The West Bengal government during the closing ceremony of the Kolkata International Film Festival (KIFF) would be felicitating five Bollywood actresses of Bengali origin. The actresses are Moushumi Chatterjee, Sushmita Sen, Rani Mukherjee, Bipasha Basu, as well as Konkona Sen Sharma.
According to KIFF director Jadav Mondal, the idea is to award 'Panch Kanya' (Five Women) from Bengal who have done well at the national level in Bollywood. Further known that the organisers of the state government-run festival have already got confirmation from Moushumi, Sushmita and Bipasha on their attending the gala event to be held on November 17 at the Science City auditorium at Kolkata. Mr Mondal said that they hope that Rani and Konkona will also soon confirm their presence.
It was known that the inaugural session of the 19th edition of KIFF would be held at the Netaji Indoor Stadium in the presence of Bollywood giants like Amitabh Bachchan, Kamal Haasan, Mithun Chakraborty and Shahrukh Khan. Among others, Bollywood actress Sharmila Tagore and directors Madhur Bhandarkar and Shoojit Sarkar would also be present at later stage of the festival on November 14. Late cinematic genius Rituparno Ghosh's unreleased film 'Taak Jhaank' (Sunglass) would be screened for the first time and would be the inaugural film. While paying commendation to the filmmaker who passed away few months ago, eight of his films including Unishe April, Dahan, The Last Lear and Chitrangada would also be screened at the KIFF. Accompanying 13 venues including the Nandan-Rabindra Sadan complex, Inox City Centre 1 and Star Theatre, altogether 189 films would be shown in the eight-day-long film carnival.
KIFF would ensure to gain with an international experience that would be prominent accompanying 24 delegates from abroad. To start with Israeli filmmaker Amos Gitai who will also hold a masterclass for film students. The organisers known to have launched a mobile application which would give all the information related to screenings of films during the festival. The focus during the present year known to be Southeast Asian films. KIFF adds to it another section namely 'Shades of Black and White' where contemporary black and white films would be showcased.
Congratulations to the great actresses!
(AW:SB)
