PANJIM: The International Film Festival of India (IFFI) which was launched in 1952, stands as one of Asia's premier film festivals. Since 2004, Goa was as its permanent destination because of the magnificent beauty, festive spirit and global appeal as a tourism destination. Since then IFFI has been an annual event in Goa. In this edition of Street Voices, Herald TV spoke to people on whether the IFFI established itself as an international film festival, in twenty years?
Yes, International Film Festival of India has established itself as an international film festival. All these years I have participated as a delegate. Artistes from Goa can attend the Master Classes, see and meet celebrities. We also get to understand how films are made, we can get an understanding to the culture of the country where the film is made. The other language films have English sub-titles. And definitely our Konkani Movies are featured at IFFI. I am proud that I was part of some of the movies such as ‘Just a Minute,’ ‘O Maria’, ‘Mariola’, ‘Soul Curry’. This year we have slotted the film ‘Tum Na Tor’ in the Goa Section of the film festival. I very happy that Goan movies run housefull. And our Goan youngsters aspire that their films are showcased at IFFI.
Has IFFI established itself as an international film festival? I don’t know. Does it have the potential to be one of the best? For sure. We have all the resources, we have the budget, we have the venue - Goa. We have everything for IFFI to become one of the best film festivals. Our focus should be more on the Premiers, which is the main objective of any film festival, instead of having the released films. I’ve seen a lot of good changes since NFDC has become a part of IFFI. So I hope that this year’s IFFI will be one of the best ones.
Miransha Naik, Writer, Director, Producer
It is great to be a part of the International Film Festival of India, since it gives us tremendous exposure. Looking at films from different countries we can see the technicalities of how a film should be, how the sound editing should be do, so we were able to learn a lot since 2004, when the film festival started to be hosted in Goa. We were able to watch a variety of films, we able to see good actors. Even today Goa plays host to the International Film Festival of India and we thank the Goa government and the Entertainment Society of Goa for it because even Goan films are showcased at this festival. I feel proud of this. I hope that the film festival will be successful and shine brightly in Goa.
Pradeep Naik, Film Actor and Tiatrist