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The London Indian Film Festival (Liff), is back for its 13th year and we have a sneak peek into the exciting films that will be showcased at the prestigious festival! This year’s Liff spans 14 days from 23rd June – 6th July, screening in various cinemas across London as well as regionally in Manchester, Birmingham, and Leeds. Plus the BFI Player will host a selection of short films. Plus there will be films available at LoveLIFFatHome.com but more to come on that later.

As with every year, the festival strives to bring thought-provoking, unique viewpoints and outstanding independent films to audiences with the selection of films Liff brings to the screen. Not only featuring world premieres, and special screenings, Liff also features masterclasses and incredible Q&a events after the screenings. Liff brings an in-depth look into cinema.

Festival Director Cary Rajinder Sawhney MBE says, “We are delighted at the...

Anurag Kashyap’s “Dobaaraa” has been set as the opening night film of the London Indian Film Festival. Despite its name, the festival will play at venues across the U.K., and will present 24 features and 18 shorts.

“Dobaaraa” is a supernatural thriller that Liff describes as involving a young woman trapped between two lives in different decades. Kashyap has previously told Variety that “Dobaaraa” is a Hindi-language adaptation of Oriol Paulo’s 2018 Spanish-language film “Mirage.” It stars Taapsee Pannu, an actor known for her eclectic choice of projects.

In “Mirage,” a 12-year-old boy witnesses a death during a thunderstorm and is killed himself. Twenty-five years later the woman who moves into the same apartment is connected to the boy through a television set during a similar storm and has the opportunity to save his life.

“Dobaaraa” was produced by Shobha Kapoor and Ektaa R Kapoor, through Cult Movies, a new...

Festival ran from April 28-May 1.

Once Upon A Time In Calcutta and Jaggi have triumphed at 2022 Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles (Iffla).

Aditya Vikram Sengupta’s Once Upon A Time In Calcutta won the grand jury prize for best feature film while Anmol Sidhu’s Jaggi took the inaugural Uma da Cunha Award for best feature film debut as well as the Audience Choice Award for best feature.

In the short film category, the grand jury prize went to Amrita Bagchi’s Succulent and the grand jury prize for best short in the inaugural Spotlight on South Asia section...

The 2022 Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles (Iffla) has announced the winners of its annual filmmaker awards, with Aditya Vikram Sengupta’s “Once Upon a Time in Calcutta” winning the grand jury prize for feature film. Anmol Sidhu’s “Jaggi” was the recipient of the Uma da Cunha Award for feature film debut, as well as the audience choice award for feature.

“This year’s edition of the film festival was wonderful in so many ways,” said Iffla executive director Christina Marouda. “The excitement felt by the reunion of so many of our filmmakers, patrons, and film fans back in the theaters was something we all shared. The months and weeks leading to the festival, we weren’t sure whether people would show up after a three-year break from an in-person festival. We were overwhelmed to see everyone coming back, eager to reconnect with the community and the Iffla family,...

It’s a tough game of survival in Calcutta, a city which keeps its people in their same old spaces with the same-same job opportunities, with little to no chance to change their lives for the better. For those few brave who try to challenge the rules of the societal game in Aditya Vikram Sengupta’s drama “Once Upon a Time in Calcutta”, things don’t go all too well. Ela (Sreelekha Mitra) gets punished for being born out of a wedlock as a daughter of a wealthy, married man and the city’s once-upon-a-time big performance star. She can’t be included to the inheritance, and her half-brother Bubu (Bratya Basu) is still sulking about his father’s infidelity four decades later, blocking her chances of getting the fair share out of the sale of the family house where he still lives alone, locked behind the barred door. Raja...

Speakers on the Knowledge Series panels discussed the precarious position of South Asian independent filmmaking following the pandemic.

While India’s economy is recovering, cinemas reopening and the streaming business booming, as the devastating second wave of the pandemic recedes, this year’s edition of Film Bazaar Online (November 20-25) highlighted the precarious position of Indian and South Asian independent cinema in the post-Covid landscape.

Speakers on several panels during Film Bazaar’s Knowledge Series talked about the usual indie filmmaker headaches of accessing funding and distribution, as well as the need for further training in areas such as animation and VFX,...

Teemu Nikki’s Venice and Antalya winner “The Blind Man Who Did Not Want to See Titanic” won the Golden star for best film at the 5th El Gouna Film Festival in Egypt, which wrapped Friday. The award carries a cash prize of $50,000.

The film’s lead Petri Poikolainen won best actor, while Maya Vanderbeque, the young star of “Playground,” won best actress.

Egyptian filmmaker Omar El Zohairy’s Cannes winner “Feathers,” which also won the Variety award at El Gouna earlier, won best Arab narrative film.

Directors Aleksey Chupov and Natasha Merkulova’s “Captain Volkonogov Escaped” won the Netpac award and bronze in the narrative category.

