Film festival to celebrate 40 years of B`desh Liberation War

Kolkata: Poignant tales from Bangladesh Liberation war fought in 1971 would come alive on celluloid at a three-day film festival here this weekend to mark its 40th anniversary year.

A total six recent films based on the war will be screened at the festival titled `Bangladesh War of Liberation in Celluloid`, Bangladesh High Commission, which is organizing the festival, today said. `Matir Moyna`, directed by late Tareque Masud which won the International Critic Prize at the 2002 Cannes Film Festival, will be the inaugural film of the event, scheduled to begin on Friday. The film, Bangladesh`s first to compete for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, deals with Masud`s personal experience of studying at a madrasah against the increasing tensions in erstwhile East Pakistan culminating in the war. `Guerilla` by Naseruddin Yousuff, `Khelaghar` and `Amar Bondhu Rasheed`, both directed by Morshedul Islam, `Joyjatra` directed by Tauquir Ahmed and `Khondo Golpo` by Badrul Anam Saud will also be screened during the festival. `Guerilla` had last month won NETPAC Best Asian Film Award at Kolkata Film Festival and is regarded as one of the best Bangladeshi movies made on the country`s liberation. A superhit at the box-office, the film is based on Syed Shamsul Haq`s novel `Nishiddho Loban` and the director`s personal war-time experiences as a freedom fighter. `Guerilla`, released in April this year, narrates the tale of a girl Bilkis whose husband disappears as the Liberation War breaks out. As the war progresses, Bilkis finds herself being drawn to the freedom movement and she actively collaborates with the freedom fighters hoping for the safe return of her husband. "In the last ten years some extraordinary cinema has been made in Bangladesh on the Liberation War. We have selected the best out of that for this festival," Mahbub Hassan Saleh, Deputy High Commissioner of Bangladesh told reporters. "It is all about building people to people contact in the two neighbouring countries. And so we have invited film personalities also so that they can interact with the audience here," he said. Directors and actors of the films will be present during the screenings. Actress Joya Ahsan and Faridur Reza Sagar who has produced four of the six films will also be a part of the visiting delegation, he said. The film festival will also travel to Agartala and New Delhi in February and March. Under a cultural exchange programme for 2010-12 signed between the two neighbouring countries to strengthen cultural co-operation, Indian films are being screened in Bangladesh and Bangladeshi films are being shown in India. Last year, the first Bangladesh Film Festival was held in Delhi and was well received by film afficionados. PTI