The 25th edition of the International Film Festival of Kerala (IFFK), postponed from last month due to COVID-19 pandemic is scheduled to be conducted from February 10 to 14 in Thiruvananthapuram, February 17 to 21 in Kochi, February 23 to 27 in Thalassery and March 1 to 5 in Palakkad. The festival will be held across five theatres in each city, with a maximum of 200 persons allowed for each show. The online registration for IFFK will start on January 30.
The festival will be in inaugurated in Thiruvananthapuram, while the closing ceremony will be held in Palakkad. There will be no public events or other crowd-pulling cultural events as part of the festival. No foreign delegate will be participating in the festival this year. Allied programmes of the festival, including Meet the Director, Master class, press meets and participation of foreign guests will be through virtual platforms.
The festival will have all the major categories, including International Competition, World Cinema, Malayalam Cinema Today, Indian Cinema Now, Kaleidoscope, Retrospective and Homage.
All the films selected for the festival will be screened in all the four regions. Four films will be screened in each theatre daily. Ten films have been selected to the International Competition section. The movies include Los Nombres De Las Flores, Casa De Antiguidades and Desterro. While Pinki Elli?, Barah by Barah and Kuthiraivaal are some of the films in the Indian Cinema Now category, See You Soon, Gramavrikshathile Kuyil and Vaanku are part of the list in the Malayalam Cinema Today category. Mayar Jonjal, Vasanthi and Biriyaani are some of the movies in the Kaleidoscope category.
If last year, the delegate fee was Rs 1000 and Rs 500 for students, the delegate fee this year has been reduced to ₹750, while for the student category, it will be ₹400.
Delegate will have to register at a venue closest to their residence. Admission to theatres will be entirely on the basis of reservation and seat numbers will be provided during reservation. Entry to the theatres will be only after thermal scanning. Theatres will be sanitised after each screening.
The Chalachitra Academy, in association with the Health Department, will make arrangements for carrying out antigen test of the delegates before collecting the passes. Passes will be provided only to those who test negative.
Meanwhile, eminent French-Swiss filmmaker and critic Jean-Luc Godard has been chosen for the Lifetime Achievement Award in this year’s IFFK. The proponent of the French New Wave film movement that paved way for transformation of world cinema, Jean-Luc who has over 45 movies to his credit, was a filmmaker who changed the visual language of the movies through cinemas like Alphaville, A Woman is a Woman and so on. To mark the silver jubilee of the IFFK, Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan is said to release a commemorative postal stamp and first day post cover at the venue of the upcoming state film award function.
