Category: Event First Festival

Synopsis: The sudden industrialization and large-scale mining activities in central-eastern India in the twenty-first century have significantly impacted the socioeconomic fabric of a society previously dependent on agriculture. Against this backdrop, a young man and a young woman coincidentally cross paths, both searching for their respective identities. Their journey commences within a car on an ever-expanding road. The moving car becomes a temporary sanctuary, a home away from the real home that no longer exists. However, the road itself transforms into a path riddled with lies and betrayal. Both characters yearn for freedom Remembering  Promod Pati                                           Pramod Pati’s Explorer (1968), which was produced by the Films Division of India (FD). The subjects of the film seem like they are madly in search of something, and this is echoed in the camera’s relentless movement and refusal to stay at any one image. The film visualises the innermost recesses of the mind of the youth of the 1960s as they search for meaning. Yet its circular structure highlights how this is always out of reach. In its style and structure, the film invents a form that mirrors the frenzy of the youth, where the filmmaker refuses to capture a stable image, and instead, shaky, dizzying, hypnotic and trance-like sequences follow.

Set against the backdrop of a remote village in Odisha, the film gradually unravels the hopes, despair, attitudes and motivations of the character, linking their behavior to the social totality of which they are a part. Sakuntala, a widow, is worried about her son Aru, who is in research of a job. She thinks of getting him married as soon he gets a job. Smita, who lives in the same village, has an affair with Aru, she too hopes as soon as Aru gets on appointment, his mother could send a marriage proposal to her parents. Aru learning about Smita’s marriage finalization elsewhere, sends a moving voice mail, in which among other things mentions that perhaps what happened had to happen, but then life won’t stop………….Life

“Chha Mana….” adopts a new narrative, structured around two independent segments that develop towards the same intersecting destiny to offer an absolutely unique venture. It presents Ramachandra Mangaraj, the unscrupulous Zamindar, wielding complete reach and total control overall living in Govindpur, his dominion. Champa, his maid, a compulsive flirt, and Govinda, his barber/servant, also live with him. Mangaraj’s wife, the quintessential suffering woman, stands in contrast to him. She performs the role of Mangaraj’s ever present alter-ego, constantly cautioning him against his self destructive misdeeds. On the other extreme it also presents the household of a weaver couple Bhagia & Saria. Their existence depends on a flourishing plot of land, measuring six acres and eight gunths

A traditional middle-class family – a school head master, his wife, their four sons and their children- in a small Orissa town. The obviously quiet joint family has tensions within. The head-master realizes the changing moods and forces responsible for pulling every one apart. Maya Miriga which is, by turns, an unfortunate family story told more in sadness than anger, or an incisive critique of contemporary mores and methods. Starkly told, the film, however, relies on a lyrical poignancy, which is never allowed to turn unduly sentimental.