Movies to watch at 19th Mumbai Film Festival

October 08, 2017

Movies to watch at 19th Mumbai Film Festival

The 19th edition of the Mumbai festival is starting this week with more than 200 films and cinephiles are ready for the movie marathon. The movie from around the world which is inspiring and life-changing for many of us.

If still wondering which movie to catch on in the festival, we have made it simple for you according to their section. If you've got any suggestion of yourself please do share it with us.

Opening Film

THE BRAWLER (MUKKABAAZ)

DIRECTOR: ANURAG KASHYAP

Despite being the most populated state in India, Uttar Pradesh doesn’t see a lot of upcoming sportsmen. In the city of Bareilly, in Uttar Pradesh, aspiring boxer Shravan slogs day and night to achieve his dream of becoming a recognized boxer. Things go awry when he falls in love with

a high caste, a mute woman who happens to be the niece of his arch nemesis, Bhagwandas Mishra. Mishra also happens to be the head of the state boxing federation. To marry the one he loves, he needs Mishra’s benevolence to get a job since, for Shravan, the only path to a stable government job is through boxing. But what Shravan doesn’t expect is that in India, boxing is about everything but the sport. While he prepares himself for his tournaments, what catches him unawares are the bouts against casteism, nepotism, doping, religious fanaticism, and a continuous class struggle.

Schedule:
October 12th, 2017 | Thursday | Liberty | 8:00 pm

INDIA GOLD

Granny (AJJI)

DIRECTOR: DEVASHISH MAKHIJA

When an old tailor, known fondly as Ajji (meaning “granny”), finds one of her regular clients brutally raped, it’s the beginning of an exploration into the cold and brutal heart of the city. Ajji tries to report the crime to the police, but they try to intimidate her and her family into forgetting this crime ever happened. Undeterred, Ajji embarks on her own investigation to find out who the rapist is and discovers his identity to be a powerful man. Will his position be enough to save him from Ajji’s particular brand of justice or will Ajji find a way to avenge the rape that everyone wants

her to forget?

Zoo

DIRECTOR: SHLOK SHARMA

What does it take to survive the underbelly of Mumbai? Weaving together the stories of four characters, this film flits in and out of the different conflicts they face. Two of them are teenaged rappers in Dharavi. One is a coffee-shop waiter who also runs a drug delivery business out of the

café at which he works. The last is a teenager in a posh South Mumbai neighborhood who hasn’t left her apartment in two years. Either you try to alter your realities or you reluctantly succumb to it — whichever option you pick, you can’t forget the cage in which you live.

Schedule:
October 15th, 2017 | Sunday | PVR ICON 4 , Infinity Mall, Andheri | 6:40 pm (With Q&A)
October 16th, 2017 | Monday| PVR JUHU 1 , JUHU | 9:00 pm (With Q&A)
October 18th, 2017 | Wednesday| PHOENIX 6 , Phoenix Mall, Lower Parel| 11:15 AM

IN THE SHADOWS

DIRECTOR: DIPESH JAIN

In the walled city of old Delhi, Khuddoos, a lonely man who obsessively watches people with his hidden cameras, hears a boy being beaten up. He begins a search for the boy that quickly becomes an obsession. With the boy’s condition going from bad to worse, Khuddoos’s grip on time and reality starts to loosen, eventually breaking the wall and revealing a shocking truth.

Schedule:
October 15th, 2017 | Tuesday| Thane2 , Thane | 8:10 pm
October 16th, 2017 | Monday| PVR ICON 3 , Infinity Mall, Andheri | 7:40 pm (With Q&A)
October 14th, 2017 | Saturday| PVR ECX3 , Citi Mall, Andheri | 5:30 pm (Introduction)
October 17th, 2017 | Tuesday| PVR ECX5 , Citi Mall, Andheri | 5:30 pm (With Q&A)

MACHINES

DIRECTOR: RAHUL JAIN

“God gave us hands, so we have to work,” says one of the workers interviewed for this documentary. He’s a laborer in a textile factory in Gujarat, a place where the hours of toil seem unending, where man and machine are fused into one painful being. Contrast that to the factory owner who maintains that paying his labor more than the bare minimum would make them lazy. Taking the viewer through the corridors and bowels of the enormous and disorienting structure of the factory, this is a descent into a 21st-century hell. Using personal narratives, the film shows how workers are dehumanized by their work and the way the cycle of inequality and exploitation is kept in place.

