Mumbai Film Festival to pay homage to Yash Chopra

The Film Festival is being celebrated all across Mumbai with great fervor and enthusiasm by all the cinematic lovers. The Fourth Day of the event was packed with people from all over hailing to witness the cinematic magic.

The day embarked on a gleeful note and the afternoon session was one of its kinds, which was the country’s numero uno open forum Panel Discussion on Films Restoration & Preservation. The convention involved well-known names and organizations like Film Foundation, World Cinema Foundation, Academy Film Archive of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, Twentieth Century Fox Archives, Cineteca di Bologna and eminent Indian filmmaker Shivendra Singh Dungarpur, who’s Celluloid Man, a documentary as a tribute to archivist P. K. Nair will be screened at the festival.

Ian Birnie, US Representative at the Mumbai Film Festival and Director of the Film Department at the Los Angeles County Museum, regulated the session, which highlighted the present state of preservation of films and the due to the pacing technological advancements challenges that are faced by the archives in terms of preservation and storage.

Filipino film director, Brillante Mendoza, shared his notions and experiences of a filmmaker with a low budget, at the Masterclass in “Concept to Script to Film Production” and gave away suggestions how aspiring filmmakers can expand and produce results in disregard to the financial and technical crunches. German film critic Daniel Kothenschulte, moderated the session.

A short film competition “Dimensions Mumbai” featured films of duration less than five minutes, made in any format and presenting before all, any aspect of life in Mumbai by young budding filmmakers less than 25 years of age, was judged by Umesh Kulkarni, who is an eminent filmmaker and was the Jury President; actor Sanjay Suri; Filmmaker Reema Kagti and Gitanjali Rao, an theatre actress and a filmmaker.

The famous works and cinematic masterpieces that were screened on the 4th day were The Wall by critically acclaimed director Julian Polsler, Benoit Jacquot’s Farewell My Queen, Twice Upon A Time by French filmmaker Jean-Paul Rouve, a biographic film titled Roman Polanski: Odd Man Out by Marina Zenovich, Kid by Fien Troch and the red carpet Gala screening of Australian director Boyd Hicklin’s Save Your Legs.

A special screening of Aradhana directed by an ace Indian director Shakti Samanta, was held as a tribute to the first superstar of Hindi Cinema, Rajesh Khanna, as it was his most celebrated movie. Rajesh Khanna ji left us all this year on 18th July, leaving all reminiscing his work and his contribution to the Indian Cinema.

The attendees list included director Abhinav Kashyap, veteran actor Naseeruddin Shah, theatre actor Rajat Kapur, choreographer Astad Deboo, ex-Indian Idol contestant Meiyang Chang, Restaurateur and chef Gary Mehigan, Jugal Hansraj, Chef George Calombaris from Master Chef Australia, Raj Zutshi and Hansal Mehta.

As the evening neared its end, news flashed around about the sad demise of Yash Chopra ji, who was not only a great Indian filmmaker but also the founding trustee of the Mumbai Film Festival. Hence the MFF family will observe a minute’s silence at all the screening across the city and are motivated to work with added amount of dedication to showcase more of quality cinema and stretch their audience reach.

May his soul rest in peace!