The Seoul Times

Mumbai, August 27, 2009 — The 11th Mumbai Film Festival will run from Oct. 29 to Nov. 5, 2009. Organised by the Mumbai Academy of Moving Image, the cinematic event is a Reliance Big Entertainment initiative and enjoys the distinction of being the only international film festival in India to be put together by an independent body of practicing film professionals.

More importantly, the Festival carries some of the biggest cash awards in the world for its International Competition.

The debut features will compete for a cash award of about USD 100,000 (Rs, 50, 00,000) and Golden Gateway India trophy for the best film, and the Silver Gateway India and a cash prize of about USD 50,000 ( Rs25, 00, 000) for the Jury Grand Prize. The best talent from these films will be given the Silver Gateway India. This year the Festival is introducing a USD 20,000 Audience Choice Award (about Rs. 10, 00, 000). Films from all sections except retrospective and tributes will vie for this award.

The Festival’s five-member international jury will include celebrated Hollywood scriptwriter, director and Martin Scorsese’s long term collaborator Paul Schrader (script writer for the cult film Taxi Driver & co-writer of Raging Bull amongst others) and renowned Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi (who has been awarded the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival and the Silver Bear at the Berlin Film Festival for his works).

This year, the Festival will honour two extremely talented film-makers from India and abroad. Indian Actor-director Shashi Kapoor will receive the Indian Lifetime Achievement Award at the inaugural function of the Festival on October 29. A selection of his movies will be screened during the Festival
Regarded as one of the world's greatest living directors Greek helmer Theo Angelopoulos will also be presented with a Lifetime Award on the closing day.

The Festival is divided into five sections: International Competition for first features, world cinema, Indian Showcase, Dimensions Mumbai and Retrospectives.
The Festival will hold an exhibition to commemorate and celebrate 60 years of Dev Anand’s Navketan Films. A retrospective from Navketan will be shown.

The Fun Republic four-screen multiplex in Mumbai’s Andheri will be the Festival’s central venue. The movies will also be screened at Metro BIG Cinema and other theatres.

Gautaman Bhaskaran is a veteran film critic and writer who has covered Cannes and other major international festivals, like Venice, Berlin, Montreal, Melbourne, and Fukuoka over the past two decades. He has been to Cannes alone for 15 years. He has worked in two of India’s leading English newspapers, The Hindu and The Statesman, and is now completing an authorized biography of India’s auteur-director, Adoor Gopalakrishnan. Penguin International will publish the book, whose research was funded by Ford Foundation.