Shaunak Sen’s All That Breathes is the only Indian film to premiere at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival. It will also compete in the World Cinema Documentary category, according to the lineup announcement on Friday by the Sundance Institute, curator of the US film festival.
Writing with Fire, the Indian documentary that won two awards at the 2021 Sundance Film Festival, has qualified for the 2022 Oscars in the Documentary Feature category, the Academy announced on Tuesday.
“The Kerala State Government aims to develop the Malayalam film industry based on talent. Financial soundness or favour from people in the industry should not be criteria for any person to enter the field of cinema”, says Saji Cherian, Kerala’s Minister for Culture.
51st Kerala State Film Awards were presented on Monday at a ceremony held at the Nishagandhi auditorium in Thiruvananthapuram. Addressing the gathering, Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan appreciated the jury for choosing pro-women films for this year’s awards.
Japanese Film Ring Wandering, directed by Masakazu Kaneko, bagged the Golden Peacock Award at the 52nd International Film Festival of India. The festival’s closing ceremony was held in Goa on Sunday.
Filmmaker Tushar Tyagi, who serves as a jury member at the Bengaluru International Short Film Festival (BISFF), the only Indian film festival to feature on the Academy’s Short Film Qualifying Festival List, confirms the same to Silverscreen India.Tyagi, who is also the founder of the Yellowstone International Film Festival in India, says the selection process would become tedious if short films were to represent countries since more of them are made annually as compared to full-length features.
The International Film Festival of India (IFFI) announced the official selections for its Indian Panorama segment for the year 2021 on Saturday. The list of films to be screened at the 52nd edition of the festival will include India’s entry to the 2022 Academy Awards, the Tamil movie Koozhangal.
Hong Kong’s Legislative Council passed a new film censorship law, on Wednesday, to “safeguard national security,” according to a Reuters report. It is aimed at content deemed to “endorse, support, glorify, encourage and incite activities that might endanger national security.”
Tamil film Koozhangal (Pebbles) directed by Vinothraj PS, is India’s official entry to the 2022 Oscars.
If Koozhangal finds a place on the nomination list, it will represent India in the Best International Feature Film category at the Academy Awards next year.
A 15-member panel of the Film Federation of India, headed by filmmaker Shaji N Karun as the chairman of the jury, selected Koozhangal from among 14 shortlisted films. Mandela, Nayattu, Sherni and Sardar Udham were among the other films in the shortlist.
Produced by Nayanthara and Vignesh Shivan under the Rowdy Pictures banner, Koozhangal, is directed by debutant Vinothraj, a Madurai-based filmmaker.
Making the announcement, Vignesh Shivan tweeted on Saturday “There’s a chance to hear this! “And the Oscars goes to …. “ Two steps away from a dream come true moment in our lives.”
As per the official synopsis of the film, in Koozhangal, “An alcoholic wife beater embarks on a journey, dragging his young son along to fetch back his wife whom he had chased away.”
Silverscreen India’s review of the film called it “part of a new wave happening on the peripheries of Tamil cinema where young filmmakers with little or no experience in filmmaking are coming up with stunning experiments in cinema.”
In February this year, Koozhangal also became the first Tamil film to win the prestigious Tiger Award at the 50th International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR).
Speaking to Silverscreen India after the win, Vinothraj said “Everyone who had watched the film at the festival had liked it. We knew we were going to win something.”
“Film festivals are important. But I want the film to be seen by my people. It is about them, for them,” he added.
The Academy Awards are scheduled to be held in March, 2022. Other films selected to represent India at the Oscars in the past include Lijo Jose Pellissery’s Jallikattu and Zoya Akhtar’s Gully Boy. Both films failed to find a place on the nomination list. In the 2021 Academy Awards, Danish film Another Round won in the Best International Feature Film category.
The 52nd International Film Festival of India (IFFI) in Goa will bestow the Satyajit Ray Lifetime Achievement Award on Martin Scorsese, the veteran Hollywood director, and Hungarian filmmaker Istvan Szabo, the Union Minister for Information and Broadcasting Anurag Thakur announced in a press release.
The 72nd edition of the Berlin Film Festival will once again feature an in-person event and red carpet, the size of which will be similar to the pre-Covid 2020 edition, its curator announced on Thursday.
South Korea and Spain announced that the films Escape from Mogadishu and The Good Boss will represent their respective countries at the 94th Oscars, in the Best International Feature Film category.
Actors Nushrratt Bharuccha and Ali Fazal have bagged nominations at the Asian Content Awards by Busan International Film Festival 2021.
Freddie’s Piano, the upcoming independent feature film directed by Aakash Prabhakar, will release on Neestream on Thursday.
Afghan filmmaker Sahraa Karimi, speaking at a virtual conference at the Toronto International Film Festival on Monday, noted that she has been attempting to “get answers from” the Taliban-controlled Afghan government, regarding her position as the chairperson of the Afghan Film Organization, The Hollywood Reporter reported.
Happening (L’Evénement), the French drama film on illegal abortion conducted in the 1960s, won the Golden Lion award for Best Film at the 78th Venice Film Festival.
Afghan filmmakers Sahraa Karimi and Sahra Mani threw light on the plight of filmmakers in Afghanistan since Taliban’s takeover of Kabul on August 15, during a panel discussion at the Venice International Film Festival on Saturday.
Aparna Sen’s The Rapist is set to have its world premiere at the Busan International Film Festival. The festival organisers announced on Monday that the film will be screened in the ‘A Window on Asian Cinema’ section.
Sahraa Karimi, the Afghan filmmaker who penned an open letter to the international film community asking to help and rescue stranded filmmakers from Afghanistan in the wake of Taliban’s takeover, will make a feature film about her experience fleeing from the country, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
The 78th edition of the Venice International Film Festival kick-started on Wednesday, with Bong Joon-Ho, Chloe Zhao, Penelope Cruz, Pedro Almodovar, Roberto Benigni, and others on the red carpet. Benigni was awarded the Golden Lion for lifetime achievement.
I wrote the story nine years ago but horror was not in trend at that time. Only (films like) Yaavarum Nalam and Eeram had come out. Even the film Pizza (a popular Tamil horror film directed by Karthik Subbaraj) hadn’t been released. People were skeptical about horror and so I left the script. I went on to work on my first film Idhu Vedhalam Sollum Kadhai but it had stopped due to several factors. So Vijay Sethupathi (Tamil film actor) encouraged me to work on Boomika again. (The actor had read the script when it was first written. ) I had lost my interest in it because a lot of horror movies have come out in the last 10 years.
Bonamy, the upcoming Malayalam film directed by debutant Tony Sukumar, marks the production debut of actor Sinseer, who has appeared in films like Dam999 (2011) and Aickarakkonathe Bhishaguaranmaar (2018).
Afghan filmmaker Sahraa Karimi will speak about the problems her country’s filmmakers face under the new Taliban at the Venice International Film Festival, the organisers announced.
Afghan filmmaker Shahrbanoo Sadat has safely made it out of Afghanistan following the Taliban takeover of the country. She is currently in Abu Dhabi, waiting to board a flight to Europe, said a statement released to the press by her representatives.
Afghan filmmaker Sahraa Karimi put out a plea seeking help from the international film community for those who are stranded in Afghanistan, after the Taliban began gaining control over several parts of the country. Indian filmmaker Anurag Kashyap subsequently shared her plea on social media.