INTERNATIONAL COMPETITION

I Am Not A Witch

DIRECTOR: RUNGANO NYONI

A misunderstanding with a neighbor leads to Shula, nine years old and an orphan, being accused of being a witch. She is exiled to a “witch camp”, officially a settlement where ‘witches’ are safe from the hostility of locals, but is actually an internment camp. Here, Shula is told that if she tries to escape, she will be transformed into a goat. As she navigates this new life with its new players, Shula must decide whether to accept this fate or suffer the risks that come with seeking freedom. Although

the particular witch camp in the film is imaginary, the director spent time a real one — the oldest witch camp in Ghana — while researching the film.

Oblivion Verses

DIRECTOR: ALIREZA KHATAMI

The elderly caretaker of a morgue has an impeccable memory for everything but names. One day, protests break out in a nearby city. The militia raid the morgue beat the caretaker up and then hide civilian casualties in the morgue. The caretaker discovers the body of an unknown young woman and his determination to give her a proper burial brings the caretaker back to the morgue after he’s been driven out by the militia. He is a magical odyssey, back home from the desert, fuelled by memories of personal loss and alleviated by the companionship he gets from a mystic gravedigger who collects stories of the dead, an old woman searching for her long-lost daughter, and a hearse driver
tormented by his past. For in this world, humanity lives in oblivion.

WORLD CINEMA

THE SQUARE

DIRECTOR: RUBEN ÖSTLUND

Christian is a curator working on an art project for a museum about altruism that’s titled, The Square.
It’s supposed to remind people of their responsibility towards fellow humans. While the museum’s PR figures out how to ‘sell’ his project, Christian finds himself getting dragged into strange and troubling situations. There’s a stolen phone, a one-night stand, mistaken accusations, and a whole load of chaos, which together offer a satirical portrait of the art world and white privilege.

PATTI CAKE$

DIRECTOR: GEREMY JASPER

At first glance, Patricia Dombrowski isn’t a rap star, but she does have rhymes and she has dreams.

Unfortunately, when you’re plus-size, with curly hair and bills to pay, the challenges of making your name in the music business feel impossible to conquer. Still, Patricia, aka Patti Cake$, has her friend Jheri, her grandmother and who knows? Maybe the reclusive goth-metal musician named Basterd is her ticket to hip-hop superstardom.

MOTHER!

DIRECTOR: DARREN ARONOFSKY

Mother and Him, a mid-career writer, live a seemingly idyllic existence in a secluded paradise. He writes (or at least tries to) and she takes care of him. When a man and woman arrive at their home uninvited, all equanimity is destroyed. More and more guests arrive, and Mother is forced to revisit everything she knows about love, devotion, and sacrifice. It’s a story about artistic vanity and the way one can be savaged by the crowd.

THE FLORIDA PROJECT

DIRECTOR: SEAN BAKER

Moonee and Jancey are six and the fact that they live on the fringes of homelessness isn’t doing a

thing to lessen their joie de vivre. Moonee’s mother Halley can barely scrape together rent at The Magic Castle, a motel on the outskirts of Orlando. Despite their hardships, Moonee, Halley and their community do manage to fill their lives with love and happiness. Unfortunately, the grim reality is here to pop their summery bubble.

24 FRAMES

DIRECTOR: ABBAS KIAROSTAMI

The last film Abbas Kiarostami completed before his untimely death last year is a wordless, non-narrative film looking at paintings and photographs of nature from a fixed frame perspective. Each of the 24 works is stared at for four and a half minutes, building up to a conclusion that is both mischievous and melancholy. Occasionally an animated detail makes its presence felt discreet. The first is a painting, perhaps a discreet hat tip to Kiarostami’s beginnings as an artist (he studied painting in university), and the last shows a sleeping woman with a MacBook that has an editing suite open. It’s a perfect, final farewell from a legendary filmmaker who loved to play with his audience and enjoyed blurring the lines between cinema and life.

