Let's have film festivals in India

I find myself in virgin territory here. I never expected my film to be screened at a festival and that too a festival like the iView Film Festival in New York, which highlights films dealing with human rights and gender inequalities in the Asian sub-continent. But here I am, thoroughly enjoying myself. I have been exposed to a buffet of films from various countries, but more so, I got a chance to interact with many filmmakers.

Some who have proven their mettle like Mira Nair and Parvez Sharma, a director from Pakistan, who has made a documentary about being gay and its consequences with his religion; meeting these people got me thinking.

Here was a group of filmmakers and documentary directors from south Asia that has travelled across the world to meet in an alien country to discuss matters related to our homelands. Why weren't we all meeting back home? Why don't we have a festival like this in India? If we did, what would be the outcome? How many mainstream films would even qualify to participate?

After a lot of thought I am glad to say that the answer is, lots.u00a0

Kabir Khan's New York, Neeraj Pandey's A Wednesday , Madhur Bhandarkar's Fashion, RajKumar Gupta's Aamir and Shimit Amin's Chak De India! are some films that would definitely qualify. All these films have uniquely blended what we call popular entertainment, and a social message, ranging from human rights issues to gender biases. Now I realise that festivals are also a medium to promote films, which would not get a wide scale audience or commercial acceptance like these films did, due to budgetary restrictions or the lack of star value, which got me to my next thought.

With the lack of a marketing budget or the absence of a star, would audiences in Mumbai come to this festival to watch documentaries and other short films? And, once again, I am glad to say that the answer is, yes.u00a0

Movies are a religion in our country, and I am quite sure that the turnout for an event like this would surpass all expectations. And considering that we wouldn't have to travel across continents to participate, we would definitely have the involvement and presence of all the top stars. And we all know, where there are stars, there are sponsors.u00a0

So, if we have the audiences, the stars, the sponsors and definitely the content, why don't we have such festivals? I guess the only reason is that we don't have the desire.u00a0

I do hope that with the industry growing the way it is, we do get people like the guys who have organised this festival to plan some right here. That's because we shouldn't have to travel anywhere around the world to talk about our problems. I hope more so for a festival like this, so that you too can see the films that have been made possible for me to see. There are so many stories to tell and so many to be heard, and the best place to do that is at a film festival. Hope to see you at one!

(The writer is a Hindi film director and writer. His last project was Dostana starring Priyanka Chopra, Abhishek Bachchan and John Abraham)