International Short and Independent Film Festival Ctg '08 begins

A five-day long film festival, titled International Short and Independent Film Festival Chittagong 2008, began here Friday. With its classical and superb films, the fest was a virtual feast for cinema lovers.

Chittagong Film Centre has organised the event in conjunction with the Bangladesh Short Film Forum. Folk singer Abdul Gafur Hali inaugurated the festival through a ceremony at Theatre Institute Chattagram (TIC) on April 25.

CFC Director Shaibal Chowdhury expressed the opinion that the belated international festival on short film in Chittagong was likely to resonate with the audience.

A total of 76 films of 35 countries will be screened during the festival.

The participating countries are France, Slovakia, Italy, United Kingdom, United States, Azerbaijan, Spain, Iran, Bosnia Herzegovina, Check Republic, Hungary, Canada, Portugal, Australia, Finland, Greece, Sweden, Mexico, Croatia, India, Belgium, Latvia, Brazil, Germany, Poland, Nederland, Taiwan, China, Austria, Luxemburg, Sri Lanka, Japan, Nigeria, Malaysia and Bangladesh.

Three films that bagged awards in various categories at the Dhaka festival held earlier in this month were shown after the inaugural ceremony. The films included best documentary award achiever best fiction award winner Abel's black dog (Slovakia) and best independent winner Stay in touch (Bangladesh). A seminar on 'Digital Film Making: Perspective Bangladesh' was held on Saturday at TIC Gallery hall at around 11:00am. Short filmmaker N Rashed Chowdhury conducted the seminar. Four films will be screened everyday at 11:00am, 2:00pm, 5:00pm and 7:30pm. The films will be screened in four categories including retrospective, diploma film, Bangladesh Panorama and General. Four documentaries by Tanveer Mokammel will be screened in the retrospective category. Several films made by Kolkata Rupkala Kendro, Film and Media Department of Stamford University, Canada Film School and Bangladesh Short Film Forum run courses will be aired in the diploma category.