The 45th edition of the IFFI, which will start on November 20 in Goa, is all set to host a coming together of two stars, Rajinikanth and Amitabh Bachchan, who have helped millions of Indian cinema lovers soar into orbit over decades.
The two supreme stars of Indian cinema will attend the inauguration ceremony of IFFI at the Syama Prasad Mookerjee indoor stadium on the outskirts of the state capital.
While Big B will be the chief guest at the event, Rajinikanth will be present to accept the Centenary award for Indian Film personality of the year at a ceremony which will be attended by Union ministers for Information and Broadcasting Arun Jaitley (cabinet) Rajyavardhan Rathore (state) and Goa Defense Minister Manohar Parrikar, among others.
The President directed by Mohsen Makhmalbaf will be the opening film of the festival, while The Grandmaster by Wong Kar-wai, who will incidentally receive the lifetime achievement award, will be the closing film.
The Indian Panorama section will include 41 feature and non-feature films. Seven films from the India's North-Eastern region will also be screened at the event, as part of a special package.
Retrospective sections on Gulzar and Jahnu Baruah, special homage films on Sir Richard Attenborough, Robin Williams, Zohra Sehgal, Suchitra Sen, and special tribute to Farooq Sheikh would be other attractions this year.
This positioning of China as a guest country at this year's event is a result of cinematic partnership as envisioned in an India-China agreement signed between the two countries when Prime Minister Narendra Modi hosted the Chinese President Xi Jinping earlier this year.
The organisation of the latest edition of IFFI has also seen its share of controversy, with the main opposition party, the Congress, alleging a tendering scam in creation of temporary infrastructure for the event, a charge which the organisers have rubbished.
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