480 films to be screened at Bangalore film festival

By Our Special Correspondent

BANGALORE, JUNE 29. As many as 480 films, including 200 from abroad, will be screened at the 32nd International Film Festival of India (IFFI) to be held in Bangalore from October 10.

The 10-day festival is the second to be held in Bangalore. The one held in 1992 was a low-key affair due to the Cauvery riots in the city.

Organised by the Directorate of Film Festivals, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting of the Union Government, the festival is being held here on a request by the State Government, which is the co-host.

The Union Minister for Information and Broadcasting, Ms. Sushma Swaraj, who presided over the first meeting of the organising committee on Friday, told reporters that the regulations for the festival had been circulated worldwide to invite entries. They were in consonance with the international regulations formulated by the Paris-based Inter-national Federation of Film Producers' Association (FIAPF) with which the IFFI and most major film festivals in the world were accredited.

Ms. Swaraj said the festival programme had been divided into ``Cinema of the World'', ``Foreign retrospectives'', ``Country focus'', ``Indian panorama'', ``Indian retrospective'' and ``Mainstream Indian cinema'' categories.

Under the first category, 75 films, produced in the past two years in 45 countries, would be screened. They represented the best of the latest in world cinema and included award-winning ones.

In the ``Country focus'' category, Brazilian films would be screened. Focus would be given to films of women directors from Brazil. A retrospective of the film-maker, Joao Batista De Andrade, would also be held.

In the ``Indian panorama'' category, about 30 feature and non- feature films selected by a panel of eminent film personalities would be screened.

About 3,000 delegates, including film personalities, directors, actors and journalists from abroad, would attend the festival.

The organising committee had authorised the Karnataka Minister of State for Information and Broadcasting, Prof. B.K.Chandrasekhar, and the State's Minister for Tourism, Mr. R.Roshan Baig, to decide on the venue of the function.

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