LOS ANGELES: The Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles (IFFLA) has unveiled its line-up of 120 features, documentaries, and short films as part of its new virtual showcase.
The showcase, titled "IFFLA Over the Years: 17 days celebrating 17 years of Indian cinema", is filled with movies that were screened at the festival ever since it began in 2003.
It has been curated into 12 categories such as 'Humour Me Now', 'Grit and Thrills', 'A Female Lens', 'This Is Not Fiction', 'Stories of Youth', 'Diaspora Windows', and 'Keeping it Short'.
'Humour Me Now' will feature comedy movies like Manish Acharya's "Loins of Punjab", while 'Grit and Thrills' focuses on darker themes in films like Anurag Kashyap's "Gangs of Wasseypur", and Vikramaditya Motwane's "Trapped".
In 'A Female Lens', movies made by and centering on women will be showcased, such as Karishma Dev Dube's "Devi" (Goddess) and in 'This Is Not Fiction', award-winning documentaries including Faiza Ahmad Khan's "Supermen of Malegaon" will be presented.
'Stories of Youth' will showcase children and adolescence in films such as Rima Das' critically-acclaimed movie "Village Rockstars" and Shubhashish Bhutiani's Oscar-shortlisted short film "Kush".
'Diaspora Windows' will feature stories of Indian characters living outside of India such as Lena Khan's "The Tiger Hunter" and Ruthy Pribar's "The Caregiver".
'Keeping it Short' includes over 70 films, including Neha RT's satire "The Shaila(s)" and Jennifer Rosen's "Laksh".
"We are beyond thrilled to be presenting this online showcase of alumni films. Traveling through 17 years of programming has allowed us to reconnect with so many of our alumni with whom we share fond memories. We are excited about this opportunity to collaborate with them to offer new audiences worldwide the chance to discover some of the most visionary voices of Indian independent cinema in recent years," Christina Marouda, IFFLA's founder, said in a statement.
"We also hope recent IFFLA attendees have a chance to catch up with films from our first decade, and early attendees who could not join us in recent years are able to discover some of the newer gems we've presented. There is literally a film for everyone's appetite," she added.
The festival, which is held in April every year, was among the many film events that were canceled all over the world due to coronavirus pandemic. The organizers said the showcase is IFFLA's response to the ongoing uncertainty in the film festival world.
All the features, documentaries, and short films by festival alumni will be available for free viewing on the IFFLA website.