After struggling to find its feet in the past few years, the film market of the International Film Festival of India (Iffi) in Goa is undergoing a radical overhaul this year in partnership with government agency, the National Film Development Corporation (Nfdc).
This year, Film Bazaar (November 24-26) will ditch the traditional sales booth format, which previously featured local film exporters and state film commissions, and replace it with a three-day co-production and projects market at the Goa Marriott Resort.
Under the theme Cinemas of India, the market will present 14 selected projects, in different languages and from different parts of India, to potential co-producers, sales agents and other investors.
Film Bazaar will also feature the first ever Indian Script Development Workshop and a seminar programme covering issues such as international distribution of Indian films, co-production and new revenue streams.
Nfdc managing director Nina Lath Gupta hopes the market will help raise international awareness of the many different types of Indian cinema, not always necessarily 'arthouse' or with niche appeal, that is produced outside the Bollywood mainstream.
'India's parallel (ie arthouse) cinema is programmed at festivals, but not many non-mainstream films are sold at international film markets, partly because sales agents don't know where to start looking,' Gupta says.
Meanwhile, the script development workshop, which will be held for six days in the run up to Iffi (November 18-23), will enable eight Indian film-makers to work on their scripts under the guidance of six international writers and directors, including Danis Tanovic (No Man's Land) and Bernd Lichtenberg (Good Bye Lenin!). 'The idea is to develop commercially viable scripts aimed at the international market,' says Gupta.
The market and workshop are part of the recently revitalised Nfdc's mission to support new talent by becoming active in co-production, financing and marketing initiatives, rather than by simply subsidising niche film-makers.
Founded in 1975, the Nfdc enjoyed its heyday in the 1970s and 1980s when it funded the film-makers of the Indian New Wave. But it failed to effectively market its new discoveries, and by the turn of the millennium had been written off by the local industry as bankrupt and bureaucracy-ridden.
Gupta, who became managing director 18 months ago, has been putting the Nfdc's house in order by clearing its debts and securing a government loan to move back into funding new film-makers. She also hopes to raise equity finance through discussion with local banks.
Under her watch, the agency has introduced two funding schemes, one that fully finances films from first-time directors, and a three-way financing model under which the Nfdc pitches in 30% of a film's budget if the producer provides 30% and can raise the remaining 40% within one year. The second scheme is open to international co-productions.
The first project under this scheme, Anjali Menon's rites-of-passage drama Lucky Red Seeds, is in production. The Malayalam-language film is a co-production between the Nfdc, Menon's Little Films and India's Mirchi Movies, owned by the Times Of India.
As part of her drive to raise international financing, Gupta took Lucky Red Seeds and another project from the funding scheme, Sanjivan Lal's Bubble Gum, to participate in Cine-Mart's Rotterdam Lab at the Rotterdam film festival this year.
'We have a mandate to not just support Indian cinema but to identify new talent,' says Gupta. 'We were great at that in the 1970s when film-makers like Ketan Mehta and Sudhir Mishra made their first films with us. Now we want to start discovering new talent again.'
GOA'S WORLD CLASS POLICY
Film Bazaar and its associated events will run parallel to the 38th edition of the International Film Festival of India (Iffi), which has been held annually in Goa since 2004. The state government of Goa has created an agency, the Entertainment Society of Goa, to organise Iffi and frame a policy to help transform the state into a world-class entertainment hub. This year, former Iffi director Neelam Kapur has returned to head the festival.
Cristian Mungiu's Cannes Palme d'Or winner 4 Months, 3 Weeks And 2 Days will be the opening film of this year's Iffi, with director Mungiu expected to attend.
Among the more high-profile local films making their Indian premiere at the festival are Mira Nair's collection of films on Aids, Aids JaaGo, and Rituparno Ghosh's Shakespearean drama The Last Lear, starring Amitabh Bachchan. Carlos Saura's Portuguese music doc Fados will close the festival. Special programmes include a tribute to Ingmar Bergman and a collection of French films.
'This year we have expanded capacity with four additional theatres close to the festival venue,' says Kapur. 'In order to solve the problem of queuing experienced by delegates last year, we have introduced a system of ticketing. Tickets can be collected up to three days prior to the screening.'
Iffi also aims to support non-mainstream Indian talent through its Indian Panorama section, which last year screened 20 features and 20 documentaries from all over the country. Udita Jhunjhunwala
PROJECTS SELECTED FOR THE FILM BAZAAR CO-PRODUCTION MARKET
Aryaman (language - Hindi) Dir: Gaurav Jain
As The River Flows (Hindi) Dir: Bidyut Kotoky
Benoy Badal Dennis (Hindi) Dir: Anjan Dutt
Constance (English/Hindi/Malayalam) Dir: Charudutt Acharya Prod: Richard Holmes
Happy Go Lucky (English/Punjabi/Hindi) Dir: Ruchika Oberoi
Last Days Of Ropang (English/Hindi) Dir: Shyamal Kumar Karmakar
Ocean Of An Old Man (Hindi) Dir: Rajesh Shera
Poona Company (English/Hindi) Dirs: Sunandan Walia and Yugesh Walia
Protham Maa (Bengali/Hindi) Dir: Ashim Ghosh
Shadkala Govinda Marar (Malayalam) Dir: Sri Sivan
Shor (Noise) (Hindi) Dirs: Raj Nidimoru and Krishna DK
Sunshine Stars (Coorgi/English) Dir: Priya Belliappa
The Blue Baby (Hindi) Dir: Kshitij Negi Prod: Neerav Ghosh
Veerappan Attahasa (Kanada/Tamil) Dir: AM Ramesh
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