MANIFESTO

DIRECTOR: JULIAN ROSEFELDT

Two-time Oscar winner Cate Blanchett performs 13 distinct, must-see vignettes that incorporate timeless manifestos from 20th-century art movements. From anchorwoman to a homeless man, from Pop Art to Dogma 95, the chameleonic Blanchett gives a tour de force performance as she transforms herself like never before. Rosefeldt weaves together history’s most impassioned artistic statements in this stunning and contemporary call to action

BRIGSBY BEAR

DIRECTOR:DAVE MCCARY

To say James’s parents are over-protective is an understatement. In their underground home, the

one connection James has to the outside world is a children’s television show called ‘Brigsby Bear’.

One night, James’ life is upended when he realizes his parents aren’t who he thought they were. While adjusting to his new life, Brigsby Bear remains James’s security blanket. When James decides he’s going to make a Brigsby Bear movie, all the moving parts of his old and new lives collide in unexpected ways.

CITY OF GHOSTS

DIRECTOR: MATTHEW HEINEMAN

In 2014, the Syrian city of Raqqa was taken over by the Islamic State and the atrocities began against

its residents. A group of activists started a website called ‘Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently’, hoping that awareness would bring relief. This is the story of a brave group of citizen journalists as they face the realities of life undercover, being on the run, and in exile, risking everything to stand up against one of the greatest evils in the world today.

LAST FLAG FLYING

DIRECTOR: RICHARD LINKLATER

Three aging Vietnam-era Navy vets — soft-spoken Doc, unhinged and unfiltered Sal, and quietly-measured Mueller — reunite to give Doc’s only child, who has been killed in the early days of the Iraq invasion, a proper burial. As this trio of old friends makes its way, Richard Linklater presents a rich rendering of friendship, a grand mosaic of common life in the USA during the Bush era, and a striking meditation on the passage of time and the nature of truth.

THELMA

DIRECTOR: JOACHIM TRIER

Thelma has just moved away from her rigorously religious family in to become a student in Oslo.

One day, right after she meets a student named Anja, Thelma has a powerful seizure that leaves her

writhing on the floor. As her friendship with Anja deepens, Thelma finds herself more and more drawn to the other woman. Yet her upbringing has taught her to see such feelings as sinful. Overwhelmed by these emotions, her body is racked by seizures and the doctors can make no sense of it. Then, one day, Anja disappears without a trace.

A SUITABLE GIRL

DIRECTORS: SARITA KHURANA, SMRITI MUNDHRA

Ritu, Dipti and Amrita represent a new India. Educated, financially stable and raised with a mix of traditional and contemporary values in Mumbai and New Delhi, the three women have access to the world in ways their mothers did not. What they do have in common with the previous generation is the pressure to get married and to conform to an arranged marriage. Career aspirations become secondary to the pursuit of a husband, and the women struggle with the prospect of leaving their homes and families to become part of another. Documenting the arranged marriage and matchmaking process over four years, the film is a touching coming-of-age story and a portrait of India’s urban middle class.

INDIA STORY

Pushkar Puran

DIRECTOR: KAMAL SWAROOP

Twenty-nine kilometers from Ajmer, in the heart of the Thar Desert, is the holy city of Pushkar. Once a year, the town and the nearby dunes become an enormous fairground. Thousands of villagers bring cattle, camels and horses to trade. Folk artists, musicians, Ferris wheels and merry-go-rounds appear like a mirage in the desert, only to vanish with the decapitation of Brahma’s fifth head. Designed as a music video, this film explores the ancient myths and politicking of Indian gods as the

heavens descend and the water in Pushkar’s lake turns holy.

Bhasmasur

DIRECTOR: NISHIL SHETH

Dhaanu, a villager, is in financial debt. One night, he stealthily returns from the city to the village. He is hiding from a moneylender. With no other option, Dhaanu decides to sell his donkey, Bhasmasur. He hopes he’ll get a good price for the animal in the city, but his son Tipu shares a bond with hasmasur and tries to unsuccessfully stop this expedition. Ultimately, Dhaanu decides to take Tipu to the city with him, to sell Bhasmasur. Their eventful journey brings the father and son closer, but
can this bond last?

