Fri, 28. to Sun, 30. Oktober 11 at Kino Orfeos Erben, Frankfurt
New Generations Independent Indian Film Festival
From 28 to 30 October 2011 for the third time the ﾄNew Generations ﾖ Independent Indian Film Festival will bring highlights of the new Indian Cinema to Frankfurt. The festival is unique in Germany and has been very well received beyond Frankfurt. Again in 2011 at the renowned cinema Orfeos Erben we will present fascinating high quality productions from the genres feature, documentary and short film, among them some Germany premieres.ﾓIndien aktuellﾔ wrote about the mostly sold out festival 2010:
In view of the excellent selection of films one can only look forward for the ﾓNew Generationﾔs festival in the next year. It would be desirable, if this kind of Indian films would be presented more frequently in Germany.
New Generations - Indian Independent Indian Filmfestival
Programme
Friday 28 October 2011
20: 00 Opening
20: 00 West is West
22: 00 Best of No Masala ﾖ Traveling Indian Short Films
Curator Bernd Lützeler will appear in person
Saturday 29 October 11
18: 00 David wants to Fly - Director David Sieveking will appear in person
20.30 I Am ﾖ Director Onir will appear in person
22: 15 The Way Home
Sunday 30 October 11
16: 00 Mumbai Diaries
18: 00 Indian Dinner
Tickets: 8,50 Euro per film, reduced fee 6,50 Euro
tickets for two films per day 6,50 Euro each
We strongly recommend ticket reservation by 069 707 69 100
(Mon - Fri 12 ﾖ 3 pm, daily from 6 pm)
Indian Dinner
Please make your reservation until 25 October at this phone number:
069 707 69 100.
Fanpage New Generations New Generations Group
The festival brochure is online
Friday, 28 October 11, 8 pm
West is West
Eleven years after the hit British-Asian comedy drama, 'East is East' (1999), writer Ayub Khan-Din continues the story of the dysfunctional Khan family and its ongoing struggles with life between two worlds. In 1975, four years on from the events in the first film, the youngest of the Khans, Sajid (Aquib Khan), is fast approaching adolescence. As a British-Pakistani living in Salford, he finds himself caught between his father's despotic insistence on Pakistani tradition, and the merciless school bullies who celebrate his racial difference by repeatedly shoving his head down the toilet. It isn't long before Sajid retaliates with a growing repertoire of misdeeds. Realising that drastic measures are called for, George (Om Puri) decides to take Sajid on an eye-opening trip to Pakistan to meet the first wife and daughters he abandoned 35 years before.
Greatbritain 2010, 35 mm, 102 min
Englisch, Urdu with English Subtitles
Director: Andy De Emmony
Script: Ayub Khan-Din
Cast: Om Puri, Linda Bassett, Aqib Khan, Jimi Mistry
Friday, 28 October 11, 10 pm
Best of No Masala - Traveling Indian Short Films
presented by Bernd Lützeler
Alternating the Bollywood mainstream innovative young film makers have emerged in India, challenging traditional clichés and presenting a fresh approach to the medium. For the last time ﾓNo Masala - traveling Indian short filmsﾔ stops at Frankfurt, carrying the favorite works of the vital and growing short film scene in its luggage, presented personally (tba) by Bernd Luetzeler. No Masala collaborates with the Mumbai based "The short circuit".
With 500 Rupees to Heaven
Wherever you wanna go, the Chennai rikshaw wallas know the way, even if you want to go to heaven.
Directors: Jan Gassmann & Thomas Jörg
India/ Switzerland 2004, 5: 50 minutes, documentary
English, Tamil
photography: Thomas Jörg
cast: the rickshaw drivers of Chennai
Bengali Tourist
Contrary concepts of travelling: the great and often complaining Moroccan traveller, Ibn Battuta and the Bengali tourist. A cell animation with photographic background with animated figures in the foreground.
