City Lights – a Teaser to the Upcoming 7th Indian Film Festival in March
From Left: Director Hansal Mehta, Festival Director, IFFH Board Member, Ellen Goldberg, Mohammed Iqbal Khan, Sutapa Ghosh, Amey Prakash, Consul General P. Harish, Nandita Harish, Sneha Merchant, Parul Fernandes, Atul Badwal, Jose Grinan. Photos: Navin Mediwala
By Sanchali Basu
HOUSTON: Sutapa Ghosh, founder cum director of IFFH had a brilliant idea of doing something different this year. Not in keeping with the tradition of holding the annual Indian film festival around this time of the year in Houston, it was decided to move it to March next year to make it coincide with the annual award season in India.
But not to disappoint her flock of loving movie goers, she arranged for a one-night opener with cocktails, music and the screening of the movie, “City Lights” at the Studio Movie Grille in the City Center the evening of August 27. With rain in the forecast, the cocktail reception was moved to the Straits restaurant, and the evening just kicked off in the right mood with hors d’ouevres, drinks and music. The eclectic gathering of more than 200 people ranged from the Indian Consul General P. Harish, to the movie director Hansal Mehta.
So much was the enthusiasm that 25 extra chairs had to be added in the front to accommodate some of the 31 people on the waiting list and the rest were requested to come back in March.
From Left: IFFH Board Member and Actor Mohammed Iqbal Khan, IFFH Festival Director Sutapa Ghosh, James Harris from HEB, Director Hansal mehta and IFFH Board President Amey Prakash.
City Lights, based on Sean Ellis’ acclaimed Metro Manila, was the featured movie. The thought provoking, heart-wrenching movie told the story of a poor Rajasthani villager Deepak Singh, who had to move to the big city Mumbai to make ends meet. Unable to keep up with the money lenders demands and after being forced to shut down his little fabric store, he decides to move with his wife and little daughter to Mumbai, to live the dream life. Harsh realities and painful tragedies start striking from the minute they land in the city (paved with gold?) The journey with this family was a huge eye-opener for the audience and everyone remained at the edge of their seat until the last minute to find out if they would be able to survive.
Performances by Rajkumar Rao (Deepak) and Patralekha were brilliant. In a question and answer session that followed, director Mehta thanked the actors and the producer Mahesh Bhatt for making the movie possible. In response to the query about the choice of the depressing nature of the movie, he answered that it gave him satisfaction. After receiving rave reviews from critics and succeeding at the box office in India, he is encouraged to make more movies of the same genre and producer Mahesh Bhatt is willing to produce them.
From Left: Consul General P. Harish, Director Hansal Mehta and Festival Director Sutapa Ghosh.
Consul General P. Harish thanked the board of IFFH for putting together these remarkable film festivals. Sam Merchant from senator Al Green’s office presented the director with a proclamation recognizing his contribution to Indian cinema.
Kudos to the IFFH board for coming through time and time again with screenings of such exceptionally good Indian movies and allowing the Houston Indian diaspora to be a part of it. This just whetted our appetite for more and better movies to be screened at the Seventh Annual IFFH to be held in March.
For details visit at www.iffhinc.org.
To add another feather to their cap, IFFH has been invited by IFFI (International Festival of India) to be held in Goa in November to be present at press conferences and the Film Bazaar.