Unstoppable Jaffna Cinema Festival braves Covid pandemic
Tharindu Lokuarachchige receiving the Ceylon Theatres Award for the Best National Short Film from Sanjay Niles, Executive Director - Ceylon Theatres and Pravin David Chief Executive Officer - Ceylon Theatres.
Despite the fear of Covid-19 pandemic and other extreme limitations, the 6th Jaffna International Cinema Festival took place in Jaffna and Colombo recently introducing a number of budding filmmakers to the industry.
Organised by ‘Agenda 14’ and the Festival Director Anomaa Rajakaruna, the winner of Ceylon Theatres Award for Best National Short Film 2021 was Tharindu Lokuarachchige for his creation ‘My father is a dog’. Announcing the selection of Tharindu’s film, the Jury citation read “For providing the audience with a unique cinematic experience the pose of technical excellence and strong performances and for allowing them to interpret the dynamics of the relationship between the father and his daughter who are under quarantine, thereby taking on issues that extend beyond the quarantine period”.
Tharindu won the National short film award competing with the other nominations ‘Under a dark sky’ by Rahula Jayasekara, ‘Inheritance’ by Lanka Bandaranayake, ‘Two months’ by Nilmini Perera and Testimony of Silence’ by Hilusha Hewagama.
At the International Short film category, Indian filmmaker Ashish Pandey’s direction ‘Nooreh’ won the Best International Short Film award. Among the nominations were ‘East Coast Park Lovers’ by Lin Lin Wee (Singapore), ‘Driving Lessons’ (Iran) by Marziyeh Riahi ‘Kanya’ by Apoorva Satish (Czech Republic/India) and ‘Stray dogs comes out at night’ by Hamza Bangash of Pakistan.
K. S. Sivakumaran
The Jury of the International and National Short Films in Competition comprises of Dr. Prabha Manuratne (Sri Lanka), Reena Mohan (India) and Lenin M. Sivam (Canada).
Anna Rocha de Sousa’s (Portugal and UK) ‘Listen’ was the winner of the Debut Films in Competition at the 6th JICF. The other nominations were ‘Cleaners’ by Glenn Barit (Philipinnes), ‘Teen Muhurat’ by Deyali Mukherjee (India) and ‘Salt in our waters’ by Rezwan Shahiriar Sumit (France/ Bangladesh).
Debut Films in Competition Jury was comprised of Joao Paulo Macedo (Portugal), Rwita Dutta (India) and Saman Wickramaarachchi
(Sri Lanka).
The Lifetime Achievement Award of the 6th Jaffna ICF was presented to veteran writer and film critic Kailayar Sellanainar Sivakumaran who is popularly known as K. S. Sivakumaran. He was recognised as a person who helped to introduce the Tamil literature, arts and culture to the Sinhala and other cultures writing regularly as a journalist and a critic and enriched the understanding of it in the Tamil world and helped build bridges.
Due to the pandemic, the festival was spread to stages with public screenings both in Jaffna and Colombo. The Festival consisted of physical screenings, online streaming and a part of the festival travelled to different parts of the country in 2021. “It’s the first time Jaffna ICF travelled outside the peninsula. Due to the pandemic travelling between the cities by film lovers were restricted and we screened selected films in Colombo for the audiences who couldn’t travel to Jaffna,” said Festival Director Anomaa Rajakaruna who added that every year many film enthusiasts travel to Jaffna to attend the festival.
The Programme 1 of the festival held at Kalam, Jaffna from December 26 onward and from April 3 to 7 there were public screening at theatres of Ceylon Theatres in Colombo. Award ceremony was held at Regal Cinema, Colombo on April 7, the final day of travelling Jaffna ICF to Colombo.
