Online kids film fest aims to democratise watching movies

BENGALURU: Several schools in the city will be part of what is perhaps one of the first online film festival and one which aims to democratise the concept of a film festival even to schools located in Tier I and Tier II cities.Called the International Kids Film Festival of India (IKFFI), it will be conducted from November 14 to November 19.  The fest can be hosted independently by schools across the country. Any school with good internet connection can register for the fest by paying a token amount that gives them access to screen more than 100 films from over 25 countries in their premises, for the six days.

Some city schools where the screening will take place are Delhi Public School Bengaluru South and Bengaluru East, School of India, PNC Cognitio School, AECS Magnolia, Maruti Public School, Basava
Residential Girls School and East-West School.

Sultan Syed Sultan Ahmed, Director of IKFFI and Managing Director, LXL Ideas that is organising the fest, told City Express that the fest has received registrations from 246 schools from  47 cities. The film package for each screening is designed for a duration of 90 minutes. It may contain anything between three to seven short films to one long film. There will be 27 screenings in six days with five screening each day and two screenings on the last day.

“Children’s Film Festivals around the world screen some amazing content.  The challenge is that film festivals are not easily accessible as there are very few festivals that happen. The few festivals that get organised are restricted to the big cities. Schools can organise a screening for all their school students, invite neighbouring schools, have family screening and after-school screening,” says Syed
The fest has divided the film screening of the films in four categories: Junior (class 3-5), Middle (class 6-8), Senior (class 9-12) and Open to all (teachers, students and parents). The screening will be done at 9am, 11am, 1.30pm, 3.30pm and 7pm each day for the first five days 11 am and 7pm on the last day when it will be thrown open to individual families, societies and clubs as well.Schools can register for IKFFI at ikkfi.lxl. They will then receive a step-by-step guide and online/telephonic from IKFFI team.

Some IKFFI films

Junior
Junction directed by Nathan Jurevicius about a  young girl from a family  who take a journey to a mountain to alter the direction of the wind
Peep And The Paperplane directed by Christoph Englert about an uncommon friendship between a sparrow Peep and a paperplane.

Middle
Mere Paas Cinema Hai directed by Pooja Das Sarkar about a 16 year old’s love for Bollywood.
The Orchestra directed by Mikey Hill that is set In a world filled with beautiful and harmonious music, where the protagonist always seems to strike the wrong note.

Senior
For Anna directed by Andrea Zuliani about two children, a remote village in Sardinia a island in the Mediterranean sea off Italy, and a magical meeting they never forget.
To Build A Fire directed by Fx Goby that tells the tragic tale of a man and his dog trying to survive in the overwhelmingly freezing and hostile nature of the Yukon Territory in Canada.