Children's Film Society, India

Wrong to Treat Children’s Films Lightly

As They Are As Intelligent As Adults

A peep into the Wonderous World of Cinema

Hyderabad www.cfsindia.org Issue: 7 November 20, 2011

good film for children is one made to

the level of intelligence of one’s own Alevel, because children are not less

intelligent than the average adult.

Renowned filmmaker Shyam Benegal said a

study had shown that a child’s brain is fully

developed by the age of seven and what gets

added after that is experience. But

unfortunately, many filmmakers do not

appreciate this and still either try to ‘spoon

feed’ the children or talk down to them.

But asked why he had not made films for

children, he said there were very few

financiers or takers for children’s films. He said

it was surprising that many so much money

was spent on products for children, but no one

came forward to fund good films for children.

The government should take action in this

regard and increase the funds with the

Children’s Films Society, India. The funds for

this purpose should be much larger. Money

will also be needed to push the marketing and

publicity of the films.

There also has to be some motivation for the

government in the same way that it is

motivating people on the children’s right to

education.

He said with his term in the Rajya Sabha

coming to an end later this year, he will come

back to making films full time.

Asked why he had never made a film in

Telugu, he said he would make films in

languages he knows. He does not like dubbing

his films. “I like the actors speak the language

in which they are acting. I hate dubbing. In

someone lending the voice to the actors, the

originality goes and it will be a manufactured

performance,” he said.

Referring to the screening of his black and

white film ‘Charandas Chor’, he said he was

pleased to note that not a single child left the

auditorium despite the fact that there was no

interval for 2 hours 35 minutes. And the

children were very engrossed with the

characters of the film. Theatre and film

personality Atul Tiwari added that the children

were very participative and even clapped and

laughed with the characters.

When asked about his association with the

city, he became nostalgic. “I was born in

Gajju’sProgramme today

Contd. Page 4...

The time has come for the jury to announce

their verdict, but I can say that even those

which may not be awarded were films I will

never forget. And i want them to go away with

good memories.

That is why Nandita Aunty (our Chairperson

Ms Nandita Das and Sushovan Uncle (CEO and

Festival Director Sushovan Banerjee) with all

the Uncles and Aunties from this city of Pearls

have planned a fantastic closing evening.

His Excellency the Governor, Mr E S L

Narsimham, Mr S Jagathrakshkan, Minister of

state for Information and Broadcasting who

has especially come to Hyderabad to be with

us, and the Andhra Information and Public

Relations Minister Ms D K Aruna will all be

there along with Nandita Aunty and Sushovan

Uncle.

I am particularly touched by the fact that one

of my most favourite singers, Ms Usha Uthup,

apart from Sriram and Ramachary’s Children’s

troupe will be performing. But a special treat

will be the Bharatnatyam performance by the

special children of the Syed Pasha group.

Padma Shr i percuss ionis t Dr Ye l la

Venkateswara Rao will also enthrall the

evening, just as Sivamani had done at the

inauguration. And there is a charming

Namaskar India dance performance.

The colourful evening will end with the

screening of the best film.

I am sure all my friends who have come from

all over the world and from other parts of

India will keep in touch with me for a long

time to come.

Children's Film Society, India

Children prove their creativity on stage as well never had it better. Brilliant performances,

magic shows, mimicry, singing, puppet Ishows, and tricks – I have seen it all since

the Festival commenced on Children’s Day.

Apart from all the screenings and workshops,

my young friends are also joining me by

taking part in cultural events.

The famous Bhartanatyam dancer Deepika

Reddy, Chairperson of the Cultural Committee,

said it is amazing to see children volunteering

and enthusiastically taking part in cultural

events.

She said she and her team had been working

from the past 25 days to get schools to come

and take part. “The response received was

overwhelming. Seventy-five schools have

been selected for the programmes in the

cultural section. Special emphasis has been

g iven to Government schools and

underprivileged children.”

Ta lk ing about the inaugural day ’s

performances, she said, “I can not explain in

words how happy I was when I saw the

number of participants this Festival attracted.

Street children took part too. The kind of

happiness they experienced was touching.”

