In 2010, Ketki Parikh and Amit Rana, both Chicagoans with love for the arts, especially theater and films, launched with help from like-minded people a platform for South Asian Independent filmmakers to show their work in Chicago and to expose the audience to different kinds of films.
In the inaugural year, the three-day South Asian Film Festival, which is organized now by the nonprofit Chicago South Asian Arts Council, drew some 1,300 people who watched 16 films. The community response was good, but nothing extraordinarily.
”We didn’t think in terms of the community response at that time. We were not thinking of bringing a million people to the screenings, but it was just our passion for good cinema. We did want people to come and see films, but we also wanted to make sure that people get to see good films, independent films to be precise, and films that are different from the mainstream Bollywood films,” Rana, who works for an IT company in Chicago, but maintains his passion for films along with Parikh, told Desi Talk in an interview.
Over the years, the Chicago South Asian Film Festival has grown both in its reach and popularity, and has carved a niche for itself not just in Chicago, or Illinois, but in North America and outside, from where independent filmmakers love bringing their films to be screened before film connoisseurs at the Chicago festival.
Evidence to this was available at the 2016 CSAFF that ran through Oct.6-9 at Showplace Icon Theatre Chicago that received over 500 submissions for screening from all over the world, including Canada, South America, Japan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Pakistan, besides India.
“Before I took over last year, we had less than one percent non-south Asian attendance rate to the festival. This year, we had 16 percent because more and more non-South Asians are also getting interested in watching films that are not Bollywood films. In the minds of non-South Asians, Bollywood, or commercial Hindi films are just song and dance and over-the-top dramatics, but independent South Asian or Indian cinema show the genuine livelihood, lifestyles of South Asians and real life issues affecting them and attract both South Asian and non-South Asians,” Archana M. Jain, CSAFF Director, told this correspondent in an interview.
The audience this year voted for ‘Matir Projar Deshe’ (Kingdom of Clay Subjects), a full-length feature film made by Bangladeshi director Bijon Imtiaz in his directorial debut, as the best feature film peoples’ choice category.
The film, which is in Bengali with English subtitles, addresses different social stigmas and revolves around the story of 10-year-old Jamal and his struggle to find his identity and place in his world, the village. The film brings out the social struggles of children in poverty and through the eyes of a child who cannot gain admission to a school for not knowing the father’s name. With a child’s-eye view of events reminiscent of Satyajit Ray’s Pather Panchali, the film is a tale told with humor, visual flair, and a canny sense of narrative.
“This year we had two fantastic Malayalam movies, one Sinhalese movie, and a Pakistani movie. It is important for us we incorporate all of India, all of South Asia in our festival because our main objective is to provide a platform to not so well-known,” Jain said.
One of the features introduced to the festival from last year is accepting films from anywhere in the world as long as it is made in a South Asian language, or in any language but by a South Asians. There was a Russian film made by an expatriate Indian in Russia and it was popular at the festival. This the festivals close to 30 films, including over a dozen short films such as ‘It’s My Face’ directed by Sreejith Nair of U.S., ‘Wheels of Hope’ directed by Charanjit Singh Kalsi of U.S. and ‘Spunkle’ directed by Lisa Donato, also from the U.S.
“We saw talent travel from all parts of the world this year and we had some 28 talents attending the festival – from someone extremely notable like Swara Bhaskar of ‘Tanu Weds Manu’ fame to someone from Chennai who has a very small short film,” Jain said.
Besides, feature films and general short films, there was a separate section titled ‘Fanny Pack’ in which short films made by Chicagoans vied for the best Chicago short film award. Six filmmakers, all of them from Chicago, competed for the section.
To a question, Jain said the festival has succeeded over the years in creating some awareness among audience about independent and regional films. “It is as much important for us to show good films, give young filmmakers seeking audience access a platform as also to develop awareness about independent films,” she said. “Today, the number of people who come to watch our festival is a testimony to its growing popularity.”
The post Debut Film By Bangla Director Bags Best Feature Award appeared first on News India Times.