Ask The Sexpert

DIRECTOR: NISHIL SHETH

Dhaanu, a villager, is in financial debt. One night, he stealthily returns from the city to the village. He is hiding from a moneylender. With no other option, Dhaanu decides to sell his donkey, Bhasmasur. He hopes he’ll get a good price for the animal in the city, but his son Tipu shares a bond with Bhasmasur and tries to unsuccessfully stop this expedition. Ultimately, Dhaanu decides to take Tipu to the city with him, to sell Bhasmasur. Their eventful journey brings the father and son closer, but
can this bond last?

SPOTLIGHT

The Hungry

DIRECTOR: BORNILA CHATTERJEE

Tulsi Joshi is a single mother seeking revenge for the brutal murder of her oldest son. Her target Tathagat Ahuja — a ruthless tycoon and his picture-perfect family. The venue His son’s wedding at the Ahujas’ remote and opulent castle, just outside Delhi. Based on Shakespeare’s Titus Andronicus and set in the elite circles of north India, the film follows Tulsi into a den of corruption and false celebrations, where, with each passing hour, her murderous desires to get even, battle with her own

humanity and compassion.

The Song of Scorpions

DIRECTOR: ANUP SINGH

Nooran, carefree and defiantly independent, is a tribal woman learning the ancient art of healing from her grandmother, a revered scorpion stinger. When Aadam, a camel trader in the Rajasthan desert, hears her sing, he falls desperately in love. But even before they can get to know each other better, Nooran is poisoned by a treachery that sets her on a perilous journey to avenge herself and find her song.

Schedule:
October 15th, 2017 | Sunday| PVR ICON 4 ,Infinity Mall, Andheri | 3:30 PM
October 16th, 2017 | Monday| PVR ECX 4 ,CitiMall, Andheri | 8:30 PM

DISCOVERING INDIA

SHALOM BOLLYWOOD: THE UNTOLD STORY OF INDIAN CINEMA

DIRECTOR: DANNY BEN-MOSHE

When Indian cinema began 100 years ago, it was frowned upon for Hindu and Muslim women to perform on screen, so Indian Jewish women took on female lead roles and dominated this space for decades. The film reintroduces us to some of India’s great Jewish actors, like Sulochana, the superstar of the silent film era; Pramila, the first Miss India; the unforgettable Nadira; and Bollywood’s favorite uncle, David. Using archival footage, interviews, storyboards and re-enactments, old stories and lives are revived

THE VALLEY

DIRECTOR: SAILA KARIAT

Neal Kumar and his family seem to be living the American dream in Silicon Valley. However, below this veneer of success, there are fissures of discontent running through everyone in the Kumar family. When college-going Maya, one of Neal’s two daughters, commits suicide, the entire family is devastated. Unable to understand what could have driven Maya to take this drastic step, Neal tries to deal with his grief by digging into her life to discover the truth. It leads him to learn as much

about himself and his family as his deceased daughter.

WHAT WILL PEOPLE SAY

DIRECTOR: IRAM HAQ

Sixteen-year-old Nisha lives a double life. At home with her family, she is the perfect Pakistani daughter, but when with her friends, she is a normal Norwegian teenager. When her father catches her in bed with her boyfriend, Nisha’s two worlds brutally collide. To set an example, Nisha’s parents decide to kidnap her and place her with relatives in Pakistan. Here, in a country she has never been in before, Nisha is forced to adapt to her parents’ culture.

Marathi Talkies

UBUNTU

DIRECTOR: PUSHKAR SHROTRI

When the village schoolmaster has to go back to his own village, he asks one of his brightest students, Gauri, to hold the fort while he’s away. Gauri finds few parents are interested in sending their children to school if she’s teaching, but she perseveres. In the middle of all this, she learns that a representative from the Education Department will come for inspection. To make sure the school shows 100% attendance, Gauri needs to make sure she finds one of the brightest students, Abdul. But Abdul has been sent off to work in a nearby town. If Gauri can’t find him, the school might just get closed down.

