[Reader-list] Documentary Film Festival in Bangalore, Jan 2-Feb 20

[Chandni Parekh]

>From Max



  National Gallery for Modern Art (NGMA) 
in collaboration with
India Foundation for the Arts
present
IFA FILM FESTIVAL
January 2- February 20, 2011
(All documentary films will have English subtitle)
Venue: National Gallery for Modern Art (NGMA)
Manikyavelu Mansion
49 Palace Road, Bengaluru 560 052
Contact: 080 2234 2338
  
 
January 2, 2011, Sunday, 3 pm
BISHAR BLUES, 1 Hour 16 minutes
By Amitabh Chakraborty
 
Itis a 90-minute film based on the fakirs of Bengal, exploring their music and 
their deeply spiritual everyday life as a living practice of radical syncretism. 
In this film, Amitabh Chakroborty talks about music as an integral part of their 
mythology and that music enshrines and expresses the philosophy of Man. This 
film has won the National Award for Best Non-fiction Film, Best Editing and Best 
Audiography.
 
January 8, 2011, Saturday, 3 pm
 
THE OTHER SONG, 2 Hours 
By Saba Dewan
 
In 1935, Rasoolan bai, the well known singer from Varanasi, recorded for the 
Gramaphone a thumri that she would never sing again- ‘Lagat job anwa ma chot, 
phool gendwa na maar’ (My breasts are wonded, don’t throw flowers at me). A 
variation of her more famous song -  ‘Lagat Karejwa ma chot, phool gendwa na 
maar’ ( My heart is  wounded, don’t throw flowers at me), the 1935 recording, 
never to be repeated, faded from public memory and eventually got lost. More 
than seventy years later the film travels through Varanasi, Lucknow and 
Muzzafarpur in search of the forgotten thumri.Through the story of this lost 
thumri sung by Rasoolan Bai, whose career as a performer overlapped with 
significant transitions in both the practice of music and public female 
sexualities, the film examines the major shifts in the history of the tradition. 

 
  
 
January 9, 2011, Sunday, 11:30 am
MAYA BAZAR, 1 Hour
By K M Madhusudhanan
 
This is a film on Surabhi, a 120-year old travelling theatre company from Andhra 
Pradesh. Envisaged as a journey with the repertory company, the film, examines 
the everyday activities of these travelling actors and their families, 
rehearsals, exercises, the staging of the plays based on the epics and the 
puranas, the audience, sets, make-up and costume design. The film also explores 
the traces of Parsi theatre, silent cinema from the Phalke era and the paintings 
of Ravi Verma in the design of the theatre company’s sets and costumes.
 
 
January 9, 2011, Sunday, 12:45 pm
OUT OF THIN AIR, 50 minutes
By Shabani Hassanwalia and Samreen Farooqui
 
‘Out of Thin Air’ is the story of one of the most surreal and hostile landscapes 
in the world. This is the story of Ladakh, not through the postcards that 
tourists often see, but through the subterranean, local film movement that has 
taken such strong root here in the last six years, that it has become a voice of 
the people. Today, taxi drivers, grocery store owners, cops and monks are 
producers, directors, camerapersons and actors of one of the youngest, and most 
dynamic, local film industries in the world. 
 
 
January 23, 2011, Sunday, 11:30 am
CITY OF PHOTOS, 1 Hour
By Nishtha Jain
 
City Of Photos explores the little known ethos of neighborhood photo studios in 
Indian cities, discovering entire imaginary worlds in the smallest of spaces. 
Desires, memories and stories all so deeply linked to photographs all come 
together as a part of the personal journey into the city of photos.
 
 
February 12, 2011, Saturday, 3pm
NATAK JARI HAIN, 1 Hour 24 minutes
By Lalit Vachani
 
A film on the New-Delhi based theatre group, Jan Natya Manch (Janam), critically 
explores its history and contemporary practices. Combining archival footage and 
documentation of contemporary performances, the film especially focuses on the 
Nukkad Natak (street theatre), and its ability to create innovative contexts 
that facilitate significant involvement on the part of its audience.
 
February 12, 2011, Saturday, 4:30 pm
RASIKEN RE, 33 minutes
By Pooja Kaul
 
"Rasikan Re" ("O Lover of Life") is an urban story about the cautious attraction 
between a young girl, Madhu, and her 40-year-old neighbor Kedar. The 
film--inspired by the Ragamala, a tradition in Indian Moghul miniature painting 
that attempts to visualize music--explores a young woman's desire, the 
correlation between art, music and life, and the rhythm of urban India. Apart 
from the historical, aesthetic and socio-cultural contexts of the Ragamala 
tradition, the study will explore how the conventions of the Ragamala can 
themselves inform the stylistics of representing the tradition on film.
 
 
February 13, 2011, Sunday, 11:30 am
KITTE MIL VE MAHI, 1 Hour 15 minutes
By Ajay Bhardwaj
 
A deeply felt and moving film, Ajay Bharadwaj’s Kitte Mil Ve Mahi cuts to the 
quick and puts across a well reasoned and eloquent quest of the Dalits in Punjab 
to take on the legitimacy of the deeply exploitative and humiliating caste 
system. This sensitively crafted and provocative film provides a glimpse of the 
alternate cultural forms of the Punjabi Dalits that critique the oppression of 
the ‘upper’ castes and articulate a powerful vision of social justice. It 
focuses, in particular, on the popular Sufi traditions of the Punjabi Dalits. 
 
 
February 19, 2011, Saturday, 3 pm
THE LISTENER’S TALE, 1 Hour 16 minutes
By Arghya Basu
 
This is a film exploring the cultural history of Tibetan Buddhism in Sikkim 
through the sacred dance theatre of Chham. The film examines this ritual dance 
as it shapes and is shaped by its religious and cultural contexts, as well as 
the mutations in its traditional meanings through modernity and education. The 
film seeks to be a witness to the contradictions and counter-forces that sustain 
this ancient art practice. The Filmmaker was awardedthe Pierre and Yolande 
Perrault Grant for young filmmakers by the Cinema du Reel, France for this film.
   
 
February 20, 2011, Sunday, 11:30 am
NEE ENGEY, 2 Hours 38 minutes
By R V Ramani
 
The film inquires into the performative and technical aspects of shadow puppetry 
while simultaneously striving to serve as a record of the life and times of the 
puppeteers. It also seeks to identify useful comparisons and areas of common 
interest between shadow puppetry and cinema. Ramani’s film identifies parallels 
and areas of common interest between shadow puppetry and cinema, while as an art 
form it is also in conflict with the forces of manipulation and crass 
commercialization of the medium.

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