The 9^th Auroville Film Festival 2026 got off to a brilliant start on the 18^th of January 2026 with a live music performance by Auroville band NoizeGate playing Creedence Clearwater Revival.

The Auroville Film Festival, organised by residents of Auroville, aims to showcase films that attempt to foster a deeper understanding of the aspirations of Auroville through a creative engagement with the medium of cinema, as well as turning film-viewing from a passive activity into an intimate dialogue between artist and audience. The festival screens films that reflect the creative, experimental and spiritual research Auroville is dedicated to.

During the week, the festival featured 48 films in the category of films made by residents of Auroville, the bioregion and Pondicherry. Made with local participation, the films in this category form a mosaic bringing together the local creative community in an exchange of documentaries, ideas and stories. The richness of the selection in this category featured prominent local filmmakers like Stanzin Raghu, Alessandra Silver, Serena Aurora, Lesley Branagan, Aurovenkatesh, Cheenu Wild, Jeremy Carroll, Yuvasri, Smiti, Yatra Srinivassan and Jalil Nordman. There were some exciting experimental shorts proposed by Nefertiti Chakrabarti. Emerging filmmakers like Ravikiran Rangaswamy, Lisbeth Nusselein, Birgitta Volz, Uttara Jadeja, Sampriti Roy, Donny Lee Duke, Nandha Kumar, Rishi Vengadesan, Gobinath Mounissamy, Kanchan Avchare, Mukul Kumar, Divya Mani, Karthik K, Magheshwar Kumaran, Lalit Verma and Anna-Maria Bakhtiarova had a warm reception.

There were 8 films in the category of films made about Auroville, the bioregion and Pondicherry. This selection of films by visiting filmmakers about Auroville and the bioregion, its various projects, people and undertakings, brings home the image of our region as it appears to the world outside. International filmmakers in this category included Joseh Garcia and Alan Baiss from Canada. Exceptional films that were screened in this category were made by the students of the Auroville Film Institute, including Santosh, Polash, Kartik, Sai Krishna, Stanzin, Jahnavi, Amogh, Pia, Partha, Yoni, and Logeswaran.

Managed by Richa Hushing and Rrivu Laha (graduates of FTII), the Auroville Film Institute offers regular courses, both online and on site, featuring well known independent filmmakers as faculty.

There were 47 films in the category of films that develop the theme of human unity. This segment features a carefully curated selection of short and feature-length films that dwell upon themes of human unity and values similar to that of Auroville, accompanied by discussions that further elaborate on these themes. The category featured the work of filmmakers from around the world including Shonali Bose, Sreemoyee Singh, Nishtha Jain, Tarun Jain, Tathagata Ghosh, Rizwan Hussain, Bijukumar Damodaran, Aajad Singh Khichi, Piyush Thakur and Rima Das, to name just a few. The film Wisdom Of Happiness featuring the Dalai Lama was one of the well appreciated films.

Eminent jury members for the Aurovilian films included Premendra Mazumder (Vice President of the Federation of Film Societies of India, Ashavari Majumdar (Director of the Manifest Dance-Film Festival), and Dr. T Balasaravanan (Dept of Electronic Media and Mass Communications, Pondy University). Jury members from Auroville were Rajeev, Nitzan and Gita and they decided the winning films in the human unity category.

The screenings were held at three venues (CRIPA, Kalabhumi Amphitheatre and MMC/CP) and were complemented by outdoor music performances, discussions (at Centre d’Art), and an art installation.

The proliferation of digital cameras and the constantly improving quality of smartphone cameras

have made it possible for just about anyone to make their own movie, and one of the goals of the

Auroville Film Festival is to showcase and encourage local talent in this field. Part of the festival is, therefore, a Kino Kabaret! Kino Kabarets are events where artists collaborate to create films within 48 hours and, in our festival, all these films were screened on the last day.

The importance of festivals organised by the residents of Auroville can never be overstated, especially in the way they contribute to local vitality and stimulate cultural development in Auroville. The outdoor screenings and performances and the crowds they drew further testify to the power of outdoor arts to bring together audiences that might otherwise not take the trouble to attend art events.

This festival aims to bring people and cultures together within Auroville and beyond, thereby furthering the aspiration of human unity. With the ninth edition of the Auroville Film Festival the experience was one that went beyond film-viewing, turning it into a truly fulfilling cultural experience.

