BISFF goes hybrid this year

NT Correspondent

Bengaluru: The 12th edition of the Bengaluru International Short Film Festival (BISFF) gets underway today. After two years of being an online event, it returns to the big screen with screenings at Suchitra Film Society and Max Mueller Bhavan. “From the last few years, we have been receiving about 3,000 entries from about 100 countries and we screen close to 250 films,” said Anand Varadaraj, the artistic director of the festival. The film festival has competitions in six categories: international, Indian, Karnataka, Animation, Lets Include – An Inclusion Section, and Women’s Collective with each category showcasing about 20-30 films. Besides film screenings, the festival will also have a master class by Balaji Manohar on Blocking for Camera and a talk by P. Sheshadri, Manso Re, and Abhishek Iyengar on Literature and Script. “Once upon a time we saw a lot of literary adaptations on screen but now that has dropped off, we will be discussing why that is and the challenges of adapting literature to film,” said Varadaraj. For the first time ever, the festival will be a hybrid event, with films being screened online from August 4 to 14 and offline from August 11 to 14 across two venues. “Since last year we have been focusing on inclusion and women filmmakers. We are also collaborating with Tampere Film Festival from Finland to bring the best of international cinema to Bengaluru,” said Varadaraj. BISFF is the only Oscar-accredited short film festival in India, wherein the winners of the international and Indian sections stand a chance to be nominated for the Oscars. Speaking about the quality of the film, Varadaraj said, “There has been a drastic improvement over the last 8 years. It was very difficult to pick just 20 films in the International category because the quality was top-notch.”