from Special Correspondent
Daijiworld Media Network - Panaji (GA)
Panaji, Nov 19: Renowned Hong Kong film-maker Peter Chan directed movie 'The Warlords' will be the opening film for the 39th Edition of International Film Festival of India beginning from Saturday November 22 in the State.
"Iranian film 'The song of the sparrows' directed by Majid Majidi will be the closing film for the festival," director of film festivals S M Khan announced here in presence of state chief minister Digamber Kamat.
The festival will be held at two venues – Kala academy and entertainment society of Goa complex – on the banks of Mandovi river between November 22 and December 2.
"The films from Asia, Asia Pacific, Latin America and Africa will compete for the award which will be selected by the jury headed by Peter Chan, a noted director from Hong Kong," he said.
Khan said that the other jury members include Marco Muller (Venice), Niki Karimi (Iran), Lav Diaz (Singapore) and Tabassum Hashmi (India).
The festival will have retrospective of Aki Kaurismaki (Finland), John Landis (USA) and Wong Kar Wai (Hong Kong).
This time, the films from countries including Russia, Switzerland and Iran would be in the 'Country Focus' section wherein best of the films would be screened during the festival.
The IFFI 2008 will also have special tribute to Iranian film-maker Niki Karimi. Also, the five films by NRI film-makers would be screened during Film India Worldwide section.
Khan said that Indian Panorama will have 47 Indian films including 26 feature films and 21 non-feature films.
The retrospectives will be given to Bimal Roy and L V Prasad for their birth centenary year and 75 years of Kannada cinema.
India's veterans Dilip Kumar, Lata Mangueshkar, B Saroja Devi and Tapan Sinha would be conferred lifetime achievement award constituted by Government of India to commemorate 60th year of India's Independence, the DFF director said.
Homage would be paid to G P Sippy, B R Chopra, F C Mehra, Jayashree Gadkar, Raghuvaran, Mahendra Kapoor, Jeeva, Sridhar, Vijay Tendulkar and Nabendu Ghosh.
The festival will also have screenings of the films based on Taj Mahal including Shiraj, a 1928 made silent film, Shah Jahan (1946), Taj Mahal (1963) and Taj Mahal (2005).