Short films are making their presence felt with strong content and usual subjects. To watch some great short films, go for the screenings at the 7th National Short Film Festival (NSFF). Department of Media and Communication Studies (DMCS) at Savitribai Phule Pune University (SPPU) is organising the two-day festival, which concludes today. The festival, which has been coordinated and executed by the students, aims to create a niche in the arena of Indian short film festivals. The event is being held at Sant Namdev Sabhagruh in the university.
“The idea of DMCS NSFF stemmed from the need to nurture student filmmakers by enabling them to participate and get a national platform to showcase their craft in a public and professional domain. This national level film festival intends to create a community of student filmmakers, by giving them the required impetus,” says festival director Dr Madhavi Reddy, head of department, DMCS, SPPU.
DMCS NSFF is aimed at bridging the gap in the existing market for national competitive festivals featuring students’ work. According to the organisers and participants, it is a tremendously exciting time to be in this field when filmmaking is increasing leverage by improvements in technology, easy public access to digital platforms and globally minded audiences. The market for low-budget student films has a great potential to thrive in this conductive environment.
NSFF kicked off with Sakhisona — a fantasy short film, directed by Prantik Basu. The films that are being screened fall under students, open and non-fictional categories.
Vijay Kumar, who made Nirnay and Paro, says that it is about Paro Pratha (bride trafficking). “Paro is based on true events. My motive is to highlight the issue of Paro Pratha and the importance of women in society. One of the reasons why this social evil prevails in Haryana is because of the low sex ratio and also poor families who don’t have the money to pay dowry for their daughters,” explains Kumar.
Pankul Gupta’s Bhalla Brothers Presents is a dark comedy on the current filmmaking ethos in India. This is a film purely made in Delhi, by the Delhi people. “We are going through a huge transition in filmmaking. The young Indian filmmaker in the film is trying hard to find glory in film festivals. He wants to break out in world cinema and thus he is unknowingly creating a new language which is different from the taste of his own Indian audience. He is confused as a filmmaker, so is society,” says Gupta.
