Bengali cinema sees jump from 10% to 18% in nomination roster of FIPRESCI-India
Times of India | 10 March 2025
KOLKATA: Contrary to the accusations of contemporary Bengali cinema being 'ghatiya', the recent nomination roster of FIPRESCI-India for Grand-Prix-2024 unveiled a substantial increase in the number of Bengali motion pictures.
Whilst the previous year witnessed merely six Bengali films securing nominations, this year the figure has escalated to 11. Among all the Indian languages, Bengali has the highest number of films in this list.
The Bengali movies in the list are Sudeshna Roy and Abhijit Guha’s 'Aapish', Promita Bhowmik’s 'Ahana', Amitabha Chaterji’s 'Adim' (‘Primitive), Samik Roy Choudhury’s 'Beline' (‘Offtrack’), Pratim D Gupta’s 'Chaalchitro’ (‘The Frame Fatale'), Bratya Basu’s 'Hubba', Arka Mukhopadhyay’s ‘Kalponik’ (‘Myth & Pieces’), Soumodeep Ghosh Chowdhury’s ‘Silence of the Womb’ (‘No Maas No Din Ebong Antoheen’), Soumendu Bhattacherya’s ‘The Broken Mirror’, Indrani Chakrabarty’s ‘The Terrace (‘Chhaad’) and Kumar Chowdhury’s ‘This is Not Breaking News’ (‘Sob Khobor Bishesh Noy’). These are in competition with favourites like Payal Kapadia’s ‘All We Imagine As Light’, Shuchi Talati’s ‘Girls Will Be Girls’, Christo Tomy’s ‘Undercurrent-Ullozhukku’ and Rima Das’s ‘Village Rockstars 2’.
Last year, only six Bengali films made it to this list that included 58 films. This year, the list has 62 films. This shows a significant jump of Bengali cinema from 10% to 18% this year. Many believe that this jump is reassuring for Bengali cinema. According to Premendra Mazumder, the general secretary of the India chapter of FIPRESCI (an association of professional film critics and film journalists from 50 countries worldwide), this compilation refutes the criticism about Bengali cinema and substantiates that the films being produced presently are progressively orchestrating a resurgence and garnering screenings at prestigious festivals worldwide.
“Bengali cinema is doing quite good both in the festival circuit as well as in box office. It's a fact that the local film industry is facing some problems due to which the number of productions has decreased. With 11 Bengali films making it to the primary list of nominations for 2024 Grand-Prix, I have to admit that the quality of films has not gone down. There are many good talents in this industry who are offering their best to make us proud of Bengali cinema. Always running them down in the name of being critical is not a healthy practice,” Mazumder said.
Bhowmik, whose ‘Ahana’ premiered at the 30th Kolkata International Film Festival, asserts this compilation provides a counter-narrative to those dismissive about contemporary Bengali cinema.
“Appreciating a film remains a personal preference, but when Bengali language films dominate the list across all languages in the primary nomination list, it speaks volumes about the calibre of our work. Whilst we might not be producing films that reach Cannes and Berlin, our productions are indeed securing good festival screenings too,” Bhowmik remarked.
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