There are performances every evening in

NITHM and Lalitha Kala Thoranam.

evelopment does not mean building

big cities and having two-three mobile Dphones. Development starts from the

villages, which is still not happening. The film

‘Dekh Indian Circus’ revolves around the

village talking about the hurdles children face

and the happiness they experience in little

things.”

Mangesh Hadawale, director of the film which

is in the India Competition, he said people

often chase happiness and search for it in

material things but they do not realize that it

is the little things in life that makes a person

happy.

“Dekh Indian Circus” has already been

screened at the South Korean and Chicago film

festivals.

Producer Chiraag shah said “Both I and my

director had the same vision of wanting to

make films with a concept of this kind.” This

film will appeal to both the children and the

child in the adults.

Mangesh said “I stay for 15 days in Mumbai

and 15 days at my village. In those fifteen days

that I stay in the city, I feel that the city

represents India, the metropolitan hub. The

days I stay in my village, Jaisalmair, it is a total

contrast to the rest of India. It is the villages

that daily face hurdles of even the basic of

necessities. Our politicians say India is

developing, but where is the development?”

Answering a question, Mangesh said

“Children’s films too are commercially viable if

one makes the films with proper planning and

move in a strategic manner to market them,”

The duo is confident of releasing the film in

theatres too.

Mangesh completed his degree in theatre

from the Centre of Performing Arts in Pune

and his first Marathi film ‘Tingya’ was a

commercial and critical success winning

several awards at the National Film Awards

and the Pune International Film Festival.

- Deepti Thakur

Life itself is a circus,

says director Mangesh HadawaleWorkshops turned

into learning with fun One thing will always make me very sad. I just

could not get enough of the workshops, and I

only wish they could have gone on longer.

The filmmaking and animation workshops

particularly proved to be very popular, with

the number of children going up everyday.

The scriptwriting, film appreciation, and the

puppet making workshops also had a large

following.

Held over five days, the five workshops kept

me and my friends quite busy, often making

me miss some films! But I did not mind – I can

get DVDs of the film, but will not get this

learning opportunity again.

Children coming out of the workshops on the

last day more or less voiced my point of view,

and some even promised to continue this

process of learning after school hours!

I found something very interesting in the

workshops. Those who trained us gave us full

opportunity to improvise and come out with

ideas. The scriptwriters of tomorrow were

asked to think of stories, while the would-be

critics were asked to comment on films. In the

puppetry workshop, different themes were

given and the children asked to show what

they could do.

I am sure that the Little Directors in the next

International Children’s Film Festival will have

several children who have been training over

the past five days!

Children's Film Society, India

he medium of cinema has no language

and can certainly serve as a bridge Tbetween different people. And because

children only grasp what should be grasped

without criticism or negativity, children’s films

are perhaps the best way to bind different

people of the world.

This was the general consensus amongst the

participants in the last Open forum of the 17th

International Children’s Film Festival on

whether cinema can bridge differences

between people.

‘Children are full of the fire of life and they are

the ones who bring about a change in this

society’ said one of the participants.

The assembly of the filmmakers at the Forum

was itself an example of the unity that cinema

brings about. They included Harun Habib from

Pakistan with “The Land Of Fireflies”, Kikuo

Kawasaki with “David and Kamal” which is an

Israeli-US co-production, Vibeke Muasya with

“Lost In Africa” which is a Denmark-Kenya

collaboration, India’s Nina Shabnani with

“Mukand and Riyaz”, Norway’s Christian Lo

with “Rafiki”, Daniel Evans of France with

“Kosher”, and one of the makers of the Iraqi

film ‘My name is Mohammad’.

Cinema is universal and understood globally

irrespective of languageEven as the filmmakers hoped cinema would

become truly inspirational, they advised the

younger generation to live their aspirations

and hopes.

Harun said “there isn’t much scope for

children-based films in Pakistan. It’s all about

commercial cinema. Most of the filmmakers

are not educated enough to understand the

importance of non-commercial cinema. In

India, I can see that things are changing and

people are making quality films. People are

realizing now that they need to be more

literate in cinema.”

The other directors, reflecting on whether

cinema means the same to everyone, said

that there was need to understand which part

the filmmaker belonged to, even though the

world was turning into a global village.

Humans are the same everywhere, they felt.

