SIGNS docu, short film festival begins today

Thrissur: About 150 documentaries and short films from different parts of the country will be screened during the SIGNS film festival beginning here on Thursday.
Organised by the Federation of Film Societies of India, the five-day festival will be inaugurated by Bengali film maker Supriyo Sen. ‘Swimming Through the Darkness’ produced by Sen will be the opening film of the festival.
A retrospective of 10 films produced by Sen on various themes like Bengal partition, environmental issues, art and culture has also been arranged as part of the festival.He is also the chairman of the jury which will select the best documentary, short film and experimental film of the festival.
20 films selected from the ‘Ethnogra Package’ being held in Paris will be showcased during the festival which will be held at two venues at Kerala Sahitya Akademi.
There will be a special section to pay homages to departed artists Mrinal Sen, Girish Karnad, Agnes Varda, Vijaya Mulay and M J Radhakrishnan. A documentary on the legendary Malayalam writer and thinker M Govindan will be screened to coincide with his birth centenary programmes.
‘Prison Diaries’ which is a documentary on the Kannada actor and cultural activist Snehalatha Reddy, who was jailed and tortured during the Emergency, ‘The Death of us’ Vani Subramaniam and ‘Memory Beings’ produced by Sudha Francis are some of the films to be screened during the festival.