Your own film fest

The second year of the experimental festival in Puri drew a number of young, new film-makers. Bibhuti Mishra reports

Last year it began as an unusual experiment but going by the response in its second chapter this year the experiment seems to have paid off. Bring Your Own Film Festival(BYOFF) at Puri in Orissa has shaped well to become an important platform for low-budget, struggling filmmakers and film buffs.

Organised at Puri from February 16 to 20 this year, a large gathering of independent filmmakers screened their works and interacted with each other. The venue was Pink House, a hotel-cum-restaurant, right on the beach .It has a large fenced-off area where the event took place.

A large tent, lined with black cloth, was put up where films were projected on VHS, VCD, mini DV, betacam et al. There were also night screenings in the open air on 35mm and 16mm. The projection of movies was on a big wall that had been painted white. The screenings inside the tent began early in the afternoon after lunch and continued till late in the night. After eventide the viewers had the option of films screened in the open air.

There was also a mini DV for open air screenings this time as most films that came this year were DVDs. The festival featured more than 100 films over five days. They ranged from feature length to short films of two-minute duration. Some highlights were Sharmy Pandey’s Ebam Phalguni, a 26-minute short film described as "shocking, bold yet beautiful," Pankaj Advani’s black comedy Urf Professor, Soumya Mukhopdhayay’s 12 minute tribute to Jean Luc Godard Death of JLG, Sudipto Acharya’s student workshop production Orbit and Shiladitya Sanyal’s Abhimaan Band-party. Films like Chennai-based theatre person Michael Muthu’s The Girl a comedy on a girl intruding into a youngman’s life and career, Ranu Ghosh’ Curtain Call on early Bengali theatre and Saratchandra’s Only An Axe Away on Kerala’s Silent Valley project and the resultant environmental issues generated much interest. Though there were no foreign filmmakers present with their films Waiting was screened.

According to a member of the BYOFF team," There were about 250 people at the festival and in its second year we felt the message has got across. The response has been very encouraging though we are still struggling for funds." The festival budget is about Rs.5 lakh and though the organisers raised the amount from their own sources last year this time around they found sponsors. If they get their act together and begin the process early they are confident that sponsorship should not be a problem.

The BYOFF idea, the title of which explains the essence, has already generated response from the Indian film-making community and abroad too. The organisers do the networking through Internet, e-mails and sms. It is meant to be an informal gathering of not only filmmakers or actors but also of artists, musicians, theatre persons, writers, everyone interested in arts in general and films in particular.

"The idea is to just bring your film and screen it right there, on the beach ... No entry forms, no selection procedures, no competition, no bureaucracy, no hierarchy. Just films." the BYOFF brochure declares. Going down memory lane, the organisers explain why they came up with BYOFF- "For a while some of us, a motley bunch of film makers, felt the need for some free space where independent film makers could gather and show their work to each other, exchange thoughts, ideas, information and experiences. There are a few film festivals with such opportunities, but mainly in the oppressive atmosphere of big cities and sometimes under the cloud of a bureaucratic government machinery. We needed a place where we could let our hair down and just be ourselves. So we zeroed in on Puri, the lovely beach town frequented by tourists who come for the beach and Lord Jagannath temple. We decided to have a film festival right on the beach and found a place ideally suited for our purpose. The current scenario of independent film-making in India, particularly for documentaries, is in a state of flux. In the present circumstances, such attempts made by film-makers themselves will go a long way in giving a boost to the cause of the small, independent documentary, short fiction and feature films."

She sells bananas at Ghoda bazar in the beach town of Puri and has no formal education. Yet she knows about 10 different languages including many foreign languages. Meet Kanak Reddy (32 ) who has become a celebrity of sorts in this holy town, the abode of Lord Jagannath. Kanak, who came into the headlines for inaugurating this year’s BYOFF at Puri is married and has two sons and a daughter. Her husband works in the local ice factory. For the last 15 years, Kanak has been a banana vendor and at times visits hotels and restaurants to sell the fruit.

What are the languages she has learnt over the years? Well apart from Hindi, Telugu, Oriya, Bengali and Tamil she also knows Japanese, French, Italian, Spanish et al. How did she manage that? Answers Kanak- "I always had a fascination for languages. I came into contact with many foreigners who come to Puri as tourists. They ask me the price of the banana in their language and I befriend them and learn their languages." By now Kanak has more than 100 foreigners as her friends. Many of them have become her language teachers during their long sojourns in Puri. Has she never thought of greener pastures beyond these shores since she could easily go abroad with the help of her friends. "No. I am happy here at the abode of Lord Jagannath," is the pat reply. Then she reveals rather shyly, "I have got many marriage proposals from the foreigners. But I have refused them. They have the money but they might take me now and abandon me after a couple of years. What would happen to me then?"

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