Kolkata celebrated the weeklong carnival of celluloid dreams from 10 to 17 November 2005. This uninterrupted annual event stepped into its 12th edition in 2006 since its inception in 1995. The most important characteristic of this cinematic feast is that it always pulled a huge crowd from its 3rd/4th edition. From 5th/6th edition the crowd became so crazy that anybody from outside the city would get emotionally overwhelmed seeing the Kolkatans’ love for good cinema. But as soon as this festival fever faded out this delusory crowd of film buffs preferred to be reluctant about better cinema. Still this festival mania at least proved itself to be visibly successful in terms of the massive audience roaming around ‘Nandan’ complex – the main festival venue with five major screens. ‘Mass’ was an important factor and so the festival director was proud enough to announce in the massive festival catalogue that: “This year our festival altogether presents a massive package of more than 200 films from not less than 52 countries”. The term ‘this year’ is also to be noted carefully as ‘this year’ the Kolkata Film Festival (KFF) got a new director whose primary task was to prove himself better than that his predecessor Mr. Ansu Sur – the founder director of the KFF (earlier CFF, as Kolkata was Calcutta a couple of years back). Mr. Sur became the icon of KFF with his charismatic presence all-over the festival. His phenomenal PR qualities were the secret of the popularity of KFF locally, nationally and globally – to some extent. So it was a big challenge to Mr. Nilanjan Chattopadhya, the new director, basically a civil servant, to overcome the mammoth shadow of his predecessor in-absentia. Moreover, as this was fully a government-controlled event after all, the new director had the challenge to prove his competence to his real big boss Mr. Buddhadeb Bhattacharyya, the Chief Minister of West Bengal – the original mastermind of this annual cine-fete, practically snatched away from the ‘Cine Central, Calcutta’ – the founder organisation of Calcutta Film Festival before the Government. To prioritize this mission of satisfying the Chief Minister, the festival director even brushed off the internationally famous Indian filmmaker Mr. Girish Kasaravalli. Keeping the humble maestro waiting for hours, the director was enjoying a film to accompany the Chief Minister to prove himself a real film buff. Humiliated Kasaravalli had no other alternative but to leave director’s office in disdain. Kasaravalli was here as the guest of the ‘Cine Central, Calcutta’ – presently the festival partner of KFF organising the section ‘Forum for New Cinema’. This section was inaugurated by Kasaravalli’s new film “Nayi Neralu”. Surprisingly the master came to know only during the inaugural ceremony of this particular section that his earlier film “Hasina” was going to be screened in the main venue of the festival. KFF authorities never cared to inform him the news earlier. This famous film maker had to rush to the festival director’s office several times just for having an entry pass to the main venue where his film was scheduled, but the director had no time to meet him. However, Kasaravalli was given an entry pass after three days by the deputy director while he was leaving for the airport on his way back of home. This year KFF authorities were very much antipathetical to the Indian filmmakers. Some of them were tramping around without proper attention and even without an invitation to the extravagant parties. Festival’s over dependence on the bureaucracy well designed to nourish the vested interest helped the people in power to misuse their powers copiously. Even the Liftman of Nandan dared to throw out the invitees according to his own decision. This Liftman’s source of power was generated from his service to the Chief Minister during the Ministerial rendezvous in Nandan every evening. This type of misbehavior from the liftman to the top-man by the government officials of this state controlled film centre stood as the main barrier to KFF to reach its deserved height even after twelve years of existence.
