"Mohandas" by Mazhar Kamran

After a film festival on terrorism, organized by Gauhati Cine Club, the prime city of Northeast India has hosted another important international film festival. Organized by Cine Arts Society, Assam (CineASA) for the second consecutive year, the weeklong Guwahati festival is starting after the merry making Bhogali Bihu festival of Assam.

The Second CineASA Guwahati International Film Festival 2010 is scheduled to be inaugurated by Assam Governor JB Patnaik on January 18, where the Sri Lankan film ‘Akasha Kusum’ to be screened as the inaugural movie. The director of the film, an eminent Sri Lankan Prasanna Vithange will be present in the function as the guest of honour.

The other movies made by Vithange are included for screening in the Jewel of Asia section, informed Bitopan Barbora, on behalf of the organizing committee in a recent press at Gwahati Press Club.

Nearly 40 film woks including the movies by Pedro Almodover, Christian Mungio, Jean Luc Godard, Francois Troufaut, Mahsin Makhmalbaf, Kiarostemi, Kim Ki Duk etc have been selected for screening in the festival. It will also have a retrospective section comprising the films by Pedro Almodovar, a tribute section for film works by Kim Ki Duk and a focus section for the movies by Mahsin Makhmalbaf, Samira Makhmalbaf, Mazid Mazidi, Abbas Kiarostemi and Bahman Ghobadi.

A package of Asian films which had won awards in Cannes, Venice, Berlin, Locarno, Pusan, London festival will also be screened.

Similarly, the Indian panorama section includes ‘Golabi Talkies’ by Girish Kasarvalli, ‘Frozen’ by Shivajee Chandrabhushan, ‘Houseful’ by Bapaditya Banerjee, ‘Mohandas’ by Mazhar Kamran etc.

‘Aai Kot Nai’ by Manju Bora and ‘Dhunia Tirutabor’ by Pradyut Kumar Deka are the Assamese entry to the festival, where ‘The Other Bank’ by George Ovashvili will be shown as the closing movie.

In another important section, a competition for short films under the Northeast Shots is organized, where three awards will be offered to the film personalities. Like the earlier festival, three sessions for discussion are on schedule during the festival. The themes of the discussions include Asian Cinema and its Salient Features, Future Roadmap for Cinema on Northeast India, and New Avenues in Financing Short and Feature Film Projects.

Demise of important Assamese film personalities The first fortnight of the new year brought sad news to the Assamese film industry. Two important film personalities of the State died during the period.

First it was a senior cine-journalist and author Pabitra Kumar Deka who passed away on January 5 after suffering from a heart attack at the age of 70. On the other hand, eminent film producer Sailadhar Baruah breathed his last on January 10 at the age of 69.

The name of Sailadhar Baruah was synonymous with the distinguished Assamese film director of international repute Jahnu Barua. The two acclaimed film makers had given some excellent and award wining movies like ‘Halodhia Choraye Baodhan Khai’, ‘Firingoti’, ‘Kukhal Konwar,’ ‘Papori’, ‘Konikar Ramdhenu’, ‘Pokhi’, ‘Tora’ etc.

Sailadhar Baruah was associated with sports and theatre activities since his early years. Later his association with Jahnu brought laurels to Assam. Their films have won national awards (best movie, best director, best actress) to international recognition from Locarno film festival and Tokyo festival.

Died as a bachelor Sailadhar Baruah served the Assam Institute of Mass Communication and Media Research, Guwahati as its director till his demise.