8th Edition of IDSFFK begins

The inaugural ceremony of eighth edition of the International Documentary and Short Film Festival of Kerala will be held at Kairali Theatre today at 6 pm . The festival will be inaugurated by Padma Shri Tom Alter. The Cultural Affairs Secretary,  Rani George will preside over the function. The festival book releasing will be carried out by KSFDC Chairman Raj Mohan Unnithan and it will be received by KCAWFB Chairman G Suresh Kumar .Festival Bulletin will be released by Chalachitra Academy Executive Committee Member Aryadan Shoukath  by handing over it to Chalachitra Academy Executive Committee member Ram Chandra Babu . Welcome speech will be delivered by academic vice chairman Joshi Mathew and vote of thanks will be delivered by the Secretary S Rajendranath.

The function will be followed by the screening of the opening films; “The Phone Call“ directed by famous English film maker Mat Kirkby and “Following Nazarin” directed by the surrealistic film maker  Javier Espada.

Around 210 films selected from 35 countries are screening under 15 categories in this festival .Competition category comprises 74 films including 11 Malayalam films. 9 Korean films are screening under the Country focus category. The 8^th IDSFFK presents Amit  Dutta  as “Filmmaker in Focus” and screens  his famous 10 short films.

The jury for the documentary section are Audrius Stonys , R V Ramani and Venu . The Jury members of the fiction category comprises the critic turned film maker Altaf Mazid, film maker and cultural entrepreneur Ari Allansson  and the famous Bengali director Ashoke Viswanathan.

The Best Short Film will be  awarded  by a cash prize of RS.50,000/- and a certificate and the Best Music Video will be awarded Rs.25,000/-and a certificate.  Rs. 20,000 and a certificate will be awarded to the creative team of Best Campus Film. Award for the Best Cinematographer donated by eminent Cinematographer Mr. Navroze Contractor and the award constitute a cash prize of 15,000/- and a certificate.

As a part of the festival there will be daily Press Conferences and Face To Face programmes in which eminent short film and documentary directors will participate.

The five day long festival , organised by Kerala State Chalachitra Academy is scheduled to be held at Kairali -Sree-Nila Cinema complex from June 26^th to June 30.

 “Master Classes” which deals with different topics related to Documentary films will be held at Nila Theatre at 2 PM from 27^th to 30^th June. “Kerala Pavilion”, a programme which performs various traditional art forms of Kerala, will be held at Kairali theatre premises from 27^th to 29^th June at around 6 PM.