Hema Malini, Prasoon Joshi to Receive Honours at IFFI 2021; Salman, Ranveer to Attend Opening Ceremony

Veteran actor Hema Malini and lyricist Prasoon Joshi will be honoured with the ‘Indian Personality of the Year’ award at the International Film Festival of India (IFFI) as the festival on Thursday announced additional programming for the upcoming edition.

Union Minister for Information and Broadcasting Anurag Thakur declared that Malini and Joshi are the recipients of the ‘Indian Personality of the Year’ award for the year 2021. “Film actress Hema Malini and noted lyricist Prasoon Joshi, both will be awarded with the Indian personality of the year at IFFI in Goa,” Thakur told reporters in Shimla on the sidelines of the All India Presiding Officers Conference.

Meanwhile, Festival Director Chaitanya Prasad announced that the opening ceremony for the 52nd edition will be hosted by filmmaker Karan Johar and actor Maniesh Paul. It will be attended by Bollywood stars Salman Khan and Ranveer Singh, along with actors Riteish Deshmukh, Genelia Deshmukh, Shraddha Kapoor, amongst others, a press release stated.

Legendary filmmakers Martin Scorsese and Istevan Szabo will be honoured with the first Satyajit Ray Lifetime Achievement Award. “Unfortunately, they will not be attending the festival physically but their video messages conveying acceptance of the award will be played,” Prasad said.

The festival will pay a special tribute to the late Sean Connery, who was the first actor to play iconic character James Bond. The film gala will also honour prominent Kannada actor Puneet Rajkumar as well as legendary actor Dilip Kumar, filmmakers Sumitra Bhave, Buddhadeb Dasgupta, Kannada actor Sanchari Vijay and National Award-winning actor Surekha Sikri.

IFFI will feature 148 films from about 73 countries in the International Section. The festival will have about 12 world premieres, about seven international premieres, 26 Asia premieres and about 64 India premieres. An array of world-renowned filmmakers, actors, technicians, critics, academicians and film enthusiasts will come together to celebrate cinema and the art of filmmaking through various film screenings, presentations, masterclasses, panel discussions and seminars.

Streaming service Prime Video is bringing its upcoming title, Nushrratt Bharuccha-starrer “Chhorri”, to the festival, setting the stage for the film’s world premiere on November 25.

The streaming service will also hold multiple masterclasses with the creators and cast of critically-acclaimed series “The Family Man” and Shoojit Sircar-directed movie “Sardar Udham”.

“The Family Man” masterclass, which will take place on November 21, will be with creators Raj & DK, Aparna Purohit, Head India Originals at Amazon Prime Video, actors Samantha Ruth Prabhu and Manoj Bajpayee (virtually).

The masterclass with Sircar and producer Ronnie Lahiri, the team behind “Sardar Udham”, based on the life of the titular revolutionary, is scheduled for November 23. Spanish filmmaker Carlos Saura’s “The King of All the World” will be the opening film for the 52nd edition, while Asghar Farhadi’s “A Hero”, which won the Grand Prix at the Cannes Film Festival, will close the festival.

Filmmaker Jane Campion’s acclaimed movie “Power of the Dog”, starring Kirsten Dunst and Benedict Cumberbatch, will be screened mid fest. The Indian Panorama section will kick-off with the screening of Aimee Baruah-directed “Semkhor” (Dimasa, a dialect from Assam).

Among the major international titles to be screened at the festival includes Julia Ducournau’s Palme d’Or-winning movie “Titane”, which is among the 11 movies that will be screened under the Kaleidoscope section. The line-up also includes Sean Baker’s “Red Rocket” and Pablo Larrain’s “Spencer”, starring Kristen Stewart as Princess Diana, Juho Kuosmanen’s “Compartment No 6”, which bagged the Grand Pic award at Cannes, and Joachim Trier’s “The Worst Person In The World” that won the best actress trophy for Renate Reinsve.

“Titane” and “The Worst Person In The World” are being brought to the IFFI by streaming service MUBI, which will also screen Valdimar Johannsson-directed “Lamb”, featuring Noomi Rapace, and filmmaker Apichatpong Weerasethakul “Memoria” with Tilda Swinton. “Lamb” is among the 55 international films that will be screened under the World Panorama Section at the IFFI.

The line-up also includes Mia Hansen Love-directed “Bergman Island”, “A Higher Law”, “Dark Matter” and “Humanization”. The 52nd edition of International Film Festival of India is being organised by the Directorate of Film Festivals, the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting in collaboration with the Goa government.

The nine-day film gala will be organised in a hybrid format — virtual and physical — from November 20 to 28.

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