Love, family and the filmmaker’s gaze
In collaboration with Dharamshala International Film Festival
Panelist
Namrata Joshi is a senior journalist and film critic. She is the winner of India’s National Award for Best Film Critic for 2004. She came out with her first book, “Reel India: Cinema off the Beaten Track”, in which she journeyed through the interiors of the country, intimately chronicling little-known accounts about the nation’s incessant obsession with the movies. It was published by Hachette in July 2019.
A member of FIPRESCI, the international federation of film critics based in Munich, she has been a member of the Fipresci critics’ juries at the international film festivals in Toronto, Cluj, Cairo, Moscow, Trivandrum and Aurangabad. She has been on the selection committees for films at the International Film Festival of Kerala and International Film Festival of India, Goa, and on the juries at the Jio MAMI Mumbai Film Festival and International Documentary and Short Film Festival of Kerala.
Priya Sen is a New Delhi based filmmaker and artist who works across film /video, sound and installation. She received an MA from MCRC, Jamia Millia Islamia, Delhi, and an MFA from Temple University, Philadelphia. She has worked with and taught non-fiction and experimental media practices and co-facilitated video modules at various institutions in Delhi and Bangalore, as well as in online contexts. Sen’s films have been presented at the Flaherty Seminar 2019, among other festivals and venues that include BFI London Film Festival, Forum Expanded Berlinale, Bangalore Queer Fest, Outfest LA, Experimenta, Portland International Film Festival and the Dharamshala International Film Festival. Her work continues to explore eclectic forms, urban ethnographies and the potentials of realist documentary as a generatively defamiliarizing enterprise.
Born in 1986 in Mumbai, India, Archana Phadke is an alumni of the Berlinale Talent campus. Her short film as a Director, “Uski Baarish” (2013) was screened at various international film festivals including Clermont-Ferrand International Film Festival, Aspen Shorts Fest, Toronto International Film Festival (KIDS), Seattle International Film Festival and 34 others. She has Produced and Edited, feature-length documentary Placebo. Placebo was an Indo-Finnish co-production premiered at the International Documentary Film Festival of Amsterdam (IDFA), 2014, where it won the jury nomination for Best Film in First Appearance Category. She has Co-edited the film “Raghu Rai, An Unframed Portrait” – Winner of IDFA Europe fund and Winner of Best International Pitch at Asian Side of the Doc and which had its premiere at IDFA 2017 (Mid length Competition). Her debut film as director “About Love” premiered at the Sheffield Doc fest in June 2019, where it won the New Talent Award.
Ritu Sarin is an Indian filmmaker and artist based in Dharamshala. She has been making films for more than 30 years. Her work includes several award-winning documentaries, video installations and two narrative features. Her debut feature film, Dreaming Lhasa (2005), was executive produced by Jeremy Thomas and Richard Gere, and had its world premiere at Toronto International Film Festival and its European premiere at San Sebastian International Film Festival. Her latest film, The Sweet Requiem, had its world premiere at the 2018 Toronto International Film Festival and has since shown in film festivals around the world. In 2012, she launched the Dharamshala International Film Festival, which is now one of India’s leading independent film festivals.
Topics
How do documentary filmmakers navigate the ethically ambiguous and cinematically complex challenges of entering into the deeply personal and intimate domains of their subjects’ loves and families? How do the objective and the subjective play out when they become embroiled in the real-life difficulties and vicissitudes of their protagonists’ lives? Filmmakers Archana Phadke (About Love), Priya Sen (Yeh Freedom Life), and Ritu Sarin and Tenzing Sonam (When Hari Got Married) discuss these and other issues in the context of their films.
Talk with Laura Samani
Talk on the film Piccolo Corpo (Small body) Italy, France, Slovenia 2021, 89’
Panelist
Laura Samani graduated at Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia di Roma, in directing class. Her graduation short movie THE SLEEPING SAINT (2016) premiered at Cannes Cinéfondation. Her first feature film SMALL BODY (2021) premiered at La Semaine de la Critique in Cannes and was selected at Toronto IFF, BFI London Film Festival, Hamburg Film Festival and won the Audience Award in Annecy Film Festival.
