Film festival in town

Raisul Islam Asad, Munira Yusuf Memi and Thithi in a scene from Lalshalu.

The festival director, Gholam Rabbani Biplob, said, "Our film festival is not different from others that have taken place as regards the purpose i.e. the promotion of cine culture. However, the arrangements and the sources arranging it is different. This is a maiden venture for the Bangladesh Federation of Film Societies. Before this the members had been involved in film exhibition work in one form or another."

He added that his organisation is arranging this festival helped by other associations such as that of film producers, film directors and film artistes, which remain co-organisers. "This is being done under the umbrella of the International Federation of Film Societies and Bangladesh Motion Pictures Exhibitors' Association. Unofficially the government is helping too in various ways including financial assistance, even though up till now the government has not given any money in advance."

Meanwhile, we are told that there has been a government order to collect Tk 1 with each cinema ticket all over the Bangladesh and this additional payment would go into helping the cost of the film festival and the DCs of each district will look into this as regards the collection. In addition, Rabbani said, the government has given the festival organisers a loan of 4 lakh takas which will have to be repaid after the festivals. Asked if they had to spend anything from their own pockets, Rabbani answered in the negative. In addition, the organisers were trying to get some private sponsors such as business concerns too.

Dwelling on the films and the directors that they had planned for the occasion, Rabbani said that there will be an international competition section in the festival. The opening will be with "Amar Bhubon" directed by Mrinel Sen (India) in which the cast include Kaushik Sen and Nandita Das (they will be attending the inaugural ceremony). The other important film makers will include Buddhodev Das Gupta, Gautom Ghosh and Ritu Posno Ghosh (also from India). Rabbani said that in all there will be 10 Asian film makers whose films will be screened in the competition section. This will include from Pakistan, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Vietnam, Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia, the Philippines, China and Japan, India apart. We are further told that the entries from Bangladesh will include Tariq Masud's "Matir Moina", Abu Said's "Kritton Khola" and Tanwir Mokammel's "Lal Shalu" and "Chitra Nodir Parey". In this Bangladeshi panorama will be selections of films from the last thirty years. Eight popular films will be screened as well and this is what makes this festival so different from many others that one has witnessed earlier, said Rabbani.

The festival will also include, we were told, films from other parts such as Europe but the competition section will be limited to Asian films. When asked how this festival will compare with other famous ones such as ones at Cannes and Tashkent, Rabbani admitted that theirs will, in comparison, be on a much smaller scale. However this festival will be more public oriented as special importance will be given to the popular cinema and they will not restrict themselves to art films.

Farouque Alamgir of ITV, media sub-committee convenor, asked if there was any future in the young film lovers coming together, forming film societies and presenting films to the Dhaka viewers, said that he was very hopeful because "This type of attempt will definitely be fruitful. I can claim this as I am one of the pioneers of film societies of Bangladesh."

Asked to assess the films of the various international film festivals, Alamgir said, "The film societies consist of people who have done a lot to bring together audiences for good films, by which I don't mean the conventionally acclaimed ones. The underground movies, the nouvelle vague, realism and neo-realism movements in Europe, will all be included to satisfy the popular de-mand of some selected film lovers."

Touching on whether the young organisers of BFFS are going about the right way in carrying out their goals, Alamgir said that the young organisers are doing their best in bringing in films that include Europeans ones too such as ones from Austria, Netherlands, Latin America (like Argentina), Yugoslavia and the Czech Republic and Kazakistan.

Let us hope that the film-goers for this international film festival will be as enthusiastic as the film organisers.