WINNING FILMS IN THE CATEGORY OF FILMS MADE BY AUROVILIANS AND RESIDENTS OF THE BIOREGION

Mongbra Award :

MORIBUND by Birgitta Volz : This impactful film highlights the resilience and creativity of the Auroville community as it faces ecological and other challenges.

Cinema Paradiso Award :

SOUND OF AIR by Rishi Vengadesan :  The film stands out with its treatment of sound and image reinforcing its choice of an interesting subject.

Wisdom award:

ECM’ 24 by Nefertiti Chakrabarti : A sensitive and complex tribute to the Endangered Crafts Mela that conveys the transformative experience of learning and apprenticeship in Auroville.

The Jury Award was shared by two films

Jury Award 1 :

EARLY YEARS IN AUROVILLE by Lisbeth Nusselein : This film blends archival photographs with an autobiographical narrative that invites the audience to reflect on the journeys and voices that have built Auroville.

Jury Award 2 :

30 YEARS OF KEEPING THE MUSIC FLOWING by Serena Aurora :  This film highlights the insipiring effort by Aurovillians to harmonise its diverse notes and sing in one voice – a metaphor for the community as a whole.

WINNING FILMS IN THE CATEGORY OF FILMS MADE ABOUT AUROVILLE AND THE BIOREGION

Cinema Paradiso Award :

REFLEKT by Santosh Manik: The film is a tribute to the transformative power of cinema tracing the directors journey from being a student of technique to emerging as an artist in the vibrant spiritual landscape of Auroville.

Wisdom Award :

NOTES FOR THE SELF by Jahnavi Pradeep: The film effectively uses Aurovilles landscape to depict the tensions and harmonies of a mother-daughter relationship as a poignant visual poem.

Jury Award :

BLOOMING HOUR by Logeswaran M – An honest, lyrical exposition of the beauty of mornings.

WINNING FILMS IN THE CATEGORY OF FILMS THAT DEVELOP THE THEME OF HUMAN UNITY

Cinema Paradiso Award:

AGENT OF HAPPINESS by Arun Bhattarai and Dorottya Zurbó  : This documentary takes place in Bhutan. In 2008, Bhutan adopted the Gross National Happiness index, intended as a holistic way of measuring quality of life. The movie follows two agents who are hired to travel around Bhutan to carry out the Gross National Happiness survey. The film highlights happiness as a complex and personal experience, shaped by inner states and external conditions. Along the way, we witness a blossoming love story, moments of hope and disappointment, humour, and the beauty of the country itself.

Wisdom Award:

PATROL by Camilo de Castro and Brad Allgood : Patrol takes us through the rainforest in the Indio Maíz Reserve in Nicaragua. Rapid illegal deforestation is taking place to feed the growing demand for meat, especially for export to the USA. The documentary follows the Rama-Kriol people, who are determined to protect the forest in a peaceful yet powerful way. They collect data and travel across Nicaragua and finally the world to take legal action and bring the issue to light. They show a deep love for nature and an understanding of all humanity’s dependence on the health of the rainforest. The film shows how structural and economic pressures are driving environmental destruction.

Jury Award:

NO OTHER LAND : It depicts the generations long struggle on an almost barren area that is dotted with tiny villages. It allows viewers to experience the daily lives of the villagers and shows their humanity and ability to find moments of joy and laughter amidst hardship and brutality. The movie depicts human resilience and persistence in the face of crushing failures as well as the power of the powerless.

Special Mention:

FARMING THE REVOLUTION by Nishtha Jain : The film depicts the collective strength of farmers, who across generations and social backgrounds, come together to defend their livelihood. It shows how a shared purpose can become a unifying force.

THIS FESTIVAL WAS MADE POSSIBLE THROUGH THE EFFORTS OF:

