Indian Film Festivals

Showmen riding cinema lorries have brought the wonder of the movies to faraway villages in India once every year. Seven decades on, as their cinema projectors crumble and film reels become scarce, their patrons are lured by slick digital technology. A benevolent showman, a shrewd exhibitor and a maverick projector mechanic bear a beautiful burden - to keep the last traveling cinemas of the world running.

In artful and contemplative black and white, The Cloud and the Man (Manikbabur Megh) is a surreal and philosophical reflection on one recently-bereaved middle aged man and his accidentally complex yet meaningful relationship with a cloud.

When a sculptor visits a remote fishing village on the Bangladeshi Delta, he finds himself center stage in a primal, elemental conflict between land and sea, man and nature, past and future.

A sex trafficking survivor seeks therapy for mysterious blackouts, meeting a therapist battling sex addiction. Both must overcome their psychological struggles before their inner darkness consumes them.

Ranjit, a farmer in India, takes on the fight of his life when he demands justice for his 13-year-old daughter, the victim of a brutal gang rape. His decision to support his daughter is virtually unheard of, and his journey unprecedented.

Set in colonial India against Gandhi's rise to power, it's the story of 8-year-old Chuyia, who is widowed and sent to a home to live in penitence; once there, Chuyia's feisty presence deeply affects the lives of the other residents.

Two documentary filmmakers chronicle their time in Sonagchi, Calcutta and the relationships they developed with children of prostitutes who work the city's notorious red light district.

Bombay city's slums are due for an improvement at the hands of builder Karanjia, but a gangster, Kanta, asks for a price that is too high, leading to Karanjia recruiting Ramesh Kulkarni and some of his friends, paying them, and arming them with weapons to fight it out with Kanta's men. This leads to a gang war, and Kanta's men are subdued. Then Kanta gets together with a corrupt Minister and the Police Commissioner,and together they plan Hindu-Muslim riots, which leads to the death of Ramesh. Enraged at this, Ramesh's quiet and soft-spoken brother takes over, and the fight continues. To make matters worse, Satish's unmarried sister gets pregnant, and commits suicide. In a suicide note she indicts the Police Commissioner and the Minister who raped her. Unable to bear the loss of his son daughter, Vinayak, passes away. Satish now has arranged for three funerals in a very short while, and goes about his task of revenge ruthlessly - until he finds out that he is being used as a pawn by Karanjia - and that he is on the hit list of the police, Kanta as well as Karanjia's men - and he has no place to run nor hide.

In a cluttered news landscape dominated by men, emerges India's only newspaper run by Dalit women. Chief Reporter Meera and her journalists break traditions, redefining what it means to be powerful.

The elephant has awoken. Bombay, India's gateway to the West, has reinvented itself - and emerged as Mumbai, a modern, self-confident commercial metropolis. A magnet for the hopes of the rich and poor. But with thousands of migrants pouring in every day, half of its almost 20 million inhabitants is forced to live in slums, between the cracks of the official city. The biggest of these slums is called Dharavi. With an estimated 800,000 inhabitants, it is one of the most densely populated areas in the world. Once Dharavi was outside the city limits. Nowadays it's at the heart of a constantly growing metropolis, flanked by traffic arteries and right next door to Mumbai's new financial hub. The former marsh has turned into prime real estate - a playground for ambitious urban planning. Ten years ago, US-trained architect Mukesh Mehta has come back to India to usher in a new turn in Mumbai's slum rehabilitation policies. His formula is Public Private Partnership. Billions of Dollars could be made - if the responsibility for a radical makeover of Dharavi were to be put into the hands of private investors. The government has been persuaded by Mehta's vision and has appointed him as the consultant for the Dharavi Redevelopment Project. While thousands of families living and working in the slum are facing the threat of being evicted, Dharavi is becoming a test case. Not only for Mumbai or India, but for the future of the underprivileged of the entire world. "Dharavi - Slum for Sale" follows the struggle on both the planner's and the slum dwellers' side to achieve their respective goals. While exploring differing perceptions of what development should focus on, it gives a first hand insight into the living conditions in one of the most surprising places in human society.

Quota The Reservation, Story of a Dalit medical student who faces discrimination and bias only due to his lower caste, and one day he decides to break the system and do something like the whole nation will shake up

After Nihilistic rapper Gandu steals from his mother's lover, he embarks on a drug-fueled rampage with a rickshaw puller in this abstract film.

When an aging activist is arrested, the lives of the accused, the lawyers, and the judge intertwine to reveal bigotry that underscores the judicial system.

A mother toils to save money to build a road in a Himalayan village to take her wheelchair-bound son for physiotherapy but her husband who believes that a shamanic ritual 'Jaagar' is the remedy, steals her savings.

Follows the life of a bereaved mother trying to desperately find a new identity, love and independence.

Excited about the grandson's visit, an elderly couple plan to cook chicken curry for dinner. But, things go awry when the chicken goes missing.

A young migrant battles hordes of monkeys in the heart of New Delhi as a contractual monkey repeller.

A portrait of daily life of the workers in an Indian textile factory, revealing its beauty as well as its shameful working conditions.

In small-town Assam, the 10-year-old daughter of a widow defies societal norms as she befriends a group of boys and dreams of having her own rock band.

A fourteen year old Dalit (lower caste) boy in rural India is killed for writing a love letter.

A young boy is seduced by a woman who later turns him into a gigolo (male prostitute).

In a post-Taliban Afghanistan a young woman (Agheleh Rezaie) attends school against her conservative father's will, hoping to learn more about democracy to fulfill her dream of being the country's next president.

A young mother returns home early to discover her baby-daughter and the care taker missing. Thus begins a frantic day for all the stake holders that forces them to confront their pasts, presents and futures.

When a driver finds an expensive camera in the back seat of his rickshaw, he comes up with a ridiculously ambitious plan to gather the village and make a film - a ticket to get their drought-hit village out of its dreary conditions.

Siya, a 17-year-old rape survivor, decides to go against all odds and fight for justice after being held captive and repeatedly abused by a group of powerful men. Can she win against the perpetrators?