10 th MAMI: Lack Of Quality Stories For The 10th MAMI Glory
By Vishal Verma, Dated 14th March 2008

MAMI entered into double figures this year. The 10th MAMI Film Fest which showcased worldwide Cinema, for the entire week staring on March 6, had it last say yesterday for the year.

Though MAMI entered its first decade and registered around 2000 delegates in all as compared to last year 2168, somehow it failed to impress ‘cinematically’ considering it was its 10th year, unfortunately due to some poor film selection.

Even Jury members were a bit disappointed on the choice of selection for the Indian competition.

Such was the state in Indian Competition section that films like ‘Chak De India’ & ‘Tare Zameen Par’ who had already made their presence felt in the art and commercial circuit in India where also lined up for the competition. There is nothing against those 2 films as they are brilliantly written & made but this platform could had been more ‘profitable’ for any other filmmaker whose film may be worth.

Maybe this could have made the path for debutant Mangesh Hadawale’s ‘Tingya’ a bit easier.
Mangesh Hadawale ‘ Tingya’  won the best film award judged by a special 5 member international jury consisting of film maker and teacher Dal Wolman – Chairman ( Israel), Film Scholar Gonul Donmez Colin ( Turkey), Lawyer and filmmaker James P. Mimikos, writer, Filmaker and activist Manju Borah (India), Film society activist, Film Critic George Mathew (India) & FIPRESCI jury which consist of Rolf –Ruediger Hamacher – Chairperson ( Germany), Selvaggia Velo (Italy) & Zhuang Yuxin (China) whose film ‘Teeth Of Love’ was shown in the Global Vision section.             

Though ‘Tingya’ deserves the award but am sure it would had been more delighting experience for Mahesh if the competition would have been more stiffer as it was the case at the Third Eye Asian Film fest where in spite of  being pitted against favorites like ‘Vanaja’ and ‘Poet of the Waste’, the film got all the accolades for being a beautifully told emotional love story packed with child psych and humour between a bull and the Boy which makes an attempt to capture the dark and turbulent times of the Indian farmers at present.

First-time filmmaker Shivajee Chandrabhushan’s 107-minute, black and white film, Frozen (Hindi/Ladakhi), about a story of Lasya (Gauri), a girl in her late teens, living with her father Karma (Danny Denzongpa) and younger brother Chomo (Angchuk) in a remote village, in the mountains of the northern Himalayas & what happens when their quiet life is disturbed when the army moves into the village in search of the enemy but instead they find a frozen body. Got the special mention.
  
Director Shivajee Chandrabhushan’s effort’s in narrating a simple succession of telling moments that builds to a remarkable final image, was successful in ‘Frozen’’s journey to the Toronto Film Festival 2007 in the Discovery Section – a section tailored for emerging filmmakers from around the world Set in remote, snow-lined Ladakh, The brilliantly shot movie which reminds one of the Srilankan masterpiece , camera’d'ore winner “The Forsaken Land”.

‘Frozen’ was also the winner of the Special Jury Prize at Delhi’s Osian’s-CineFan. Swati Sen won the accolades as the best actor (special mention) for her stunning portrayal as ‘Janaki’ in Sushil Rajpal’s ‘ ‘Antardwand’ – a story of dark truths about the kidnapping of eligible boys in Bihar, who might otherwise demand hefty dowries for their wedding.

The boy wonder Darsheel Safary, got the special mention as the best child actor for his remarkable brilliance in ‘Taare Zameen Par’.

The 10th MAMI International Film Festival’s awards ceremony was held yesterday with Spanish Director Carlos Saura being felicitated with the Global Lifetime Achievement Award. Chief Guest of the event Shri Dev Anand, veteran Actor-Director, presented the Lifetime Achievement award to Shri Dharmendra.

To commemorate a decade of excellence, this year MAMI IFFM ‘08 introduced a host of exciting new initiatives. The Global Lifetime Achievement Award is one of them to recognize an international director for his/her contribution to the world cinema. The first award was conferred on Carlos Saura, the renowned Spanish director who was in Mumbai to attend the function.

