9th Bengaluru Int'l Film Festival to begin on February 2

Over 180 films from 50 countries, competition sections on Asian, Indian and Kannada cinema, special thematic sections on French ‘Cult Comedies’ and ‘Women Power.’ Coming alive from February 2 to 9 next year, the ninth edition of the Bengaluru International Film Festival (BIFFES) promises all that and more.

To be held simultaneously at PVR Cinemas, Orion Mall in Rajajinagar here and INOX Cinemas in Mall of Mysuru, the festival will showcase retrospectives on Bengali filmmaker Buddhadeb Dasgupta, Kannada actress Harini and Hungarian film director Zoltan Fabri.

Also on the festival agenda are films by Englishman Ken Loach, Asghar Farhadi from Iran, Kim Ki Duk from Korea, and Cristian Mungiu from Romania. The list of films selected for the competition sections will be announced in the first week of January 2017.

Besides the Contemporary Cinema of the World section, BIFFES will also feature films from Luxembourg, Egypt, Vietnam and Asia-Pacific in the Country Focus section. Homage will be paid to J Jayalalithaa, M Balamuralikrishna, Dr Ashok Pai, L Srihari Khoday, Andrzej Wajda (Poland), Abbas Kiarostami (Iran), Paul Cox (Australia), Jacques Rivette and Raoul Cottard (France).

In the Cinema of the World section, 30% of the films will be those made by woman directors. For the first time, Africa and Latin America will be well represented with films from Ghana, Algeria, South Africa, Morocco, Venezuela and Colombia, the festival’s Artistic Director N Vidyashankar told mediapersons here on Tuesday.

A section on ‘Biopics’ will feature films on artist Van Gogh, filmmaker Fritz Lang, poet Pablo Neruda and Kannada scholar M M Kalburgi.

BIFFES will also have technical sessions including a workshop on sound design/editing, master classes on scripting and documentary filmmaking, and a special discussion on emerging technologies such as Virtual Reality and Mixed Reality.

Film tourism policy

The state government is expected to unveil a film tourism policy at the film festival launch, said Karnataka Chalachitra Academy chairman Rajendrasingh Babu. Consultations are  on between Tourism minister Priyank Kharge and the Academy to formulate the policy.

Other key initiatives in the pipeline include a separate cell/directorate for film festivals on the lines of what exists in Delhi and Mumbai; a film city and Janata Chitramandiras for which government orders have already been issued, and a memorial for Vishnuvardhan. Guidelines are now being finalised for the Chitramandiras.