Director: Sarnath Banerjee,
UK 2003, 4 minutes, animation
English
script and photography: Sarnath Banerjee
editing: Graham Young
music: Canned
Aamchi Kasauti - Our Test
Sita, Shewanta, Kaushalya are dusting the streets around the city of Pune... They scavenge dust from daybreak to dusk and take their harvest at the end of the day to the gold traders.
Director: Rrivu Laha
India 2005, 11 minutes, documentary
Hindi/ Marathi with English subtitles
photography: Pierre Friquet
editing: Rrivu Laha
music: Rrivu Laha
Honeymoon
The bride does whatever it takes to conceal her past and preserve her honour on her wedding night.
Director: Andre Cooray
USA 2002, 7: 20 minutes, fiction
cast: Sheetal Sheth, Badraji Jayathilika
script: Andre Cooray
photography: Mary Ann Mandishona
editing: Andre Cooray
Trade
Based on an UN convention for child rights, this animation is about a young girl sold by her father. The girl comes to the city fostering big dreams only to find herself in a brothel. Child trafficing and -prostitution are major problems in India.
Director: Kireet Khurana
India 1998, 6: 30 minutes, animation
TV Stories
Associative diary of a TV junkie. A journey into the past that opens up a whole world of long-forgotten images. Mumbai international Film Festival 2006
Director: Sreejith Karanavar
India 2005, 16 minutes, docu-fiction
English, Hindi
script: Sreejith Karanavar
photography: Nilip Deb
editing: Amitava Singha
music: Pritam Das
voice: Sreejith Karanavar
Bheeru No.1
A spoof on Bollywood film making and -structure. It contains romance, action , comedy , tragedy and miracle popularly known as ﾓmasalaﾔ in Bollywood lingo.
Director: Parag Natekar, Mehul, Uttam Pal Singh
India 2002, 7: 41 minutes, animation
Hindi with English subtitles
music: Kaushal Inamdar
voices: Chetan, Nisha
Village Football
India, Gandhi said, lives in its villages. A lack of infrastructure is compensated with great passion and improvisation. That's also true for football.
Director: Sainath Choudhury
India 2005, 1 minute, fiction
script: Sainath Choudhury
photography: Jason West
editing: Prakash K/Davinder K
music: Derrick Gomes
cast: Kashish Dasani
6 ft in 7 mins
A short dark comedy about Rajeev Reddi, an East Indian guy who has been surrounded by death all his life, and on his 18th birthday he finally comes to understand why.
Director: Rafael Del Toro
USA 2005, 14: 30 minutes, comedy
English
cast: Mohammed Chaudhry, Yousef Gaffary, Joe Glass
Zulmat - Darkness
The life of a group of street kids in Bangalore. With their overwhelming instinct for freedom they act out their lives in a world full of fantasies and fears. The film uses candid, fictionalized footage and animation.
Director: Ishan Ghosh
India 2006, 21 minutes, docu-fiction
Hindi / Kannada with English subtitles
script: Ishan Ghosh
photography: Umang Razdan Bhattacharrya
editing: Ishan Ghosh
music: Aphex Twin
Saturday, 29 October, 6 pm
David wants to Fly
To meet master film director David Lynch in person and talk to him about filmmaking! A dream come true for young David Sieveking, who first finds himself sitting face-to-face with his idol in spring 2006.
The meeting takes place on the periphery of a workshop in the USA where Lynch is giving a talk on the sources of creativity. Paramount among them is transcendental meditation (TM), a technique the cult filmmaker has reputedly practiced daily for over thirty years. But he had never before spoken about it in public. Could TM be the mystery behind Lynchﾒs dark, inscrutable films?
Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, founder of Transcendental Meditation, promised creativity, health, professional success, world peace and no less than ﾓheaven on earthﾔ. David Sieveking decides to take the personal advice of the great David Lynch and begins to practice TM himself. Even master film directors start as novices, after all. And the best thing about it: TM is easy to do. Not cheap, but easy!
