ABU DHABI // The Abu Dhabi Film Festival has added another Indian film by a first-time director.
The Bengali film Autograph, directed by Srijit Mukherji, will have its international premiere in the capital. Mr Mukherji, along with the actress Nandana Sen and Prosenjit Chatterjee, a popular Bengali actor, will attend the premiere.
The film has been added to the festival's Showcase section, a selection of feature films from around the world. In contrast to the big-budget Bollywood films, Autograph has been described as part of a emerging trend in alternative cinema.
"We are delighted to welcome this brand new film to our line-up and look forward to offering the local audience an accomplished work by a talented-first time director, whose choice of cast and material is remarkable," said Peter Scarlet, the executive director of the Abu Dhabi Film Festival. "It is gratifying to see Abu Dhabi becoming a trusted first port of call for international releases of Indian films."
Autographtells the story of a superstar, a young director and a young actress whose lives interweave during the making of a film. The experience of making the movie changes their lives forever. The film's young director manages to persuade a star of the Tollywood film industry (named after Tollygunge, an area in the city of Kolkata in India, where the Bengali film industry is based) to act in a film inspired by the Indian classic Satyajit Ray's Nayak (Actor) and Ingmar Bergman's Wild Strawberries.
The result is a film within a film that looks at the world of cinema and the turmoil it brings to the lives of those involved. Mr Mukherji, a former economist, was inspired to work in the industry after performing as a songwriter and actor in a musical feature film called Madly Bengalee, which was directed by Anjan Dutt and released in 2009. He followed that with Aparna Sen's 2010 film Iti Mrinalini in which he was an actor, lyricist and assistant director.
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Translated from the Spanish by Camilo A. Ramirez
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Open Men (bonus points in brackets)
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A foster couple or family must:
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Cryptojacking: Compromises a device or network to mine cryptocurrencies without an organisation's knowledge.
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