Films I watched at the 17th MAMI Mumbai Film Festival

What would you do if you witness something extraordinary but cannot talk about it to anyone?Can you keep your sanity intact? What would you do, if a responsibility is assigned to you which might change the fate of universe?Would you be excited or petrified? A school teacher in a village goes through this mind-wrecking journey without a choice.The only choice left to him is whether he could complete the task assigned to him or he should get himself admitted in an asylum. Though the story is in the genre of supernatural thriller,the film tries to tell the story by following the cliches but breaking the rules in which cliches are told.

An encounter with ones own past, as the mainstream engulfs all sub cultures and ethos and tries to create one world order.

While spending the summer in cottage country on the shores of Lake Superior, three teens cope with boredom by testing the limits of their experience.

At the heart of the film's multiple narratives is an adaptation of A Distant Episode, the savage short story set in Morocco by American author Paul Bowles, first published in 1947. Moving between documentary, fiction and fable, "The Sky Trembles and the Earth Is Afraid and the Two Eyes Are Not Brothers" observes its protagonist, filmmaker Oliver Laxe, directing his own film Las Mimosas in Morocco, only to walk off set and into Rivers' narrative. Shot against the staggering beauty of the Moroccan landscape, from the rugged terrain of the Atlas Mountains to the stark and surreal emptiness of the Sahara, with its encroaching sands and abandoned film sets, Laxe is drawn into a hallucinatory and perilous adventure of cruelty and madness to form a multi-layered excavation into the illusion of cinema itself. "In a café in Morocco, about 50 years ago, Paul Bowles overheard a man, high on kif, say the title of this film. And so he wrote a story around this statement, a story that moves between different planes of reality. I read the story, and the story behind the story, and the strange phrase kept circling around my mind, creating images and dreams. This film is a manifestation of these images, along with obsessions about cinema and how far we will go to make it". Oliver Laxe.

An ambitious man leaves his small Indian village for America. But when his letters to home stop coming, his brother sets out on his own adventure.

Gilles and Tiny are both mourning recent deaths. Their grief unites them but hiding beneath the grief are darker shadows that connect their losses.

A married film director falls for a young painter - twice.

Fear and paranoia pervade life in rural Punjab of the '80s, before and after Operation Blue Star, as separatists clash with security forces.

Former child bride Selvi escapes her child marriage to become South India's first female taxi driver.

Musician Jonny Greenwood travels to Rajasthan, where he performs with a multitude of Indian musicians.

The Violin Player is the story of one day in the life of a Bollywood session violinist who finds expression in an unlikely place. The day unfolds to reveal startling truths about music, art, life and survival.

Set in the badlands of Haryana, known for high rates of female foeticide, G Kutta Se explores the murky world of sexual transgression and honour killings in India.

Banned from making movies by the Iranian government, Jafar Panahi poses as a taxi driver and makes a movie about social challenges in Iran.

Four labourers are tortured by the police to confess to a theft they have not committed.

A selfish, manipulative schoolteacher takes advantage of a schoolgirl's vulnerability to gratify his dark, narcissistic desires.

A collection of three comic-dramatic stories set in Mumbai. The first is about a diligent office worker who wins the office 'Fun Committee Award', which entitles him to a whole day full of fun. He is most reluctant to leave the safety of his cubicle but he has to. Prescribed fun modules have to be completed and non-compliance is not an option... The second story begins with a domineering head-of-the-family, Anil, who is on life support. Seeking some relief, his family decides to buy a TV, which Anil had banned. Now every night the family plugs into a popular soap whose hero, Purshottam, is a man ideal in every way and they are smitten. Then suddenly, comes the news that Anil is better and may be home soon. Will they have to let Purshottam go?... The third one centers on Aarti whose repetitive existence is slowly making her more and more mechanical and numb. Deep inside ferments a disconnect and unease that she is unable to articulate to anyone. Then one day there arrives a most intimate letter and everything changes...

Four folk tales from Assam re-imagined as a narrative about four mothers, each facing demons of her own.

The chronicles of Manto, a famous Urdu novelist who opts to live in Lahore after the independence of Pakistan. He left Bombay because it wasn't safe anymore for Muslims, but his artistic choices made him face obscenity charges.

An author's struggle between what he wants to write and what others might want to read culminates into a surrealist novel.

After the Supertyphoon Haiyan, which plunged the city of Tacloban in the Philippines into its horrendous state, the lives of Bebeth, Larry, and Erwin intertwine. The survivors are left to search for the dead while keeping their sanity intact and protecting what little faith might be left. A series of events continues to test their endurance.

Ottaal (The Trap) is an adaptation of one of Anton Chekhov's timeless works, Vanka. A story of the 18th century, but one that has travelled the time and space to be retold in the present day at a small village in the South of India. Kuttappayi, a young boy, is miserable and desperate as he starts writing a letter to his grandfather from a place, dim and dark. Kuttappayi's recollections takes us to the picturesque locations of Kuttanad, where Kuttappayi and his grandpa, Valiyappachayi, are arriving with their ducks. The village is as pleasant as it can be even though what brings him there is the death of his dearest parents. With hope and freedom, he is about to start his life afresh among the village's letterless postman, the nameless dog, the rich lad, Tinku and many more.

A man crippled by the mundanity of his life experiences something out of the ordinary.

The brief stay of a young man and his father to Munroe island, where his grandfather resides.