Manhattan short films return to the Mumbai

In this age of shortening attention span, short forms are getting more favour and attention from the audience. Manhattan Short Film Festival is one of the most popular platforms to have tapped the short fiction on visual medium across the globe. Returning with its India chapter – Vote for India @ Manhattan Short – for the seventh consecutive year, the festival is currently in its 19th edition in its global avatar. Started by Nicholas Mason in 1998 when he projected 16 shorts against the side of a truck on Mulberry Street in The Big Apple (that’s New York City for the uninitiated), in its lifetime, Manhattan Short has consistently expanded its footprint across the globe year on year.

This year onwards, the India chapter shall be presented by Pocket Films, one of the largest distributors of short films in India. Pocket Films’ Saameer Mody, takes over as the festival director for the India chapter from Anil Sadrangani, According to Mody, the Vote For India has received hundreds of entries. “The jury comprising of Uma DaCunha, Sudhir Mishra and Nagesh Kukunoor chose the top three winning films,” he says. Aglibaar and Taandav (both directed by Devashish Makhija with Taandav starring Manoj Bajpai) and Broken Image by Arvind V.K. are the shortlisted films. “This year the screenings will be held at the buzzing G5A Centre for Contemporary Culture,” informs Mody. He further adds, “The idea behind Vote for India initiative is to get an Indian film to win the festival on the global level. Short films are big right now and it’s only getting bigger.”

According to him, India has a huge pool of talent and the expanding global market, the festival aims to give Indian filmmakers a global platform to showcase their prowess over the medium. “With this aim, this year we are offering the winner of Vote for India a production grant to produce his next short film,” he says.

To know more log onto: http://www.pocketfilms.in/