‘International Forum of New Cinema’ – the section organised by the ‘Cine Central, Calcutta’ showcased a package of selected films from different countries of the world. Amongst these some mention worthy films were the Chinese film “The Young Teacher” by Wang Junzheng, Indian film “Samsara” by Pan Nalin, Tareque and Catherene Masud’s Bangladeshi film “Ontarjatra”, Bela Tarr’s Hungarian film “Damnation” etc. Opening film Girish Kasaravalli’s “Nayi Neralu” was the gem. Title of the film (in English: “In the Shadow of the Dog”) symbolically referred to the dog of the ‘Mahabharata’. Actually it was ‘Dharma’ who in disguise of the ‘Dog’ followed ‘Yudhisthira’ till the end of the ‘Swargarohana’ (Way to the Heaven). But the title was just metaphoric. Even Kasaravalli warned the audience in his inaugural speech that they could be disappointed if they desired to see any dog or its shadow in the film. The story is set in a traditional village where Achchannaiah lives with his wife and their widowed daughter-in-law Venkatalaxmi and their grand daughter Rajalaxmi. Venkatalaxmi lives a restricted ritualistic life of a typical Hindu rural widow till a young man in his early twenties appears – who is believed to be her dead husband reincarnated. Venkatalaxmi initially reluctant about all these bogus belief of her in-laws is involved circumstantially into a physical affair with the boy and the complication began. Girish who personally does not believe in reincarnation just has used a famous Kannad novel to interlace the intricacies of relationship at different layers of relationship. Pan Nalin’s “Sansara” was already a festival hit, world wide, due to its theme and frames. Sex and philosophy dealt in breathtaking scenic outdoors of Ladakh took the film in its deserved height. In Fernando Venfell’s Portugese film “Skin” the bold and the beautiful Olga is in search of her identity. In spite of possessing everything, she still faces rejection because of her color and her inability to answer questions about her mother. Concluding film of the section was “Ontarjatra” from Bangladesh by Tareque Masud and Catherine Masud. Tareque’s earlier film “Matir Moyna” (The Clay Bird) moved Kolkata last year and so there was a high expectation regarding this one too. This time it was a simple story of a divorced woman’s return to her homeland Bangladesh from England with her son after several years. Audience in full house of the Globe Cinema congratulated the Masud couple for this emotional film with great applause.
There were about one hundred guests invited from different countries. Latin American maestro Miguel Littin from Chile was the principal guest amongst the other eminent film scholars and film personalities. Krzysztof Zanussi, the Polish Master and a regular visitor to KFF did not miss the festival this year too. The Hungarian delegation was too big of about ten delegates with directors, producers, coordinators et al. Next to it was Germany with nine delegates in which there was even a ‘friend of the director’ too. However, representation from South Korea, Russia, Indonessia, Bosnia, Mexico, Spain, France, Germany, China, Finland, Canada, Switzerland, Japan, Denmark, Cuba, Venezuela, Sri Lanka, Slovenia, Uzbekistan, Brazil and Bangaldesh were also there.
The festival was inaugurated by the 2005 Dennish production “Adam’s Apple” by Anders Thomas Jenson. Anders Thomas won the Academy Award in 1998 for his short film “Election Night”. In 2000 and 2003 he made two feature films: “Flickering Lights” and “The Green Butchers”. His third feature “Adam’s Apple” already earned wide appreciation in several festivals in Humburg, Brussels, Cannes, Berlin, Toronto, Seattle, Sundance, Bangkok and Sao Paulo. The Principal of ‘Marubi Film and Multimeida School Tirana’ – Kuztin Cashku’s eighth film “Magic Eye”, a 2005 Albania-Germany co-production was set in 1997 Albania on the edge of a civil war. The retired photographer Petro, the witness of a tragedy, travels in a bus from his native village to the capital city of Tirana. In bus he meets Berti and his girlfriend Viola – who reminds him of his love in his student days. During an attack on the bus Petro saves Berti’s life without knowing that they are the enemies of each other. An entry to Karlovy Vary and Montreal, this FIPRESCI Award winning film also won Silver Pyramid Award in Cairo last year.
