A film market without buyers

<div class="section1"><div class="Normal">KOLKATA: Bub (Father), directed by young Jyoti Sarup, is the first Kashmiri film to be produced by NFDC. <span style="" font-style:="" italic="">Ekti Nadir Naam</span>, a tribute to Ritwik Ghatak, is the debut venture from promising filmmaker Anup Singh. <br />These and some 20 other films, including the controversial movie Escape from Taliban, are waiting for buyers at the film market being held at the Kolkata International Film Festival.<br />In its second year, the film market organised by the Eastern India Motion Pictures Association (EIMPA) has failed to attract distributors, a day after it was formally opened by Aparna Sen. Ever since the Kolkata fest earned recognition as an international festival from IIPAF — the govern-ing body for international film festivals — hosting the film market has become mandatory.<br />“EIMPA officials told us the response would be good this year. But no distributor has walked into our stall till now,� said T.K. De, a represen-tative of ESC Films which is waiting to find distributors for films like Sankha Ghosh’s docu-feature <span style="" font-style:="" italic="">Eka</span> and Ujjal Chatterjee’s venture Escape from Taliban based on the life of Sushmita Banerjee. <br />Representatives of most of the 16 other production houses like NFDC, WBFDC, Rajshree Productions and Surinder Films had equally sorry tales to tell. “Unlike at the Delhi festival, not too many big guns come to the Kolkata festival. Nor do many talked-about films. As a result distributors often give it a miss,� said NFDC representative S. Pradhan. NFDC is looking for distributors for films like Prafulla Mohanty’s Maguri Ra Shagada, Ekti Nadir Naam and Bub.<br />When contacted film festival director Ansu Sur said, “It is not true that the film market did not get proper publicity. When Aparna Sen <br />inaugurated it yesterday, there was a huge crowd. In any case we have only helped them with the space. It’s upto EIMPA to contact and talk to individual distributors and bring them to the market. The initiative has to come from them.�<br />Sur also denied that the festival did not attract its fare share of distributors. “Of course they are here. But obviously they are busy watching films now. The production houses and EIMPA have to bring them to the market,� he said. </div> </div>