The 29th Kolkata International Film Festival was a gala eight-day affair with 240 films being screened at around 24 venues. Australia, Italy, Germany, Spain, France, Venezuela, Ukraine, Iceland, Poland, South Korea are some of the countries, besides several Indian states and neighbouring countries, which screened their films at the festival this year. Directors, producers and actors travelled from all over the world and different parts of India to attend the festival and take part in masterclasses, workshops and panel discussions. Exhibitions and lectures made the festival even more interesting for cine lovers of Kolkata. The closing ceremony held at Rabindra Sadan on December 13 brought the curtains down on the week-long affair.
Aditi Rao Hydari was one of the chief guests at the event. Films that stood out for the jury won awards under 11 categories. Children of Nobody, directed by Erez Tadmor and produced by Shemi Shoenfeld, from Israel, won the Golden Royal Bengal Tiger Award for best film in the category ‘International Competition on innovation in moving images’. It received the Golden Royal Bengal Tiger trophy, a cash prize of Rs 51 lakh and certificates. Chairperson of the festival, Raj Chakraborty, with his closing remarks concluded the festival followed by the screening of Children of Nobody at Nandan 1. Glimpses: