Ronita Torcato

The Mumbai International Film Festival (MIFF 2014) currently underway at the NCPA has gone national in its 13th edition. 

For the first time, it will screen a selection of films from the national and international competition section simultaneously  at special MIFF Zones in Delhi, Kolkata, Guwahati, Chennai, Bangalore and Nagpur. In all, 32 hours of short feature,non-feature and animation film will be screened at each centre. “This is to help give an impetus to the documentary film movement in the country,” festival director and DG, films division VS Kundu said. “If we get a good response, the MIFF Zones will be a regular feature every other year” he  said. (MIFF is a bi-annual event organised by the Films Division, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Govt. of India since1990. It has partnered with the Indian Documentary Producers Association (IDPA) among others for the current edition.

 

Among the highlights of MIFF 2014   are rare, restored films commissioned by erstwhile Indian royalty, the Good Pitch India campaign with BritDocs — a social entrepreneurship organisation to nurture new talent and approaches in documentary film making, a three-day  festival in partnership with Action Aid focusing on urban issues, the Lennep Kids Film Festival showcasing award winning Dutch documentaries, live action and animation films for school children, Werner Herzog Retrospective,the German Cinema Tour & Soirée Allemande –  a collection of award winning short-fiction, animation and documentaries  presented by Goethe-Institut / Max Mueller Bhavan Mumbai and a Tribute to the late Canadian film-maker and friend of MIFF,  Peter Wintonick. As Mr Kundu summed it,  MIFF's focus is “on broadening international linkages and on innovations.”

 

New awards have been instituted for films,notably the most innovative and the popular choice.  These awards are in addition to new awards for the best producer, cinematographer, editor, sound-recordist and animator, taking the total number of awards to 32 from 22 in MIFF 2012. The festival will dusburse cash awards worth Rs 55 lakh  alongwith the prized Golden Conches and certificates.

It may be mentioned that Lennep kicked off  on Jan 15  in 15 schools with screenings and a  film-making workshop teaching the children how to make films. Five of the best  will be screened at the MIFF 2014 inaugural. The Good-pitch squared campaign  will help  filmmakers, NGOs, film foundations,  and media  to network and forge coalitions around  social issues. Goethe-Institut / Max Mueller Bhavan Mumbai is also presenting the following film at  MIFF:

And who taught you to drive? (Director: Andrea Thiele, Screenwriter: Lia Jaspers)

. The Werner Herzog Retrospective will have a selection of his documentaries