India’s superb bow at Berlinale

Ooh the 72nd Berlin Film Festival has opened and Irsquom not there The festival runs from February 1020 and Irsquove stayed back in Mumbai due to COVID concerns Irsquom negative Irsquom missing it intensely because it is the 24th year Irsquom working for the festival now as India and South Asia Delegate but much more because South Asia including India has such a powerful presence at the festival this yearThere are a jawdropping 26 films and film talents selected to participate from South Asia across various sections including 14 films and talents from India These include eight films from South Asia four jury members three projects in the Berlinale CoProduction Market and 11 Berlinale Talents This is an amazing achievement given that each is chosen from fierce competition worldwideThe eight South Asian films selected include five from India These are the highly anticipated Gangubai Kathiawadi by Sanjay Leela Bhansali starring Alia Bhatt with a guest appearance by Ajay Devgn It is a biopic based on the book Mafia Queens of Mumbai by S Hussain Zaidi and our very own Jane Borges of midday This kickass feminist film celebrates the life of a sex worker who rose to become a powerful matriarch of Kamathipura Mumbairsquos red light district It will have its world premiere in the Berlinale Special Gala on February 16 at the spectacular Friedrichstadt Palast where her Gully Boy had opened earlier This is Bhattrsquos third film in the Berlinale after Highway in 2014 and Gully Boy in 2019 a remarkable achievement for an Indian actress and who is estimated to be barely about 28 The film opens in cinemas on February 25Rebana Liz Johnrsquos Ladies Only is a wonderful stylish also feminist bw documentary 79 mins that asks women in the ladiesrsquo compartment of Mumbairsquos local trains what makes them angry men men and men It is screening in the Perspektive Deutsches Kino section for German documentaries the director is based in CologneMumbaiThere are four filmmakers from South Asiaof South Asian origin on the Berlinalersquos prestigious juries and probably unprecedented M Night Shyamalan is President of the International Jury The Indiaborn US filmmaker has directed 14 features including his debut The Sixth Sense that earned six Academy Award nominations Payal Kapadia is on the International Short Film Jury in Berlinale Shorts her A Night of Knowing Nothing won the Best Documentary at the Cannes Film Festival 2021 Vimukthi Jayasundara is on the International Jury for Best First Film GWFF Best First Feature Award the Sri Lankan directorrsquos Forsaken Land and Chatrak were at Cannes his Between Two Worlds was at Venice Shahrbanoo Sadat is also on the International Jury for Best First Film the feisty woman director from Afghanistan who was recently forced to flee into exile earlier had two features Wolf and Sheep and Parwareshgah The Orphanage in CannesThe filmmakers in the Berlinalersquos other sections are Deepak Rauniyarrsquos Four Nights USMexicoNepal in the Berlinale Shorts a deeply moving short on a Nepali couple coping with job challenges and marital insecurities in the US starring Dayahang Rai and Asha Magrati From Nepal therersquos also Surya Shahirsquos Wheels on the Bus in Generation Kplus Short Competition for children and young adults that comments on caste discrimination There are four South Asian films in the Forum Expanded section that explores the intersection of cinema and the other arts Therersquos New Yorkbased Bangladeshi filmmaker Naeem Mohaiemenrsquos Jole Dobe Na Those Who Do Not Drown Bangla IndiaUSAJapanSweden a magnificent 64 min fiction on the afterlife of caregivers that was selected in the Berlinale in 2021 but is screening this year instead because of COVID constraints Teresa A Braggsrsquo documentary Sab changa si All Was Good India is on the student protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act CAA in India Pallavi Paulrsquos spectacularly titled installation The Wind in Your Body Is Just Visiting Your Breath Will Soon Be Thunder India Germany explores breath as a political practice and is presented by SAVVY Contemporary Her installation includes pyre burners grave keepers and patients and consists of moving image fragments screens and her film The Blind Rabbit 43mins Sharlene Bamboatrsquos If From Every Tongue It Drips Canada UK Sri Lanka explores the lives and culture of a couple of women living in Batticaloa Sri Lanka Ponni Arasu who writes Rekhti 19thcentury Urdu queer poetry and Sarala who is the camera operatorAll in all a rich year for South Asia at the BerlinaleMeenakshi Shedde is India and South Asia Delegate to the Berlin International Film Festival National Awardwinning critic curator to festivals worldwide and journalistReach her at meenakshisheddemiddaycom