A_lineMeant to Be, Aaro, Aashay, Akash, Amy, Anand, Anandi, Aneeta, Ann, Arul, Arun, Ashwin, Aurosylle, Auroville Bakery Cafeteria, Auroville Radio, AVI Germany, Binu Kumar, brainfever media productions, Brothers House, Centre d’Art, Chandra, Christoph K, Coffee Ideas, CRIPA, Daljeet, Damien, Dhananjey, Dharmesh, Dhruv, Divya, Dominique, Dustudio, Edo, Elaine, Elena, Erik, Fabienne, Fakirah, Fred, Glenn, Goyo, Gustavo, Guy, Hibiscus Art Village, InLight, Jayala, Jean Francois, Jenny, Jenya, Jethin, Joy, Julietta, Jurriaan,  Kalabhumi Music Studio, Kripa, Krishna, Kshitij, Laura, Laxmanan, Lella, Liliana, Malina, Marco S, Mathilde, Melody, Miniature, MMC/CP, Moghan, My Favourite Things, Nadaprem, Nandha, Naturellement, Nausheen, Nina, Nirami, Noizegate, Odile, Pala, Palani, Pavneet, Prasad, Ramesh, Rashmi, Raul, Renu, Right Path Café, Rob, Robin, Rolf, Rosie, Rugved, Saga and his team, Shakti, Sakthi Arts, Salman, Sandra, Sasi, Shanti, Sharmili, Simon, Softnet, Sundar, Sunlit Future, Surendhar, Suryan, Suzy, Swar, Sylvie, Tixon, Tlaloc, Tommaso, Utkarsh, Valerie, Venkatesh, Verena, Yunsung, and many more who offered their support as a sadhana.

Thank you!

Fotos: Marco Saroldi

The winner of the Jury Award is the movie No Other Land. It depicts the generations long struggle on an almost barren area that is dotted with tiny villages. It allows viewers to experience the daily lives of the villagers and shows their humanity and ability to find moments of joy and laughter amidst hardship and brutality. The movie depicts human resilience and persistence in the face of crushing failures as well as the power of the powerless.

The Cinema Paradiso Award goes to the movie Agents of Happiness. This documentary takes place in Bhutan. In 2008, Bhutan adopted the Gross National Happiness index, intended as a holistic way of measuring quality of life. The movie follows two agents who are hired to travel around Bhutan to carry out the Gross National Happiness survey. The film highlights happiness as a complex and personal experience, shaped by inner states and external conditions. Along the way, we witness a blossoming love story, moments of hope and disappointment, humour, and the beauty of the country itself.

The Wisdom Award is given to the movie Patrol. Patrol takes us through the rainforest in the Indio Maíz Reserve in Nicaragua. Rapid illegal deforestation is taking place to feed the growing demand for meat, especially for export to the USA. The documentary follows the Rama-Kriol people, who are determined to protect the forest in a peaceful yet powerful way. They collect data and travel across Nicaragua and finally the world to take legal action and bring the issue to light. They show a deep love for nature and an understanding of all humanity’s dependence on the health of the rainforest. The film shows how structural and economic pressures are driving environmental destruction.

We would also like to extend a special mention to the film Farming the Revolution. The film depicts the collective strength of the farmers, who across generations and social backgrounds, come together to defend their livelihood. It shows how a shared purpose can become a unifying force.

Category: By AV

Jury Award 1 :

EARLY YEARS IN AUROVILLE : This film blends archival photographs with a autobiographical narrative that invites the audience to reflect on the journeys and voices that have built Auroville

Jury Award 2 :

30 YEARS OF KEEPING THE MUSIC FLOWING :  This film highlights the insipiring effort by Aurovillians to harmonise its diverse notes and sing in one voice – a metaphor for the community as a whole.

Cinema Paradiso Award :

SOUND OF AIR :  The film stands out with its treatment of sound and image reinforcing its choice of an interesting subject.

Wisdom award:

ECM’ 24 : A sensitive and complex tribute to the Endangered Crafts Mela that conveys the transformative experience of learning and apprenticeship in Auroville.

Mongbra Award :

MORIBUND : This impactful film highlights the resilience and creativity of the Auroville community as it faces ecological and other challenges .

Category: About AV

Jury Award :

BLOOMING HOUR – An honest, lyrical exposition of the beauty of mornings.

Cinema Paradiso Award :

REFLEKT The film is a tribute to the transformative power of cinema tracing the directors journey from being a student of technique to emerging as an artist in the vibrant spiritual landscape of Auroville

Wisdom Award

NOTES FOR THE SELF: The film effectively uses Aurovilles landscape to depict the tensions and harmonies of a mother-daughter relationship as a poignant visual poem

Enjoy live music performances every evening at Kalabhumi, with the option to pre-book warm dinners. Dinner coupons will be available outside the Solar Kitchen on the 15th and 16th of January from 12.00-14.00. For more info about the dinners, send a W/A message to: 7540091255.

Join the Kino Kabaret, make a film in 48hrs and have it screened immediately! Email kinoauroville@gmail.com to register.

