America
North Texas to host first festival of South Asian cinema
Washington, Jan 30
The first festival of South
Asian independent cinema in North Texas will showcase 14 films
focusing on issues affecting the Indian sub-continent and exploring the
lives of the South Asian diaspora in the US.
The Dallas-Fort
Worth South Asian Film Festival (DFW SAFF) will be held in partnership
with the New York Indian Film Festival (NYIFF) and the London Indian
Film Festival (LIFF) from Feb 27 to March 1 at the Angelika Film Centre
in Plano.
"DFW is the fifth largest media market in the
country,a¿ said film festival director Jitin Hingorani, who is also
principal/CEO of show producer JINGO Media, a Dallas and New York-based
PR and events management firm.
"Given that the South Asian
population is growing and thriving in North Texas, it is about time
these non-Bollywood, independent films receive a much-needed platform
to engage, educate and inspire our savvy, world-cinema-loving
audiences,a¿ he said.
The festival's opening night film is the Texas premiere of Mahesh Pailoor's poignant and uplifting feature "Brahmin Bullsa¿.
Based
in Los Angeles, this father-son drama stars Mary Steenburgen, Justin
Bartha, Sendhil Ramamurthy (of Heroes fame) and Indian veteran actor
Roshan Seth.
Emma Thompson-produced and Academy Award-Winner
Jeffrey D. Brown-directed, the Texas premiere of "Solda¿ is the
festival's centrepiece film.
It's about a Nepali girl sex
trafficked in India and rescued by a team of Americans journalists,
played by Gillian Anderson and David Arquette.
The festival
closes with the world premiere of "Rough Booka¿, a controversial look
at India's current education system and how a renegade teacher rebels
against rote classroom learning by encouraging her students to think
outside the box.
The festival also boasts compelling shorts and
documentaries, women's programming, LGBT programming and family
programming, including an animated children's film and youth-focused
movies.
(Arun Kumar can be contacted at [email protected])