THE NEW MEDIUM

HOUR OF THE FURNACES

DIRECTOR: FERNANDO SOLANOS AND OCTAVIO GETINO

This film provided a model and theoretical foundation for a formally avant-garde Third Cinema. According to the manifesto Towards a Third Cinema ‘First Cinema’ is the Hollywood production model which produces escapist spectacles containing bourgeois values. ‘Second Cinema’ is the European art film, which rejects Hollywood conventions but is still centered on the individual expression of the auteur director. Third Cinema sees the director as part of a collective, unifying theory and praxis. Described by film critic Nicole Brenez as “an act of courage, and the origin of several contemporary image practices.” A chorus of images and texts, the film deploys a dazzling

variety of audiovisual techniques, ranging from collage, direct cinema, flash frames and animation; from classical music to anglophone pop hits. An open, “imperfect”, text that would function as an interlocutor in a broader dialogue about neocolonialism, and the possibilities for third-world liberation.

LOS ANGELES PLAYS ITSELF

DIRECTOR: THOM ANDERSEN

A touchstone of early 21st-century cinema, Andersen’s magnum opus examines how Los Angeles has been depicted in an impressively wide range of films — Hollywood blockbusters, low-budget genre pictures, independent, experimental and even pornographic movies. This film essay maps scene after scene of the fictional City of Angels upon the actual one, exploring former film locations both through ‘repurposed’ Hollywood snippets and contemporary footage shot by filmmaker and artist Deborah Stratman. It shows how Los Angeles evolved from being just a setting for films to a vivid cinematic character and sometimes even becoming the subject, like in Chinatown. Parallel to this runs a dense mosaic of film criticism that recognizes and holds up to the audience how films can record society and culture as well as be propaganda machines.

RESTORED CLASSICS

Stalker

DIRECTOR: ANDREI TARKOVSKY

Andrei Tarkovsky’s last Soviet film embarks on a metaphysical journey through an enigmatic post-apocalyptic landscape. A hired guide — the “stalker” of the title — leads a writer and a scientist into the heart of the Zone, the restricted site of a long-ago disaster, where the three men eventually zero in on the Room, a place rumored to fulfill one’s most deeply-held desires. Adapting a science-fiction novel by Arkady and Boris Strugatsky, Tarkovsky created a challenging and visually stunning work. At once a religious allegory, a reflection of contemporary political anxieties, and a meditation on the film itself (among many other interpretations), this film envelops the viewer by opening up a multitude of possible meanings. Stalker has been restored by Mosfilm from a 2k scan of the original negative.

Schedule:
October 12th, 2017 | Thursday| PVR ICON 1 ,Infinity Mall, Andheri | 11:00 AM
October 15th, 2017 | Friday | PVR ECX 4, Citi Mall, Andheri | 8:45 pm

Schedule of the films mentioned above: http://www.mumbaifilmfestival.com/Programme/Schedule

Registration for JIO MAMI 19th Film Festival: https://in.bookmyshow.com/mami

Movies to watch at 19th Mumbai Film Festival

Opening Film

THE BRAWLER (MUKKABAAZ)

INDIA GOLD

Granny (AJJI)

Zoo

IN THE SHADOWS

MACHINES

INTERNATIONAL COMPETITION

I Am Not A Witch

Oblivion Verses

WORLD CINEMA

THE SQUARE

PATTI CAKE$

MOTHER!

THE FLORIDA PROJECT

24 FRAMES

MANIFESTO

BRIGSBY BEAR

CITY OF GHOSTS

LAST FLAG FLYING

THELMA

A SUITABLE GIRL

INDIA STORY

Pushkar Puran

Bhasmasur

Ask The Sexpert

SPOTLIGHT

The Hungry

The Song of Scorpions

DISCOVERING INDIA

SHALOM BOLLYWOOD: THE UNTOLD STORY OF INDIAN CINEMA

THE VALLEY

Marathi Talkies

UBUNTU

THE NEW MEDIUM

HOUR OF THE FURNACES

LOS ANGELES PLAYS ITSELF

RESTORED CLASSICS

Stalker

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