We are still looking for volunteers. Call 7418105246 to find out how you can participate.

Screenings are Free & Open to All. Spread the word!

Download the program as pdf here

Locations:

Centre D’Art

CRIPA

Kalabhumi

MMC

Contact: 9159355809 or 9884120010

Schedule for the AVFF26 in html: Program in Html here

Locations:

Centre D’Art

CRIPA

Kalabhumi

MMC

InLight warmly welcomes the community to the AVFF ‘26 panel discussions with filmmakers at the multimedia room at Centre d’Art. Food and beverages are not permitted inside the hall. You can join all discussion in person or online: https://tinyurl.com/avff26 

Monday 19 January, 2026

• 17:00 | Panelists: Nishtha Jain (Farming The Revolution), Alessandra Silver (The Owl-Eyed Guardian And The Banyan Dream), Divya Mani (Anything Or Everything Could Be Theatre)

Wednesday 21 January, 2026

• 17:00 | Panelists: Nefertiti Chakrabarti (Moon Juice), David Mboussou (Afrotōpia), Tarun Jain (Ballad Of The Mountain), Alan Baiss, Joseh Garcia (Who Do You Think You Are?), Imran Hamdulay (The Wait), Ravikiran Rangaswamy (Conversations)

Saturday 24 January, 2026

• 17:00 | Panelists: Jeremy Carroll (Food Pills), Anna-Maria Bakhtiarova (India Textile), Yatra Srinivassan (Kooli Koduthu Sooniyam), Stanzin (Trashy Film), Lesley Branagan (Bride of Aravan), Serena Aurora (30 Years of keeping the Music Flowing – Auroville Choir)

Sunday 25 January, 2026

• Panelists: Tathagata Ghosh (My Comrade), Shonali Bose/Nilesh Maniyar (A Fly On The Wall), Rizwan Hussain (In The Name Of), Pankaj Gupta (Cricket Dreams), Shokir Kholikov (Sunday), Richa Hushing (Auroville Film Institute)

Location https://maps.app.goo.gl/yTXCkimce5wdaAbdA

Multimedia Center (MMC) Auditorium

Film Program: 19th January 2026 – 25th January 2026 The community is warmly welcomed to the AVFF ‘26 screenings at MMC. Doors open 15 minutes before showtime. Food and beverages are not permitted inside the hall.

Monday 19 January 2026

• 19:00 | Birds Of Puducherry 1.0 (India, 2025, Dir. Gopinath Mounissamy, 7min, NR G) Showcasing the beauty of birds around Puducherry to convey a message against littering in nature.
• 19:07 | Patrol (Nicaragua, 2023, Dir. Camilo de Castro w/ Brad Allgood, 80min, NR R) Indigenous rangers join forces with conservationists to expose the dark world of “conflict beef” decimating rainforests.
• 20:09 | Sound Of A Land (India, 2025, Dir. Yoni Vell, 14min, NR R) A personal documentary about the inner state of being a hunted Jew, shaped by history and memory. Produced by Auroville Film Institute.
• 20:23 | Conversations/Baatein (India, 2024, Dir. Ravikiran Rangaswamy, 5min, NR G) A reflection on the power of love and language between two young children.
• 20:27 | In Ultimo (Italy, 2023, Dir. Mario Balsamo, 66min, NR R) The story of a palliative care physician whose devotion to gardening parallels his work with the terminally ill.
• 21:34 | Last Drop (India, 2024, Dir. Jeremy Carroll, 8min, NR G) In a drought-stricken land, a man embarks on a journey to find the last remaining water source.

Tuesday 20 January 2026

• 19:00 | Notes For The Self (India, 2025, Dir. Jahnavi Pradeep, 11min, NR G) A portrait of the filmmaker’s mother and herself. Produced by Auroville Film Institute.
• 19:10 | Invisible Windows/Adrishya Jalakangal (India, 2023, Dir. Bijukumar Damodaran, 130min, NR R) Released from an asylum, a night watchman at a morgue begins experiencing strange things.

