Film festival to mark International Women's Day

The fourth edition of the Women's Film Festival focuses on female directors. The three-day event, starting March 8, will screen "Gulabi Gang", "Gangoobai" and "Firaaq", among others, to commemorate International Women's day, an organiser said.

The fourth festival is being organised by city-based Aashay Film Club in association with the National Film Archive of India and Aayam, a group of women journalists from the city.

"Aayam intends to bring to the fore issues related to women in various means. We believe that the visual media is very effective in reaching out to people, thus the idea of holding the film festival," said Manaswini Prabhune, Coordinator of Aayam.

The festival will also celebrate 100 years of Indian Cinema along with International Women's Day and it will be inaugurated by actress and filmmaker Mrinal Kulkarni.

This would be followed by the screening of the movie "Gulabi Gang", directed by Nishtha Jain.

Some of the films that would be screened include "Firaaq", directed by Nandita Das; "Gangoobai" by Priya Krishnaswamy; "English Vinglish" by Gauri Shinde and Suhasini Mulay's documentary "Bhramawadinee".

Every year, Aayam honours a woman film critic or journalist. This year, the Aayam Woman Journalist Award will be given to Deepa Gehlot, a film critic and journalist. It will be presented by Sudhir Nandgaonkar, film journalist and pioneer of the film society movement.

Aayam will also felicitate Shyamala Vanarase for her book on Satyajit Ray.