: run time upto 30 minutes.

4. Full Shorts: run time upto 45 minutes.

We accept films in all languages. For films in languages other than
Hindi, English and Hinglish …

Its time of the year for the International Film Festival of Mumbai popularly known as Mumbai Academy of Moving Images (MAMI) Fest. The opening ceremony will be held on the eve of 6th March, whose entry is by invitation only. The movie screenings will start from 7th of March. The people who want to register can pay 500rs for the pass and should not forget to bring a passport size photograph. The students and people belonging to cinema fraternity can get the passes for 300rs (guess will have to produce the membership of various associations.)
The best place to see the films is at Imax Wadala.With 4 screens to choose from at a time and best movies playing at this venue. The only problem is the location, which is least accessible by train, bus and even auto. But once you are there its a good outing. You are cut off …

So you guys find vague titles to be uncreative, eh? For each March Sunday 100s, I had planned out vague and interesting titles, but I guess, those titles will have to wait now. From now on I will try to pick a closed title, so you guys are able to write a Sunday 100.

Perhaps, I should start with “Mother’s Day”, but for me, everyday is a Mother’s Day. Do we celebrate ‘Happy Day’ everyday? Why not?! So it ain’t going to be that title.

Everyone has a bit of regret… If you can write about ‘love’ then you can write about…

So without further ado, the title for this week is:

Remorse

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54. That is the number of films that I and two of my co-jury members watched in just five days at the 10th Mumbai International Film Festival for Documentary, Short & Animation films (MIFF). The festival was held over seven days, from February 3 to 9, but the films in the Indian competition section (in which I served on the critics jury chosen by the Indian chapter of the International Federation of Film Critics – FIPRESCI - along with Uma da Cunha from Mumbai and M K Raghabendra from Bangalore) were screened from the 4th to the 8th. Of these 40 were documentaries, nine short fiction films and five animation films. We had a tough task at hand, since we were mandated to give out only one award – I personally felt it was a great injustice to the films as we had to select the winner from among three …

Even in the 21st century we humans are very superstitious. More so the Indians. We have facilities like ‘Buy a car, get puja done for free’(BTW, that does not mean you get a Puja with the car and you do her, for free.) I am not here to ridicule the beliefs because I also can be very superstitious….. sometiemes. But not as superstitious as people in the Indian Film Industry.

They will hire/consult a Pandit and a numerologist before they start thinking about making a film. The Pandit will perform all the rituals and the Numerologist will guide them throughout the filmmaking from the film name to the release date.

Indian Filmmaking is only about three things Numbers, Letters and Stars in the Universe & in the gutters. They have a thing for letter ‘K’ - it is sort of a good omen for them and they …