Dario Cecchi is Professor of Aesthetics in the Philosophy Department of Sapienza University of Rome. Previously postdoc in the research centre CEHTA, at EHESS, Paris, and PhD Candidate at the Alma Mater Studiorum University of Bologna. He also held courses and seminars at University Roma Tre and University of Calabria, and presented several papers in international conferences in Italy and Europe. His philosophical investigation is mainly focused on the philosophy of cinema and image theory, with regard especially to the relation between power and imagination.
Film education: growing up with cinema
Panelist
Nathalie Bourgeois leads an original international programme called Cinéma, cent ans de jeunesse, with workshops for students in 15 countries around the world and a specific resource website. She’s also involved as educational advisor in programmes supported by Europe Creative: CinEd and From Framework to Impact. She gives lectures in the master of didactics of the image at the University of Paris 3 Sorbonne Nouvelle. She has been creator and director of the Education Department of the Cinémathèque française (1993-2014). www.cinemacentansdejeunesse.org
Guy Borlée is coordinator of the international festival Il Cinema Ritrovato since 1995, organised by Cineteca di Bologna and dedicated to the study of film history and film heritage preservation: festival.ilcinemaritrovato.it/en
Cineteca also promotes the project Schermi e lavagne (screens and blackboards) for kids, families and schools: formazione.cinetecadibologna.it/schermi-e-lavagne/
Núria Aidelman Feldman is co-director of A Bao A Qu, organization devoted to the conception and development of programmes and activities that link artistic creativity with schools. Cinema en curs, a film pedagogy programme in primary and secondary schools started in 2005 and now developed in several regions in Spain, Brandenburg and Chile, is the foundation project of the organisation, while other notable projects include the European project Moving Cinema, led by A Bao A Qu since 2014, CinEd (2016), as well as Creadors en residència als instituts de Barcelona (2009), Fotografia en curs (2012). www.abaoaqu.org / www.cinemaencurs.org
Monica Wahi is a children’s film expert and founder of Southasian Children’s Cinema Forum. Over the last 16 years, she has worked as a curator, creative producer and acquisition consultant for young audiences. She has previously served as Creative Head of Children’s Film Society India, Going to School and Lennep Media. She has programmed and organised various children’s film festivals including International Children’s Film Festival of India (Govt. of India); International Children’s Film Festival Kerala (Govt. of Kerala), Sharjah International Film Festival for Children and Youth (Govt. of Sharjah), Jio MAMI Mumbai Film Festival, Dharamshala International Film Festival and Smile International Film Festival for Children and Youth.
Topics
In a world in which lives are reflected by countless multimedia screens, film education and film literacy provide fundamental support in the growth of the new generations.
Since the first years of its birth, cinema has codified the basic forms and techniques of the “moving image” language that today permeates our daily existence in all its aspects.
Furthermore films are not only extraordinary form of communication but also fundamental educational tool, involving youth on critical and diverse issues concerning life in all its aspects such as friendship, love, solidarity, human rights, fight against all kinds of discrimination, and ecological engagement.
Green shooting. A best practice for ecological cinema
Panelist
Birgit Heidsiek is the founder of the European Center for Sustainability in the Media World, which organizes international events about producing more environmentally-friendly films and publishes the Green Film Shooting magazine as well as its digital online platform. As the Green Cinema Consultant of the German Federal Film Board, Birgit is the author/producer of The Green Cinema Handbook and a two-time recipient of the German Sustainability Award.
A graduate in Political Science, Birgit also teaches courses at the Electrical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, and Technical Journalism Departments of the Bonn-Rhein-Sieg University of Applied Sciences.”
Alberto Battocchi works at Trentino Film Fund and Commission (TFC), where he currently works providing assistance to film and TV productions that are shooting in Trentino, and acting as the liaison with local film professionals and services. He is also part of GREEN FILM, the initiative launched by TFC for fostering environmental sustainability in audiovisual productions.
Lars Jessen is director and producer. For years he has successfully directed numerous television formats and five feature films, which were shown at numerous international festivals, as the Berlin International Film Festival. With his production company Florida Film, Jessen sets out to bring arthouse cinema onto the screen and meaningful content into TV and streaming platforms.
Topics
Costs of film productions are very high, from an economic but also an ecological point of view. The Trentino Alto Adige Film Commission (Italy) has devised a protocol that rewards eco-sustainable productions. German journalist, Birgit Heidsiek, Alberto Battocchi (Trentino Film Commission), one of the creators of the protocol will talk about it, involving in the discussion the director Lars Jessen, an expert in eco-friend production.