 The other awardees at the 10th MAMI International Film Festival were Shri Rishi Kapoor for Significant Contribution to Cinema over 25 years, Shri Gulzar for Outstanding Contribution to Indian Film Music as Lyrics Writer and the Kodak Award for Technical Excellence to Shri Hitendra Ghosh.

 In order to nurture talent and provide a platform to new generation of filmmakers on the occasion of its 10th edition, Smt. Jaya Bachchan, one of the trustees of MAMI, introduced a new initiative called Dimensions Mumbai. Digital films under five minute durations depicting various aspects of life in Mumbai were invited for which there was a tremendous response with of 85 entries.

‘Vaapsi’ by Sriniwas Sunderrajan was adjudged the best entry and won the cash prize of Rs. 1, 00,000.

‘Mumbai Half Marathon’ by Aishwarya S. was adjudged the second best entry and won the cash prize of Rs. 30, 000.  ‘Live Mumbai’ by Ganesh Dattaram was the third winning cash prize of Rs. 20, 000.

Aishwarya Rai Bachchan gave away the awards to the winners of Dimensions Mumbai.  The dimensions jury also made a special mention of film ‘Patri’ by Akshara Prabhakar & ‘Handful’ by Neha Singh.

The real cause of concern was the selection of films for the GV (Global Vision) though it did showcased the starkly real, shocking & the most talk about film in festivals around the globe ‘4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days’ (Romania) by Cristian Mungiu & other gems like the Iranian film ‘Adam’ which speaks about life, living happiness & death by Abdolreza Kahani.  

The satirical comedy ‘I Served the King Of England’ by Jiri Menzel ( Czech Republic) which tells the story of the youthful exploits and gradual maturing of an ambitious young man before the war and during the German Occupation. The moving Turkish film ‘The Edge Of Heaven’ by Fateh Akin which takes the audience back and forth from Turkey to Germany to tell a complex story of intersecting lives, where the hopes and dreams of the characters become intertwined in a search of love and parents.

The charming ‘Caramel’ ( Lebanon) by Nadie Labaki, the romantic comedy centered on the daily lives of five Lebanese women living in Beirut kept the audience charmed throughout the 95 minutes of its duration.

But it also selected real turkeys like ‘Day & Night’ by Danish maker Simon Staho, Hotel Very Welcome by German maker Sonja Heiss etc etc.

The festival opened with Andrez  Wazda’s film ‘Katyn’ – which tells the story of women, wives and daughters of the Polish prisoners of war who were mass- executed on Stalin’s orders by NKVD in 1940. It was gripping but failed somehow in giving an insight into the Katyn forest massacre.

The Closing Film ‘The Mourning Forest’ by Naomi Kawase (Japan) which won the Grand Prix at Cannes in 2007and other awards for its emotional touch & its universal appeal which tells the story of an oldie Shigeki who lives in a small retirement home and Machiko a young home staff who pays special attention to him.

Some of the highlights of the festival were
The Opening Gala Night marked the screening of Polish master Andrzej Wajda’s latest film Katyn, nominated for an Oscar in the foreign film category. Katyn was premiered at the recently concluded 58th Berlin Film Festival and Mumbai Festival witnessed the grand Asian premiere of the film.

The Italian silent film Pinocchio (1911) restored by Cineteca was one of the attractions of the festival. The film, based on famous Collodi’s novel, was screened with live music. The screening was sponsored by the Italian Consulate, Mumbai.

Daily master classes by renowned film makers like James Mimikos, Shriram Raghavan, Stefano Odoardi, Prof. Dragan, Govind Nihalani and Dan Wolman.

The festival celebrated the 50th year of Andrzej Wajda’s legendary film Kanal

Special screening of To Each His Own Cinema made by 35 world renowned directors from 25 countries to celebrate 60 years of Cannes Festival – 2007

Retrospective of Ritwik Ghatak and Andrzej Wajda.

Film maker in focus was Carlos Saura whose eight films including Carmen were screened

Overall, the week long festival which screened 140 films from 45 countries was an intriguing cinematic experience but unfortunately only in bits and pieces.