51st Iffi from Jan 16, Bangladesh is country of focus

Panaji: Bangladesh will be the country of focus at the 51st Iffi scheduled to start this weekend, January 16. The festival will conclude on January 24.“The collaboration is aimed at the cultural exchange between India and Bangladesh,” a statement released by Iffi read.The festival will premier Danish filmmaker Thomas Vinterberg’s ‘Another Round’ as the opening film. The historical drama ‘Wife of a Spy’ by Kiyoshi Kurosawa will bring the festival to a close.The festival will also witness the world premiere of ‘Mehrunisa’.A selection of 23 feature and 20 non-feature films will be showcased in the festival’s Indian Panorama section. Of these, six are iconic Marathi films – June directed by Vaibhav Khisti and Suhrud Godbole; Prawaas by Shashank Udapurkar; Karkhanisanchi Waari by Mangesh Joshi; Khisa by Raj Pritam More, Pandhara Chivda by Himanshu Singh and Still Alive by Onkar Diwadkar.A total of nine South Indian films will be screened in the feature film and non-feature film segments. These are Safe (Malayalam) directed by Pradeep Kalipurayath; Trance (Malayalam) by Anwar Rasheed, Kettyolaanu Ente Malakha (Malayalam) by Nissam Basheer; Thahira (Malayalam) by Sidd Paravoor; Thaen (Tamil) by Ganesh Vinayakan, Gatham (Telugu) by Kiran Kondamadugula, Asuran (Tamil) by Vetri Maaran, Kappela (Malayalam) by Muhammed Musthafa and Oru Paathiraa Swapnam Pole (Malayalam) by Sharan Venugopal.Meanwhile, 15 acclaimed films will compete for the Golden Peacock award. Of these, three films Bridge by Kripal Kalita, A Dog and His Man by Siddharth Tripathy and Thaen by Ganesh Vinayakan are entries from India.The international jury panel will be headed by Argentine filmmaker Pablo Cesar. The other members include filmmakers Prasanna Vithanage (Sri Lanka), Abu Bakr Shawky (Austria), Priyadarshan (India) and Rubaiyat Hossain (Bangladesh).The best film will win a cash prize of Rs 40 lakh, to be shared equally between the director and producer. The director will also receive the Golden Peacock and a certificate. Other awards will also go out for best director, best actor and best actress, and a special jury award Silver Peacock.