Talking on why the viewing of children’s films

is so restricted, the reply dwelt on cinema

being totally money oriented. ‘We get small

audiences from such films. Social films are not

popular’ a delegate said.

The concept of Filmy Chashma by the

Children’s Film Society, India, was lauded as

one could submit a film and get selected for

screening.

- Smrati Thakur and Swati Rama

t is interesting that young children come

up with serious subjects like AIDS, poverty, Igender inequalities and the dowry system,

as it shows that the young ones are deeply

affected by the society around them.

Kerala sets example for production of

socially relevant children’s films by the young

Three out of five films made by children from

Kerala on such subjects were screened at the

Festival.

Dr Muneer said the Social welfare Department

under the Kerala Social Security Mission has

fully funded these projects which were

completed by children, mainly girls. Three

films are in the competitive Little Directors

section.

Speaking about the three films which are of

only seven minutes duration, the Minister said

all the children had come out with innovative

ideas and they had successfully incorporated

these in the films.

The noted film director from Kerala, Sanjeev

Sivan, said a team has toured the entire State

and selected 25 girls for the cast in the films.

These girls were given five days training in the

nuances of filmmaking by reputed filmmakers

and the output was excellent, he said. He

thanked the Kerala Government for

supporting the projects which are for a very

good cause. Aishwarya, one of the girls, was

also present at the media conference.

- SN

Children's Film Society, India

Edited by B.B. Nagpal on behalf of the Children’s Film Society, India, Films Division Complex, 24, Dr.G.D. Marg, Mumbai-400 026.

Design Seshu Kumar MVV, Satya T, Guru J

Photos Kotnis Murali Krishna, Chillam Charla Suresh Kumar, D.S. Chakravarthi, D. Yuva Raj

Designed & Produced by Efforts, 11-6-872, Red Hills, Lakdikapul, Hyderabad-500 004. www.efforts.co.in

Festival Office CFSI, Camp: Shilparamam, Madhapur, Hyderabad.

irst a harmonist, then a singer, then a

music director, and finally an avant Fgarde film director.

For this filmmaker, life has been a progression

of sorts. And now, he has also become

associated with film bodies, being an

Executive Committee member of the

Children’s Film Society, India.

He regretted that most filmmakers were not

interested in taking up children-oriented

The Future of Children’s Films is not bleak:

Director Vishal Bhardwaj

films. Filmmaking for children was admittedly

a very difficult task, since the film not only

needs to be very entertaining but educational.

But he said with digital technology, the future

of children’s films was bright as budding

producers can make films with a very low

budgets.

“Private producers do not come up with

children films. Unlike overseas, there is no

‘Tintin’ or ‘Harry Potter’ here. Production

houses abroad have the proper infrastructure

and big distributors to take up child subjects.

Here, distributors will love the film but would

not be ready to take it up because they feel it

would not do well commercially.”

He also said one problem was that Bollywood

scripts are star-oriented. “If there is a star it is

enough for them.”

Interestingly, Vishal is planning a children’s

film with star-producer Shah Rukh Khan. He

said he was ready to produce children’s films if

he got any interesting scripts.

“I have been associated with CFSI and the

International Children’s Film Festival for a long

time.” He said he had witnessed the growth of

this festival.

His films were also screened at the last edition

of this festival and he had come at that time.

In fact, he had approached CFSI with his first

film ‘Makdee’ but CFSI could not produce it.

That film established him as a filmmaker, he

said.

He feels Shilparamam is a good venue. ‘It is so

ethnically done. I am glad that the Andhra

Pradesh government has been so supportive

throughout and so hospitable.”

- Sneha Nemali

Hyderabad and I had my schooling here. I did

my masters degree in economics from

Hyderabad. The composite character of

Hyderabad cannot be found in any part of the

country,” he said.

“I can fully understand Telugu. But I am fond

of the rich culture of Urdu spoken in the olden

days. That is the real Urdu,” he said in answer

to a question about why he had not made any

film in Andhra Pradesh. The city had a typical

character of its own. He had left to go to

Mumbai in 1952.

Mr Benegal described Andhra Pradesh,

particularly Hyderabad, as movie-crazy. “It is

an extraordinary place. Week after week some

Telugu film or the other is released,” he said.

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