Funded by donations Maharishi and his followers built up an unparalleled global enterprise with the global headquarters in the Netherlands; a world peace center in India; a clandestine ﾓTM world governmentﾔ in the Swiss Alps; over 20 ﾓInvincible Universitiesﾔ have been founded and there are obscure gated camps dedicated to ﾓyogic flyingﾔ. For the second time, David Sieveking discovers a whole new world.
The more research the young filmmaker does, the more discrepancies surface. Suddenly TM apostates start contacting him, former high-ups in the organization who claime to have been ruined by the Maharishi ﾖ financially as well as psychologically. Should he believe them? Is TM just a cynical money machine after all, as critics maintain, or a guru sect gone haywire?
Throughout the odyssee that follows David Sieveking never loses the sly sense of humor that gives this surprising film its strength, elegance and ambiguous charm.
David Sieveking will appear in person
Germany/Austria/Switzerland 2010, 35 mm, 97 min,
German /English/Hindi with German and English subtitles
Director: David Sieveking
With appearance of David Lynch, Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr
www.davidwantstofly.de
Saturday, 29 October, 8 pm
I Am
I AM is about issues and dilemmas that bruise the modern Indian society. Unravelling and exploring these tribulations, the film unfolds many a tale of individuals struggling to find their identity, and uphold their dignity in a world that is callous, cold and unsympathetic.
Shot in four different cities across India, I AM is a fusion of stories where the protagonists share a common dream ﾖ a desire to regain their lives, to regain an identity which has been taken away from them.
I AM AFIA is the story of a single woman who feels her identity will be made whole through the singular feminine experience of motherhood. Unable to trust or even wait for a man, her search is defined ﾖ does motherhood necessarily require the burden of a man?
I AM MEGHA is a story of two friends ﾖ a Kashmiri Pandit woman and a Muslim woman ﾖ separated by conflict. Against the backdrop of the exodus of Hinduﾒs in Kashmir in early 90ﾒs, itﾒs a story of loss of home and identity. If your own home rejects you, where do you go and where are you ﾓfromﾔ?
I AM ABHIMANYU is the story of a broken man, with a proud mask. Abhimanyu is trapped by the demons of his past, a past of sexual abuse. To move forward he must first go back, into a world where his childhood was stolen from him.
I AM OMAR is a horrific tale of sexual discrimination; blackmail and prejudice is part of the torrid fabric. It reveals how the police use Article 377 (law under Indian Penal code which criminalizes homosexuality) to harass and blackmail gay men. In the current climate of media sensationalism, perhaps this story gains even more poignancy.
Characters move in and out of the stories, thus linking them in terms of content and structure. In all, I AM is about glimpses into the lives of people who often do not know whatﾒs right and very often, do not do the right thing. There is a beauty in simple things, and a dignity in individual struggle ﾖ through its stories, I AM reflects the story of everyone.
I AM is born of true life incidents.
About The Project
After making the highly acclaimed and award winning film ﾓMy brotherﾅNIKHILﾔ ( the producer-director duo of Sanjay Suri and Onir are proud to be releasing ﾓI AMﾔ, a film that is already making waves internationally through its innovative filmmaking process and its honest, unblinking portrayal of certain issues in society.
The producers have a vision to use the medium of mainstream films to spread awareness while popularizing the culture of watching content oriented cinema. Their belief that independent cinema exists to give a voice to those working against the tide and outside the system, has led them to innovate on the basic rules of film production.
Using social networks, they have co-produced the film with more than 400 individuals across 35 cities around the world, making I AM Indiaﾒs one of its first and the biggest crowd sourced film.
Director Onir will appear in person.
India, 2010, 35 mm, 93 minutes
director: Onir
Hindi, Englisch with english subtitles
Cast: Juhi Chawla, Sanjay Suri, Rahul Bose
Saturday, 29 October, 10.15 pm
Veettilekkulla Vazhi - The Way Home
Hesse premiere
A doctor working at a Prison Hospital is assigned the case of a woman in critical condition, a surviving suicide bomber from the ﾑIndian Jihadiﾒ terrorist group.
