The ninth edition of Bengaluru International Film Festival (Biffes), which will begin on February 2, will have a platter of 240 films from 60 countries and offer this year’s Oscar nominees such as The Salesman (Iran, Asghar Farhadi) and A Man Called Ove (Sweden, Hannes Holm).
Interestingly, over 30 films that are much discussed in the international film circuit will premiere at BIFFes, which promises a diversity with a mix of contemporary local and global films. This edition has also provided a platform for eight-decade-old Kannada film industry by showcasing 40 Kannada films. All the films will be screened at PVR Cinemas, Orion Mall, Bengaluru and INOX cinemas, Mall of Mysore, Mysuru.
Kannada actor Puneeth Rajkumar, and renowned Egyptian filmmaker Hala Khalil will be the guests for the festival inauguration. The inauguration will be on the steps of the Vidhana Soudha and its eight Corinthian pillars will be used as canvas for video-mapping of cinema and culture, said M. Lakshminarayana, Secretary, Information.
The response for this edition is overwhelming, with 2,000 delegates registered already. To provide a wider canvas for the workshops, seminars and master classes that are being planned during the course of the event, webcast facility has been created, said N. Vidyashankar, artistic director, Biffes.
The countries of focus will be Luxembourg, Vietnam and Egypt. There will be a retrospective of Zoltan Fabri of Hungary and Haskell Wexler of the U.S., besides India’s prominent filmmaker Buddhadeb Dasgupta, who will the guest of honour for the inauguration.
There is something special for those keen on biopics, with films planned on Kannada scholar the late M.M. Kalburgi, Chilean poet Neruda, filmmaker Fritz Lang, artist Van Gogh, philosopher Louis Andrea Salome, and singer Mohammed Rafi.
Registration
Those interested to watch films at Biffes may register at the counters at Badami House near N.R. Square, Suchitra Film Society at Banashankari II Stage, Information Department office on Infantry Road or at Karnataka Film Chamber of Commerce near Shivananda Circle.
For details, visit http://biffes.in/
