BRICS Film Festival to explore areas of cooperation in the domain of cinema, culture & cuisine: Venkaiah Naidu

New Delhi: Shri M.Venkaiah Naidu, Minister for Information & Broadcasting has said that the

idea of organizing BRICS film festival originated at the last BRICS Summit where Hon’ble Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi proposed a BRICS film festival and film awards. The Film Festival being organized would act as a platform for people of the film industry of member countries to explore areas of cooperation in the domain of “cinema, culture and cuisine”. The festival would celebrate the excellence of cinema by rewarding film makers, actors, producers and directors. The Minister stated this here today while addressing the media at the curtain raiser press conference for BRICS Film Festival at New Media Centre. Minister of State for I&B, Col. Rajyavardhan Rathore was also present on the occasion

Shri Naidu mentioned that under the India’s BRICS Chairmanship which is scheduled to commence in Goa on 15-16 October, a five-pronged approach had been adopted keeping in view the theme of the summit which is “Building Responsive, Inclusive and Collective Solutions”. The five pronged approach includes:

• Institution building to further deepen, sustain and institutionalize BRICS cooperation;
• Implementation of the decisions from previous Summits;
• Integrating the existing cooperation mechanisms;
• Innovation, i.e., new cooperation mechanisms; and
• Continuity, i.e., continuation of mutually agreed existing BRICS cooperation mechanisms.

Elaborating further, Shri Naidu said that BRICS Film Festival would be a bioscope that would showcase distinct cultures, cuisines and arts from the participating countries. A step taken to build bridges and bring harmony amongst the BRICS countries, the festival would ensure more people-to-people contact between member countries especially youth. In this context, the minister said that India has planned activities like U-17 Football Tournament, Youth Summit, Young Diplomats’ Forum and also a special screening of student films from some BRICS nations during the course of the festival.   Shri Naidu also unveiled the poster for the BRICS Film Festival.

The Minister also gave an overview of the Jury members including the Chairperson who is from India. They are:

• Mr. T S Nagabharana (India) – A Kannada director, writer, actor, pioneers of the Parallel Cinema, served as the Chairman of Karnataka Chalanachitra Academy and founder of a theatre organization called “Benaka”. He has won 9 National Awards and 14 State Awards. Mr Nagabharana is the Chairperson of the Jury for the BRICS Film Festival.
• Mr. Francis Vogner do Reis (Brazil) – A journalist, producer and curator of film shows, professor of theory, history & film criticism and co-founder of the electronic magazine Cine Imperfect.
• Mr. Kirill Razlogov (Russia) – A graduate from the Moscow State University Lomonossov, Historical Faculty, Arts History, holds Ph.D. in arts and cultural studies. He served as a special adviser for 11 years on film history and international affairs to the President of Goskino of the USS.
• Mr. Hou Keming (China) – A professor of the direction department of Beijing Film Academy. He is also the chairperson of the China Children’s Film Association and the president of China International Children’s Film Festival.
• Ms. Xoliswa Sithole (South Africa) – Founder and director, of Nayanaya Pictures, she is also a member of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) and is the  founding member of Filmmakers against Racis.

The Opening film for the festival would be the world premiere of the Malayalam movie, Veeram directed by Shri Jayaraj Rajasekharan Nair and starring Kunal Kapoor. The movie is a trans-creation of Shakespeare’s Macbeth and flawlessly portrays the greed for power and the extent a person goes to attain them. Shri Jayaraj, is a multiple National Awards Winner who has marked his presence in mainstream as well as art house films. His last film Ottal, won the Silver Bear at the Berlin Film Festival.

The Closing film would be the Chinese movie, Skiptrace, starring Jackie Chan directed by Renny Harlin. The movie is an action-comedy, which revolves around a Chinese detective who teams up with an American Gambler to catch a Chinese Criminal.

The BRICS Film Festival will be held at the Sirifort Auditorium Complex, New Delhi, from September 2^nd to September 6^th, 2016. In the course of 5 days of the event, 20 movies will be screened in the competition section, 4 from each of the countries. The film festival will showcase an amalgamation of culture, films, song & dance and food of the 5 member countries, Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. Exclusive cuisines from all the BRICS nations would also be available at the Food Court, arranged in the festival venue. A Craft Fair is also being organized at the Sir Fort auditorium complex with all member countries putting up stalls with souvenirs and other properties for sale.

Beyond films, the Festival will also bring to stage spectacular performances by the Chengdu Performing Arts Theatre (China), Theatre Leningrad Centre Dreams of Russia and MBZ Music Production (South Africa).

The films in the competition section from all the 5 participating countries are listed below: