Mumbai: The Thomson Foundation for Film & Television Heritage launched the first ever Pune Film Treasures Festival, a four-day cinema event in Pune taking place at the National Film Archive of India (NFAI). The event is partnered with Cinémathèque Française (France), Film & Television Institute of India (FTII) and George Eastman House (USA). The film festival continuing till 20 March will screen timeless wonders based on the theme ‘Cinema of modernity and Modernity of Cinema’.
In the continuity to the courses during the day at FTII, the Pune Film Treasures Festival, open to public, will have evening screenings on each of the festival days at the Main Theatre, NFAI, Law College Road, Pune.
These movies will be introduced each night by different filmmakers explaining their choice to the audience. The festival will be attended by world-class film archivist and filmmakers Sudhir Mishra, Olivier Assayas, Nishikant Kamat and Jean-François Rauger.
The initiative to launch the festival is in continuation with Thomson Foundation’s commitment to promote film heritage in India and globally and will focus on movie programming and archiving training.
"Heritage should always be shared especially with the young generation and this is a novel attempt to make youngster aware of the heritage," said FTII Pune director Pankaj Rag.
Speaking on the occasion, Thomson Foundation managing director Séverine Wemaere said, "The Pune Film Treasures is in continuation with Thomson Foundation’s initiative to reach out, educate audience on the importance of film heritage safeguard. Our efforts to sensitize the public to the richness of archives have received a boost with the support from eminent filmmakers like Shyam Benegal, Sudhir Mishra, Olivier Assayas, Nishikant Kamat, Anurag Kashyap, Adoor Gopanakrishnan, Ketan Mehta."
"The foundation is also extremely proud of the endless support it receives from its partners, National Film Archive of India, Film & Television Institute of India, Cinémathèque Française and George Eastman House. Last year, we have created and launched the Goa Film Treasures section in IFFI Goa festival which received very encouraging response from all quarters", she added.
Classics such as Nosferatu, eine Symphonie des Grauens (F W Murnau, Germany), La Règle du Jeu (Jean Renoir, France), Rio Bravo (Howard Hawks, USA) or Shiraz (Franz Osten, India) will be screened at this ongoing festival.
