The events were first of their kind for the two cities. A thematic
selection of films from feature and documentary genres was the
uniqueness of the festival. The theme of both the festivals was 'the
role played cultures, symbols and identities in creating and mitigating
conflict.' The media coverage for both the festivals was overwhelming.
Almost all the leading newspapers and the local news channels gave
detailed coverage to the festivals. (A few paper clippings are annexed
as Annexure 1)
In Lucknow the festival, Faasle... was organised in collaboration with
Sanatkada, Lucknow. The event was held from 18th to 24th January 2010.
It was a huge success with public participation of over 2000 people
from various fields. The festival was held at eleven different colleges
and culminated at a central venue with twelve films being screened. One
of the highlights of the festival was the interaction of leading
inteelectuals and activists from Lucknow like Prof Rooprekha Verma,
Malini Manglik, Madhavi Kukreja, Shahira Naeem and Sahib Syed with
students. The festival also saw film makers like Sonia Jabbar and Lalit
Vachani interact with the public majority of them were students. Film
actor and AMAN Trustee Farooque Sheikh also spoke about his debut film
Garam Hawa, which was screened at the festival.
In Patna, AMAN collaborated with Nat Mandap, Patna. The group is one of
the most reputed theatre groups of Bihar, and has leading theatre
directors and actors such as Parvez Akhtar, Javed Akhtar, Vinod Kumar
and Mona Jha as its members. The event was organised at two different
venues from 18th to 21st February 2010. Every day two films were
screened in Patna Museum Auditorium and plays and films were presented
at Machaan, an improvised terrace theatre space. Ten films were
screened during the festival and two plays were performed. Film
critiques, activists and theatre personalities including Dr. Jaymangal
Dev, Ms Kamayani, Ms Nivedita Jha, Ashish Ranjan, Dr. Javed Akhtar, Ms.
Minati Chaklanavis, Sh. Aneesh Ankur and Vinod Kumar participated as
the moderators for the discussions on the films.
In Alwar, AMAN collaborated with SAMANTAR. The event was held from 01 - 02 May 2010. Five documentary and feature film were screened over the two days followed by discussions with eminent personalities. The film festival was the first of its kind in Alwar and saw a participation of about 1000 people from across fields.
During the festivals we experienced that there is a huge demand for
off-beat and good documentary films among the youth and activists.
There was a consensus among the activists that there should be an
archive of such films from where they could borrow films for screenings
in the areas, mainly rural, they work. The response from the colleges
and other institutions were also very encouraging as they offered to
collaborate in organising such events in their premises for their
students.
The next festival is scheduled to be organised in Jodhpur, Rajasthan and Murshidabad, West Bengal.
The event was widely reported by the print media in english and vernacular.
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