Ahmed Imamovic’s “Go West” is a co-production of Bosnia and Herzegovina. This FICC (International Federation of Film Societies) Jury Award wining film deals with the problem of a Muslim in the perspective of Serbo-Bosnian anxious tension. Jocelyne Saab’s Lebanese Egyptian co-production “Kiss Me not in the Eyes” of 2006 is a noteworthy film. Tradition, culture, expression and passion collide in this sensitive exploration of the changing nature of love and romance in modern Cairo. Krzystof Zanussi’s 2005 production “Person Non Grata” was also there. Zanusi was there too with Andrej Wajda and some other Polish directors in another 2005 production “Solidarity Solidarity” made to commemorate 25th anniversary of the birth of the Union. This film, the brain-child of Andrej Wajda, is a joint venture of thirteen Polish directors. Another important film was the Golden Bear Award winner of 2005 Berlin Festival “U-Carmen” by Mark Dornford-May of South Africa. Mark paid his tribute to the African music through this film. Mohsen Makhmalbaf’s “Sex and Philosophy” again a 2005 production of Tazikistan pulled a huge crowd. Makbalbaf would have been very happy seeing the long queue waiting in front of the theatre for hours before the schedule. It was not quite sure whether for philosophy or for sex such a vast crowd was there. But it was presumed that copious sexual elements motivated the festival authorities to programme for three screenings of a single film “Intimacy” by Patrice Chereau, which pulled an unprecedented crowd spirally standing hours together in serpentine queue even in its third screening in the main venue.
KFF had so many sections this year again probably for proving itself much more massive than earlier editions. The section ‘Cinema International’ had a total of 89 films, out of which only 13 were of this year. ‘Centenary Tribute : Luchino Visconti’ had only two films, one of 1957 and the other of 1974. ‘Centenary Tribute’ was also paid to Roberto Rosselini with four of his films – all of forties. With only one film “The Insect Woman” ‘Homage’ was paid to the Japanese maestro Shohei Imamura. Eight of Ingmar Bergman’s early films – made between 1951 and 1966 were there in the ‘Great Master’ section. This included Bergman’s three summer films: “Summer Interlude” (1951), “Summer with Monica” (1953), and “Smiles of a Summer Night” (1955). Though these earlier films of Bergman were shown in Kolkata for several times earlier in various occasions mainly in the film society circuit, still these films pulled a good number of viewers proving Bergman’s appeal to the local intelligentsia. ‘October Revolution’ was the ‘Central Theme’ of the section ‘Look Back in Wonder’. It was really to look in wonder that all the five films of this section including the famous “October” (1927) of Sergei Eisenstein were put in the early morning shows of Sisir Mancha keeping the house virtually empty in most of the time of screenings.
12th KFF could easily be remembered as the forum for archive screening as it brought out numerous prints right from D W Griffith’s “The Birth of a Nation” (1914) to so many others of early twenties and thirties and forties and so on…. from the vaults of the film archives increasing the number of titles. Festival had invented so many sections with queer names such as ‘Celluoid Diamonds’, Celluloid Pearls’, ‘Discovery’ et al. It was not very clear why and how Miguel Littin of Chile and Jan Nemec of Czech Republic come under the bracket of Diamonds while so many others were there in the Pearl section shining with the equal or more importance. It was also not very clear how the ‘Discovery’ section boasts up with the 1977 production of Bela Tarr of Hungary or 1998 productions of Jeon Soo-il of South Korea and Patrice Chereau of France. May be Chereau’s 2001 production “Intimacy” was a popular discovery by the selection committee to satisfy a particular category of viewers, but still for a section like ‘Discovery’ those were too late to be discovered. Out of the twenty titles of the ‘Indian Select’ section some important films were Girish Kasaravalli’s “Hasina” (2004), Ahsan Muzid’s “Sonam” (2005), Manju Borah’s “Jaymoti”, Shaibal Mitra’s “Sangshoy” and Himangshu Khatua’s “Kathantara”. Twenty shorts and four documentaries were there as the official entries increasing the number of titles to a fabulous 225 and keeping everything mixed-up without having any distinctive identity of the Festival. Finally it turned to be a ten million Rupees extravaganga, which kept no permanent effect on the cine scenario of the city.