The 29th Kolkata Film Festival has begun. This event is being held in a grand manner. The event terrace is filled up with the gathering of celebrities including Hollywood and Bollywood. On the day of the inauguration, the Chief Minister of West Bengal danced to the beat with stars.
Know about the starry event, KIFF 2023
Kolkata International Film Festival(Kiff) started first in1995. The event was inaugurated with inspiration from world-renowned film legends Satyajit Ray, Ritwik Ghatak, Mrinal Sen and many other pioneers of Bengali cinema.
Throughout the year, apart from Bengali cinephiles, people from different parts of the world look forward to the Kolkata International Film Festival.
The 29th Kolkata International Film Festival has kicked out from December 5 and it will continue till December 12. The photo submission period for all categories in the upcoming festival has ended. Like every year, this year too, there are various high-quality films from home and abroad.
Kolkata International Film Festival 2023 will showcase 219 films from 39 countries in Kolkata. Among them 72 feature films and 50 short films and documentaries. In the International Competition (Innovation in Moving Image) category, thirteen films will compete for the Golden Royal Bengal Trophy for Best Film and Best Director.
Theme of KIFF
The focus country of this year’s festival is Spain. Centenary tributes will be paid to Mrinal Sen, Dev Anand, Mukesh and Shailendra at the festival.
The festival has two special sections on ‘In Search of Identity’ and environmental films. Two special exhibitions titled ‘The Maverick’ on Mrinal Sen and ‘Ever Green Dev Anand’. Indian sports films are in the film festival. That list includes ‘Ghumer’, ‘Jersey’, ‘Sabbas Mithu’.
The opening ceremony of the 29th Kolkata International Film Festival (KIFF) was held at the Netaji Indoor Stadium in Kolkata.
Donna Gangopadhyay, a famous Kathak dancer and her dance troup performed ensemble dance at the opening ceremony of the festival.
Bollywood actors Sourav Shukla, Manoj Bajpayee and director Sudhir Mishra participated in the master class organization for Kolkata International Film Festival 2023.
The theme song of this year’s film festival was sung by Arijit Singh.
Celeb Fair ar Kolkata Film Festival
Over the past few years, Bengalis have become accustomed to seeing superstars like Amitabh Bachchan, Shah Rukh Khan at the opening ceremony. This year, however, neither Big B nor Badsha was not present.
Amitabh could not come due to physical reasons, King Khan was busy with his daughter’s film. But this time ‘Bhaijaan’ Salman Khan was present among bollywood stars. Legendary Cricketer ‘Maharaja’ Sourav Ganguly was present as an Ambassador.
Apart from Salman, there were a bunch of Bollywood stars including Kamal Haasan, Anil Kapoor, Mahesh Bhatt, Shatrughan Sinha and Sonakshi Sinha.
The Kolkata International Film Festival 2023 will showcase 219 films from 39 countries in Kolkata. Among them are 72 feature films and 50 short films and documentaries. In the International Competition (Innovation in Moving Image) category, thirteen films will compete for the Golden Royal Bengal Trophy for Best Film and Best Director.
Mamata Banerjee grooves with stars
Mamata Banerjee, Chief organizer of the program and Chief Minister of West Bengal, sang Rabindranath Tagore’s ‘Banglar Mati, Banglar Jal’ at the event. Sourav Ganguly even leaked a secret on this occasion. Sourav Ganguly said, “Welcome to Kolkata, my dear Mr. Salman Khan. It is a coincidence that I have met him personally here for the first time. In all these years, this is the first time I have met him personally and I said when I saw him that it was unfortunate. That we have never met before.”
Not only that, Mamata Banerjee also grooved with Salman Khan, Anil Kapoor and Mahesh Bhatt on the theme song of the event.
Mamata Banerjee remarked , “Shatrughan Sinha ji was saying that we should not fear anyone. Yes, we should fear no one; No force can divide us. All creeds, castes and creeds will remain united, because we all love the country.” By saying this she preached the message of unity.
