The Indian Cinema by Manoj Srivastava

Indian Cinema is scattered across languages, cultures, diverse traditions, lifestyles and cinematic styles. Any Indian Film Festival that aspires to present cinema from India needs to do so in its totality.

Despite the obvious fascination, the average French spectator hardly knows about India.
The Indian Cinema may seem to be composed of romantic epic dramas of 3.5 hours and colourful musical comedies, but a deeper look reveals that Indian Cinema is far more substantial and wide ranging than generally perceived.

The Indian independent cinema, formerly represented by directors such as Satyajit Ray, Mrinal Sen, Adoor Gopalakrishnan and others, not only continues to exist, but is rapidly growing. A large number of young film-makers have burst out onto the scene, blowing up the old models, ready to find their space on the international circuits. Extravagant India! (IIFF-Paris) presents the right opportunity to discover this new generation of Indian film-makers.

We gave ourselves the mission of collecting together these diverse cinematographic expressions. Our clear but eclectic choices will unite this prolific Indian production and the full range of Indian cinema will once be seen in all its diversity.

“Extravagant India !” (IIFF-Paris) aspires to present the artistic with the stylish, the big with the bold, the life like with larger than life and the serious with the entertaining, a mix of artistic independent cinemas and mainstream Bollywood musicals, rare documentaries and experimental shorts, the magic of the past and the magicians of the present like Shahrukh Khan, Anurag Kashyap, Anand Gandhi and others.

A comprehensive film festival, IIFF-Paris will sweep you off your feet with vast ranging Film Exhibitions, exciting Discussions, Poster Exhibitions, Star Interviews and other Shows

* See little index of Indian cinémas

Manoj Srivastava