Michel Franco’s “Sundown” won silver in the narrative competition, while Aditya Vikram Sengupta’s “Once Upon a Time in Calcutta” scored a special mention from Netpac.

Mounia Akl’s “Costa Brava, Lebanon” won the Fipresci award and the Green Star award for tackling environmental issues.

It’s a tough game of survival in Calcutta, a city which keeps its people in their same old spaces with the same-same job opportunities, with little to no chance to change their lives for the better. For those few brave who try to challenge the rules of the societal game in Aditya Vikram Sengupta’s drama “Once Upon a Time in Calcutta”, things don’t go all too well. Ela (Sreelekha Mitra) gets punished for being born out of a wedlock as a daughter of a wealthy, married man and the city’s once-upon-a-time big performance star. She can’t be included to the inheritance, and her half-brother Bubu (Bratya Basu) is still sulking about his father’s infidelity four decades later, blocking her chances of getting the fair share out of the sale of the family house where he still lives alone, locked behind the barred door. Raja...

Aditya Vikram Sengupta’s debut feature, “Labour of Love,” bowed at Venice Days in 2014 where it won the Fedeora Award for best director of a debut film, en route to winning several international awards and at home in India. He’s back on the Lido with “Once Upon a Time in Calcutta,” his third feature, which screens in the Horizons strand.

“Labour of Love,” a lyrical look at a relationship, was set in Sengupta’s native city, Kolkata, the Eastern Indian metropolis formerly known as Calcutta, which is crumbling on the one hand and rapidly modernizing on the other. Both the city and memories feature prominently in India-Norway-France collaboration “Once Upon a Time in Calcutta,” where three lives collide against contrasting backdrops of simultaneous urban decay and growth. The film is shot by Gökhan Tiryaki, Nuri Bilge Ceylan’s regular Dp.

Sengupta’s next film, “Birthmark,” about two women who...

Indian filmmaker Aditya Vikram Sengupta is back on the Lido with his third feature “Once Upon a Time in Calcutta,” which screens in the Horizons strand.

His debut, “Labour of Love” (2014) bowed at Venice Days where it won the Fedeora Award for best director of a debut film.

Inspired by true events, the film follows the life of a bereaved mother and an estranged wife trying to desperately find a new identity, love and independence. But she soon realizes that she is not the only scavenger in the city formerly known as Calcutta, now called Kolkata, which is brimming with hunger. The film explores the interconnected lives of people struggling to live in a city that is experiencing the aftermath of a communist regime.

“For me, exploring the city was not through the city and the infrastructure or the architecture of the locations, but through the cities and the worlds existing in these people,...

A thought-provoking film about the importance of architecture by three-time Oscar nominee Wim Wenders, and an investigative documentary about the troubled life and times of Egyptian heart-throb Omar Sharif are among 30 feature film projects to be pitched as part of the 8th edition of the Venice Gap-Financing Market, which runs Sept. 3-5 at the Venice Film Festival.

The projects, which all have at least 70% of their funding in place already, include the works of many other leading filmmakers, such as Fien Troch, Martin Rejtman, Jean-Gabriel Periot, Marjana Karanović, Aditya Vikram Sengupta and Simone Jaquemet.

Wenders’ documentary “The Secret of Places” investigates the role played by architecture in our everyday lives. It takes viewers on a tour of architect Peter Zumthor’s best-known buildings, and accompanies him during the construction of two recent creations – the new Los Angeles County Museum of Art and the extension of the Fondation Beyeler in Basel.

The programme for the 2021 Venice Film Festival has been unveiled, and includes new films from Pedro Almodóvar, Jane Campion, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Michelangelo Frammartino, Pablo Larraín, Paul Schrader, Ridley Scott, and more.Parallel MothersCOMPETITIONParallel Mothers (Pedro Almodóvar)Mona Lisa and the Blood Moon (Ana Lily Amirpour)Un Autre Monde (Stephane Brize)The Power of the Dog (Jane Campion)America LatinaL’Evenement (Audrey Diwan)Official CompetitionThe Hole (Michelangelo Frammartino)Sundown (Michel Franco)Lost Illusions (Xavier Giannoli)The Lost Daughter (Maggie Gyllenhaal)Spencer (Pablo Larrain)Freaks Out (Gabriele Mainetti)Qui Rido Io (Mario Martone)On The Job: The Missing 8 (Erik Matti)Leave No Traces (Jan P. Matuszyński)Captain Volkonogov EscapedThe Card Counter (Paul Schrader)The Hand of God (Paolo Sorrentino)Reflection (Valentyn Vasyanovych)The Box (Lorenzo Vigas)Out Of COMPETITIONFeaturesDune (Denis Villeneuve)Il Bambino Nascosto (Roberto Andò)Les Choses Humaines (Yvan Attal)Ariaferma (Leonardo Di Costanzo)Halloween Kills (David Gordon Green...