IFFI 'film bazaar' for co-production, tourism promotion

Panaji: A 'film bazaar', inaugurated onthe sidelines of IFFI, is attracting some big marketplayers who are looking for co-production deals with Indianfilmmakers besides tourism industries of countries that aretargeting Bollywood productions.

The fourth edition of the bazaar, organised byNational Film Development Corporation Ltd (NFDC), sawinternational buyers and sales agents like Fortissimo Films(UK), Cinetic Rights Management (US), Yellow Affair Foundation(Finland), Rapid Eye Movies (Germany) and Railto (Netherland)participating.

"It is my first time at IFFI and I am interested inthe diverse film culture of India. I have some meetingsscheduled with filmmakers, let us see what happens. India is avery important country for us. It has a flourishing filmculture and obviously lot of money," Christoph Thoke, aproducer from Germany, told PTI.

Thoke recently saw Aamir Khan productions' PeepliLive and is impressed with the way "reality" has been shownin an entertaining way.

"We in Europe are tired of films that are aboutsuffering. We are now looking forward to films that depictreality in a more real way without making it too heavy," Thokesaid, adding he hoped something will come out during his tripto IFFI.

The bazaar this year also includes participation fromSAARC countries. "This year for the first time we haveparticipants from SAARC countries, who can use this platformto interact with filmmakers from across the world," said NFDCmanaging director Nina Gupta.

Marten Rabarts of Binger Film Lab, Amsterdam isalready collaborating with My Brother Nikhil maker Onir forhis next production. Rabarts also held a session on 'Pitchingand Packaging of film production projects' today.

Oscar-winning film No Man's Land producer and VeniceInternational Film Festival director Marco Mueller also held asession with budding filmmakers on pitching their films ininternational circuits.

Johannes Koeck, head of Cine Tirol Film CommissionAustria, said Indian film shoots in his country have seen a100 per cent tourist increase.

"So far Austria has seen 70 Indian films being shotthere. The most latest I think was Subhash Ghai's Yuvvraaj.We are also trying to work on a co-production deal which willmake things more easy for Indian producers in terms of money.We already provide free location scouting to Indianproducers," Koeck told PTI.

"Indian films are the cheapest way of promoting acountry's tourism. From the very first film we have noticedthat Indian movies help increase the number of tourists comingfrom your country to almost 100 per cent, which is a hugenumber for us," Koeck said.

The bazaar also saw the participation of independentfilmmakers from India like Onir, Praveen Dabbas and AamirBashir among others.

The three-day event will see a master class from 3Idiots director-writer Rajkumar Hirani and Abhijat Joshi andTurkish-German filmmaker Fatih Akin. Anurag Kashyap willintroduce Akin.