MIFF 2008 to showcase rare World War II films

Mumbai, Dec 29 (UNI) The 10th Mumbai International Film Festival (MIFF) for documentary, short and animation films alongwith rare World War II documentaries will be held from February 3-9, 2008 at the prestigious National Centre for Performing Arts (NCPA) here.

The week long festival will have 44 films in the international competition section and 54 films in the Indian competition section.

Besides, arrangements were being made for showcasing some World War II documentaries, not seen before in India.

Addressing mediapersons in yesterday, Chief Producer and Head of the Films Division Mr Kuldeep Sinha said, ''MIFF has been rated as the third largest documentary film festival in the world. In all 534 entries have been received for the Indian section while 228 films from 37 countries were vying to be short-listed in the international competition section.'' ''The selection process had been entrusted to a five-member jury , comprising international and Indian experts, for each section. In the international category Australia, Poland, Canada and the United States have four entries each. In the Indian section, Maharashtra, more particularly Mumbai, has 19 entries, followed by Delhi-12, West Bengal-five, Assam and Gujarat have four each.

Besides the competition section, MIFF will showcase special packages of SAARC Films, films from Brazil, Mexico and South Africa, biographical films made on great filmmakers like Satyajit Ray, Bimal Roy, Ingmar Bergman and Andrei Tarkovsky and Glimpses of Films Division. There are also special packages of films from Jammu and Kashmir and the North East. The Classics section will show films made by great masters like Bert Haanstra, Robert J. Flaherty, Francois Truffaut, Krystoff Zanussi and Ritwik Ghatak. This package is being organised in collaboration with the National Film Archives of India.

About 3,500 to 4,000 delegates are expected to register for the Mumbai International Film Festival. ''MIFF is our sincere effort to encourage documentary film culture among people,'' said Mr Sinha, adding that his department will be taking documentary film festivals to many other parts of the country, to kindle interest in this form of films, which often get overshadowed by the mainstream Bollywood films and regional feature films.

UNI