Om Puri’s frequent collaborator, filmmaker Govind Nihalani, will host the retrospective segment on the veteran actor at this year’s Habitat Film Festival.
Puri, who died on January 6, collaborated with Nihalani in classics like Aakrosh, Ardh Satya and Dev. Some of Puri’s films which will be screened at the 12th edition of the festival include Tamas, Dev, East Is East and Sadgati.
Konkona Sensharma’s directorial debut A Death in The Gunj is the opening film at the festival, which runs from May 19 to May 28. Other first-time directors, whose films will be screened are Avinash Das (Anaarkali of Aarah), Rima Das (Antardrishti), Ananya Kasaravalli (Harikatha Prassanga) and KP Vyasan (Ayaal Jeevichirupund).
Tamil film Katrikka Vendakka , directed by Sudheesh Sankar, will have its premiere at the festival.
The 10-day event is expected to be attended by Malayalam director Adoor Gopalakrishnan, Bengali directors Kaushik Ganguly and Buddhadeb Dasgupta, Marathi director Nagraj Manjule, whose much-acclaimed film Sairat will be screened.
This year’s National Award-winning films K Sera Sera, Bisorjon, Joker and Mukti Bhawan are also a part of the festival.
A special exhibition of selected writings and film posters of Khwaja Ahmad Abbas will be organsied as part of the festival. It will include film posters and stills of Abbas’ films such as Saat Hindustani, Shehar Aur Sapna, Dharti Ke Lal, Naya Sansar, Anhoni and Pardesi among others.
There will also be panel discussions with visiting filmmakers.
