'YNW International Film Festival'-2008, the first ever competitive film festival organized in Sri Lanka will be in Colombo this December. The festival is organized by 'Tharuna Nawa Rella' (Youth New Wave) a voluntary organization comprising young, talented and enthusiastic filmmakers and the festival is organized jointly with the Ministry of Youth Affairs and National Youth Services Council.

The organizing committee for the festival include Director General and Chairman of NYSC, Bhashwara Senanka Gunaratne and advisors of 'New Wave' filmmaker Prasanna Viththanage and President of Asian Cinema Centre, Ashly Rathnavibhushana.

NYSC Director General and Chairman, Bhashwara Senanka Gunaratne

The film festival consists of two sections; international opened for Asian countries and national competition. In the international competition the awards will be given on the sections Best Short Film, Best Documentary Film, Best Animation Film, Audience Award and Jury Special Mention Awards.

In the National Competition awards will be given Best Short Film, Best Documentary Film, Best Animation Film, Audience Award, Best Photography, Best Editing, Best Art Directing, Best Music, Best Script, Best Actor, Best Actress and Jury Special Mention Awards, And for the international festival fictionalized or experimental short films, non-fictional documentaries up to 25 minutes in duration and 10 minutes duration animation could be submitted and they should be subtitled in English.

At this festival scheduled to be held in NYSC in Maharagama, cinema creations would be judged by an internationally reputed panel of judges including eminent film personalities, filmmakers and critics and the last day for the entries for the competition will be October 31, 2008.

"The idea of the international film festival was by the young dynamic group of young filmmakers who have joined with the National Youth Services Council (NYSC) and working voluntarily to promote cinema in Sri Lanka," Director General and Chairman of NYSC, Bhashwara Senanka Gunaratne said.

"We are providing financial and organizing facilities to them," Mr. Gunaratne said describing NYSC role in the festival. Youth New Wave- Aurora in the screen. Youth New Wave is a voluntary organization developed jointly by the Ministry of Youth Affairs and National Youth Services Council to absorb the novel views and trends of the youth in our country to the national cinema and to develop it on a par with international cinema.

The organization has amalgamated with the National Youth Centre to add experience of the international cinema and build a cinema with a Sri Lankan identity. YNW has groups covering all districts and the mother organization which is in Colombo district operated at NYSC.

The main objective of the YNW is to hold programmes to develop creativity and appreciation of the cinema and attract the rural youth towards the cinema. With this aim, it has formed cinema societies in schools, universities, art circles and youth societies and the organization is planning to form 50 such cinema societies within this year.

Aimed at encouraging novices to the film production, a program is underway for funding the production of 10 documentary and 10 short films by " Tharuna Nawarella" organization. A workshop on script writing was held for all those who submitted scripts and thereafter workshops were held on directing, production and technical matters for film makers of 20 selected films.

And the films produced under this program will be screened at YNW International Film Festival.
More information on the film festival and YNW could be obtained from "Tharuna Nawarella", NYSCO Video, National Youth Services Council,High Level Road, Maharagama. Email - ynwsrilank@gmail .com and the website www.ynwsrilanka.com