Despite his efforts the woman dies. But before dying she entrusts him to find her five-year-old son and unite him with his father Abdul Zuban Tariq, head of the terrorist group.
Finding the boy in Kerala, the Doctor and child set out on a journey to find his father. The journey takes them through the contemporary and mysterious path of the terrorist network in the vast country through various Indian states and with many un expectable incidents.
As a pan-Indian film, ﾄThe Way Homeﾓ captures Indiaﾒs diverse topography with some exhilarating photography. The most beautiful locations in India at different states were shot for this film. The film portrays the essence and simple beauty of relationships, diverse Indian cultures, its people and heritage. It emphasizes the path of love, survival, innocence and humanity, exploring a bloodstained facet of contemporary terrorism in India.
The locations Dr. Biju shot at Leh, Ladakh for the film were heavily destroyed by the Rain and flood disaster after 9 months.
Dr.Biju is professionally a Homoeopathic Medical graduate and a self-taught filmmaker. The Way Home is his third film.
India 2010, 35 mm, 95 min.
Malayalam with English subtitles
Director: Dr. Biju Kumar
Cast: Prithviraj, Indrajith, Govardh
Sunday, 30 October, 4 pm
Mumbai Diaries ﾖ Dhobi Ghat
Hesse premiere
Mumbai Diaries shows the Indian Megastar Aamir Khan (Lagaan), who also is its producer, in the role of an introverted artist.
Shai, an affluent investment banker on a sabbatical in Mumbai meets Arun (Aamir Khan), a gifted painter at the opening of his new show. Arun and Shai spend a night together, which later Arun cannot explain and Shai cannot forget. The very next morning they part ways, almost sure they will never meet again. Munna (Prateik), the young and beautiful washerman (dhobi) who delivers clothes to Shai's house, aspires to be a film actor. When he learns of Shai's hobby of photography he agrees to show her the 'real' city in exchange for her shooting his portfolio. Shai discovers the city through his eyes and her lens, and an unlikely friendship develops as Munna can't stop himself from falling in love with her. Meanwhile Arun finds a new apartment where he can resume his silent, reclusive life. In the process of settling in, he stumbles upon a secret that at first he is ready to dismiss, but later finds more and more absorbing: a secret that will find its way into his heart.
Dhobi Ghat (Mumbai Diaries) is the story of four people from very different backgrounds, whose worlds intersect and leave them forever altered. As they find themselves drawn into compelling relationships, the city finds its way into the crevices of their lives, separating them even as it brings them closerﾅ
Fragments of their experience - seen through a naïve video diary, black and white photographic images and painting - form a portrait of Mumbai and its people, bound together as they journey through longing, loneliness, loss and love.
Kiran Dao: "Dhobi Ghat (Mumbai Diaries) is my homage to Mumbai and its people - people on trains, in boats, stuck in traffic, perched on construction sites, sitting by the sea, thinking of tomorrow."
Aamir Khan: ﾓKiran has been an absolute delight to work with. As a producer and as an actor, I feel most safe in her hands. She has clarity, sensitivity and an ability to bring the best out in her team, which makes her a leader I am happy to follow.ﾔ
India 2010, digital, 100 minutes
Director: Kiran Rao
Producer: Kiran Rao, Aamir Khan
Hindi, English with German subtitles
Cast: Amir Khan, Prateik, Monica Dogra, Kriti Malhotra
Sunday, 30 October 6 pm
Indian Dinner
We will finish our festival with a delicious Indian Dinner
Excellent cuisine by Mrs. Sahkunthala Chenchanna , who will take care of the dinner guests personally.
15 Euro per person
Please make your reservation until 25 October 11 at this phone number:
069 707 69 100.
The "New Generations - Independent Indian Film Festival" is realised with the friendly support of the City of Frankfurt, Department of Cultural Affairs, Department of Multicultural Affairs
We thank our media partners:
