Film Bazaar, South Asia’s largest co-production market, has revealed 21 eclectic projects from several countries and in a welter of languages, for its 2021 online edition.
The selected filmmakers will pitch their projects virtually to a curated audience of Indian and international producers, distributors, festival programmers, financiers and sales agents at an open pitch session. This year, Film Bazaar has also collaborated with the French Embassy in India which will be sponsoring the French Institute Award for one market project.
As is the usual case, the projects are a mix of festival favorites and debutants.
From India, Berlinale title “Eeb Allay Ooo!” editor Tanushree Das and Rotterdam title “Nasir” cinematographer Saumyananda Sahi make their directorial debuts with Bengali-language “Baksho Bondi” (aka “How Long Is Tomorrow?”), produced by Naren Chandavarkar (Rotterdam FIPRESCI winner “The Bangle Seller”); Tamil-language “Bommainayagi” (aka “Queen Doll”) by debutant Shanawaz Nizamudeen, produced by Pa. Ranjith, director of Rajinikanth titles “Kabali” and “Kaala”. They are joined by: Manipuri language “Eshing” (aka “Water”) from producer/director Haobam Paban Kumar, Asia Pacific Screen Award winner for “Lady of the Lake”; and English, Gujarati and Hindi language “Ghol” (aka “The Catch”), produced by Dina Dattani (“The Ashram”), directed by Rishi Chandna who made the Berlin-winning short “Tungrus.”
Indian selections also include Arun Fulara’s Kumaoni-language “My Home Is In The Hills,” produced by Munish Tewari; Bengali-language “Notun Gur (aka “A New Sweetness”) by Deyali Mukherjee (“Three Auspicious Hours”), produced by Sriram Raja; English, Hindi, Malayalam and Tamil-language “Rasa” from hit filmmaker Anjali Menon (“Bangalore Days”), produced by N.P. Prakash (“Koode”); and Subhadra Mahajan’s English, Hindi and Pahadi-language “Second Chance,” from Shyam Bora and Bhaskar Hazarika (Tribeca title “Aamis”).
Also from India are Gourab Kumar Mullick’s Hindi-language “Starfruits,” produced by Umesh Vinayak Kulkarni (Busan title “The Well”) and Samir Sarkar (Rotterdam title “Jonaki”); Marathi-language “The Bookkeeper’s Wife,” by Director: Bauddhayan Mukherji (“The Violin Player”), produced by Monalisa Mukherji; director/producer Kivini Shohe’s Nagamese-language “The Shape of Tiger,” produced by Bhaskar Jyoti Das; Hindi-language “The Storyteller” by Ananth Narayan Mahadevan (“Rough Book”), produced by Suchhanda Chatterjee and Shubha Shetty; Yudhajit Basu’s Bengali-Khasi, Nepali-language “What We Lost In The Fire,” produced by Prithvijoy Ganguly and Shiv K. Kapur; and Franklin Jacob’s Tamil-language “Writer,” produced by Aditi Anand (“The Extraordinary Journey of the Fakir”).
International co-productions include Prantik Basu’s Bengali, English, Hindi-language “Dengue” (India/Netherlands), produced by Jan van der Zanden (Venice and Toronto title “White Sun”); Khasi-language “Ha Lyngkha Bneng” (aka “The Elysian Field,” India/China), by producer/director Pradip Kurbah (Busan Kim Ji-seok award winner for “Market”), co-produced by Xu Jianshang (“Ma Ama”); Paromita Dhar’s Hindi-language “Last Time on Earth (India/France), produced by Yohann Cornu (“Domingo”); and Hindi, Urdu, English, Kashmiri, Kannada, Marathi, Bengali-language “We Are,” (India/Canada) by Onir (“I Am”), co-produced by Anticlock Films (“Chauranga”) and Shant Joshi (“Porcupine Lake”).
Other South Asian projects include Pasang Dawa Sherpa’s “Ne Pasang Kuhiro Pariko Sahar” (aka “A Hidden Tale Behind The Mist,” Nepal), produced by Prem Prasad Adhikary; Shanaka Galagoda’s Sinhala-language “Mokada Methada Thaniyama?” (aka “What Are You Doing Here, Alone?,” Sri Lanka), produced by Prasad Pereira; and Nuhash Humayun’s Bengali-language Locarno Open Doors project “Moving Bangladesh” (Bangladesh), produced by Arifur Rahman and Bijon Imtiaz’s Goopy Bagha Productions (“Kingdom of Clay Subjects”).
In addition, five projects have been selected for the market’s works in progress lab. They include: Konkani-language “Aiz Maka Falea Tuka” (aka “Today Me Tomorrow You”) by Sreejith Karanavar; Marathi-language “Ghaath” (aka “Ambush”) by Chhatrapal Ninawe; Malayalam-language “Paka: The River of Blood” by Nithin Lukose; Hindi-language “Powai” by Kuldip Patel; and Tiwa-language “Sikaisal” by Dr. Bobby Sarma Baruah.
The Bazaar runs Jan. 16-21 and is run by India’s National Film Development Corporation.