The relevance of film festivals in a hyper-digital world
In collaboration with Dharamshala International Film Festival
Panelist
Aseem Chhabra is a film journalist in New York City and New Delhi. He has been published in The New York Times, The Boston Globe, The Philadelphia Inquirer, Mumbai Mirror, Rediff.com, The Hindu, Outlook, BBC.com, Quartz, Scroll, Newslaundry. He’s been a commentator on Indian cinema and popular culture on NPR, CNN, BBC, CBC, ABC’s ‘Good Morning America.’
Aseem is the festival director of the New York Indian Film Festival, the largest and the oldest Indian festival in North America.
He is the author of the biographies of Bollywood actors Shashi Kapoor, Irrfan Khan and Priyanka Chopra.
Aseem is the voice of Shadow Puppet #1 in director Nina Paley’s acclaimed animated film, Sita Sings the Blues.
Deepthi Pendurty is the festival manager for Dharamshala IFF since 2018 and oversees various aspects of the festival including operations, partnerships and building the year round programme. She has over 9 years of experience in television and is the co-founder of Hyderabad Children’s Theatre Festival.
Christina Marouda is the Chair of the Board and founder of the Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles (IFFLA) where over the past 20 years she has created, developed and expanded the film festival into a creative and business portal between Indian and United States entertainment industry. She has developed key relationships with governmental, business and charitable organizations including SAG-AFTRA and the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, executives at all major film and television studios, prominent Indian filmmakers and leading international film festivals.
“Prior to that, she worked for five years with the American Film Institute for its globally renowned international film festival, AFI FEST, as Guest Services Director in charge of the Filmmaker Office. In 2008, she produced the Los Angeles Greek Film Festival (LAGFF) at the Lynwood Dunn Theater in Hollywood. Ms. Marouda started her career in entertainment in the New Media and Marketing department at Lions Gate Entertainment.
Ms. Marouda holds a B.A. in international relations from Athens University of Economics, and an MBA from California State University, Long Beach. She has studied and worked in Italy and Spain and speaks five languages.”
Meenakshi Shedde is South Asia Delegate, Berlin International Film Festival, pre-selecting films since 1998, and independent film curator, based in Mumbai. Winner of India’s National Film Award for Best Film Critic, she has been on the jury of 20 international film festivals, including Cannes, Berlin and Venice. She has been international curator/ programmer/ consultant to the Berlin International Film Festival, Toronto (TIFF Bell Lightbox), Locarno, Busan, Dubai, IFFI-Goa, Kerala and Mumbai Film Festivals; British Film Institute (BFI, London), Asia Pacific Screen Awards (APSA, Australia) and Kochi Muziris Biennale (India). She has been Script Lab Mentor and Critics’ Lab Mentor worldwide, and on the Selection Committee of top Film Funds in the US and Europe. A senior journalist, she freelances for Variety, Screen International, Sight & Sound, Film Comment, Cahiers du Cinema, Times of India and Sunday Midday, and has written for/edited 19 books, mainly on cinema.
Topics
The onset of the Covid-19 pandemic forced film festivals around the world to rethink their modus operandi and raised difficult questions about their very existence. The digital realm became their temporary refuge but as they come out of the pandemic and return to a physical domain, they find a very changed landscape, one that is dominated by the overwhelming presence of OTT platforms. How can film festivals, especially smaller ones, reinvent themselves and remain relevant to their communities in this new world of unlimited digital access and choice?
Cinema together: co-production in and out of Europe
Talk with Delphine Jaquet (Banshee Films)
Panelist
Delphine Jaquet is the co-founder of Banshee Films, a French production company which defends original styles in filmmaking. She collaborated artistically with several directors, notably on BURN IT UP, DJASSA (Berlinale Panorama 2013) and RUN (Cannes Un Certain Regard 2014). She turns to production for Philippe Lacôte’s second feature NIGHT OF THE KINGS – a coproduction between France, Ivory Coast, Canada and Senegal which premiered at Venice Orizzonti 2020.
Topics
Cinema is a collective job, made by a community of talents, creative and productive energies which cooperate together, at different levels, to create bigger and stronger projects. We love the idea that the increasingly expanding dimension of co-production in European countries somehow reflects the authentic sense of the European Union. Let’s discover the co-production universe and the passionate interest in working together to keep on celebrating the power of cinema and the art of storytelling, as a sign of belonging to humankind.