The Hindu Business Line : Will Goa become our Cannes?

This seems to be the big question on every film enthusiast's mind, as 2005 will be a make-or break year for the India International Film Festival that begins in Goa today.

Actors Pooja Bhatt and Meera pose with the IFFI poster. - R.V. Moorthy

When festival director Afzal Amanullah addressed a small press meet in New Delhi recently to talk about the latest edition of the India International Film Festival (IFFI), he promised, "that from now on, it would only get bigger and better".

The 36th IFFI festival opens in Goa today, and Amanullah's team along with co-host, the Goa State Government, will hold its breath for the ten-day duration. Last year, when the IFFI moved to Goa for the first time, there was vociferous doubt that it would return.

It was as late as September this year that Goa was designated as the permanent IFFI venue, and full-fledged preparations have been under way only since then. As is the Information and Broadcasting Ministry's wont, Amanullah, a joint secretary in the Ministry, is not a full-fledged festival head, a tradition that seems to have been buried nearly a decade ago.

So what he takes on this year is not only a new job, and strife-ridden departments, he also inherits a festival which seems to have lost its moorings in the past decade, which has seen several festivals start and prosper in other parts of the country.

The IFFI used to be an annual pilgrimage for film-lovers, who would turn up in vast numbers at the venue (it was held in various state capitals and New Delhi during alternate years). Now cinephiles in Thiruvananthapuram say they have no need to travel because their own festival is world-class; Kolkata has its own, so do Pune and Mumbai.

The last with its focus on documentaries and short films established itself as a film destination in January; New Delhi now has Osian's Cinefan, which has a one-point agenda — to make itself the place where films and filmmakers arrive to showcase their latest in July every year.

So, despite Mario Miranda's lovely poster, which welcomes all film-lovers to Goa, it is clear that this is the IFFI's make-or-break year. The first time around, glitches are not only expected, they are also forgiven. The media and film fraternity actually expected things to be worse, so the flak the festival directorate received, for such things as a chaotic opening gala where invitees were left stranded outside the auditorium, among others, was mild.

Any film festival has to focus on movies first, foremost and last: the glamour and red carpets come later. Last year, the only notable international entry was The Motorcycle Diaries, with Mira Nair's already released-and-reviled Vanity Fair being the inaugural film.

This year, there is supposed to be an exciting fare from Europe (the IFFI has to be among the few festivals which calls itself international and releases its brochure with confirmed entries only on the day the festival starts), as well as from Latin America and Africa. The broadened competition section will include films from these countries as well as Asia.

Another new feature, according to Amanullah, would be premieres of our own movies at the festival. It's not that new, because last year, a few forgettable Bollywood films did open at the festival. This year, Prakash Jha's eagerly awaited Apharan will be a `mid-fest gala'. Deepa Mehta's controversial Water is also expected to be a star entry.

So will Goa become our Cannes? We will have a strong inkling at the end of these 10 days.

Period films... non-starters?

The budget was rumoured to hover at the Rs 75-crore mark, which makes Akbar Khan's Taj Mahal — An Eternal Love Story one of the most expensive films Bollywood has produced. But reports after the opening weekend have been less than ecstatic. In many theatres, collections have been a dismal 30-40 per cent.

It proves an old jungle saying in showbiz — all show, no tell, does not a blockbuster make. The period is painstakingly recreated, down to the delicate filigree work on the palace walls, and the intricate embroideries on the costumes. Khan reportedly took well over a decade to research his film which was nearly three-and-a-half years in the making. The sets dazzle, the stones sparkle, but the film is inert.

One-film-old Zulfikar Syed, and debutant Sonya Jehan, as the legendary lovers Shah Jahan and Mumtaz Mahal, are all dressed up, but have nowhere to go. Also, on screen, the white marble looks like papier-mache! There is none of the towering impact of the real-life monument, which after weathering nearly 400 years of pollution and use, still manages to amaze the first-time visitor.

What is it with period movies, and Indian audiences? Except perhaps for Mughal-e-Azam, Pakeezah, and to an extent Razia Sultan, almost all others have had no takers. Given that even 50 years is considered period by today's audience, even recent films like Parineeta could have been consigned to the dust-heap, but what the filmmakers got bang on target was the look and the tone of the film; the settings may have been the 1960s, but the feel was contemporary.

Taj Mahal goes all the way back to the mid 1600s, when the Mughal Sultanate was taking root in the North. The dialogue in the film is flowery Urdu, which sounds impressive only from a couple of characters (Kabir Bedi who plays the old Shah Jahan, and Arbaaz Khan who plays his ambitious, scheming son, Aurangzeb); the rest of the cast appears to be reciting their lines.

A Devdas gets Bharat Shah, the diamond merchant-producer of the movie who spent Rs 40 crore, both fame and returns because of Sanjay Leela Bhansali's lavish sets, as well as the tremendous star power of his cast, Shah Rukh Khan, Aishwarya Rai, and Madhuri Dixit. The doubly expensive Taj Mahal tries to do the same, with little known names, and also-rans: a terrible idea for a film that cost a bomb.

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