Wednesday 21 January, 2026

• 19:00 | Where is Humanity?/எங்கே மனிதநேயம்? (India, 2024, Dir. Magheshwar Kumaran, 6min, NR G) A vlogger visiting Auroville finds his curiosity captured by a quiet woman.
• 19:05 | ECM 2024 (India, 2024, Dir. Nefertiti Chakrabarti, 4min, NR G) Highlights the Endangered Craft Mela, an educational program celebrating the dignity of craftsmanship.
• 19:09 | Nature is Almighty/இயற்கை பெரியவன் (India, 2024, Dir. Nandha Kumar, 11min, NR R) A young man, consumed by rage, commits an uncontrollable act of fury.
• 19:20 | Food Pills (India, 2024, Dir. Jeremy Carroll, 9min, NR R) A look at how those who depleted our resources now control our food and lives. Selected for the Street Movies Festival.
• 19:30 | Free Words: A Poet From Ghaza (Egypt-Netherlands-Falasteen-Turkey, 2024, Dir. Abdullah Harun Ilhan, 23min, NR R) Follows Pulitzer-winner Mosab Abu Toha, whose art becomes a voice of resistance.
• 19:54 | Connection (Bailanysh)/Байланыш (Kyrgyzstan, 2024, Dir. Jandos Djoldoshov, 30min, NR R) A grandson’s arrival for a funeral in a mountain village creates unexpected tension.
• 20:24 | The Companions/La Compañía (Spain, 2024, Dir. José María Flores, 12min, NR R) A couple on their way to dinner encounters a crowd gathered around a mysterious event.
• 20:36 | Garbage/Mycop (India, 2024, Dir. Anna-Maria Bakhtiarova, 13min, NR R) The harsh realities of consumer society in Auroville and Pondicherry seen through the eyes of workers.
• 20:48 | A Land Beyond The Mountains (India, 2025, Dir. Smiti, 8min, NR G) A reflection on happiness while traveling through Bhutan.
• 20:56 | New Best Friends (India, 2025, Dir. Birgitta Volz, 3min, NR G) An unconventional perspective on recovery following a leg operation.
• 20:59 | The Matrimandir & I, Episode 1: Four People From Four Corners Of The World. One Connection. (India, 2025, Dir. Serena Aurora, 8min, NR G) Four Aurovilians speak about their personal experiences with the Matrimandir.
• 21:07 | Auroville: The City Of The Future (Russia-India, 2023, Dir. Anna-Maria Bakhtiarova, 13min, NR G) A film about restoring ecological balance in south India, nominated at the Yalta Film Festival.
• 21:20 | Water in the Mountains/Pahadon Mei Paani (India, 2025, Dir. Karthik K, 12min, NR G) The story of installing a solar pump at 13,000 feet in the Spiti Valley.

Thursday 22 January, 2026

• 19:00 | Cricket Dreams (India-Netherlands, 2025, Dir. Jamillah van der Hulst, 77min, NR G) Nine former street children from Delhi compete in the Street Child Cricket World Cup in Chennai.
• 20:17 | One Side Of The Road (India, 2024, Dir. Jalil Nordman, 88min, NR G) A road in Tamil Nadu serves as a frontier between emancipation and subordination for local villagers.

Friday 23 January, 2026

• 19:00 | Puffling (UK-Iceland, 2023, Dir. Jessica Bishopp, 20min, NR G) Two teenagers rescue young puffins on a remote island, exploring youth action in environmental issues.
• 19:20 | Dear Daughter (2023, 13min, NR R) A young woman tells her story of being trafficked and sold into marriage.
• 19:33 | How Would One Know If One Forgets Something (India, 2025, Dir. Karthik Sreenivasan w/ Sai Krishna, Stanzin Angdu, 9min, NR G) Traces memory and the passage of time in the landscape of Ladakh. Produced by Auroville Film Institute.
• 19:42 | Kooli Koduthu Sooniyam (India, 2023, Dir. Yatra Srinivassan, 9min, NR PG-15) A tale of a family torn apart by addiction and their subsequent resilience.
• 19:51 | You Lift on a Stroke, There Is A Dog Shelter (India, 2025, Dir. Donny Lee Duke, 17min, NR G) A video-poem about the Auroville Dog Shelter and its place within the community’s aims.
• 20:08 | Hausnummer Null (Germany, 2025, Dir. Lilith Kugler, 95min, NR R) Explores a young man’s struggle to find his place in society after never fitting in.

Saturday 24 January, 2026

• 19:00 | Purga (Lithuania, 2024, Dir. Gintarė Valevičiūtė Brazauskienė w/ Antanas Skučas, 13min, NR R) Based on true memories of deported people struggling to survive in the Arctic Circle in 1942.
• 19:13 | Agent of Happiness (Bhutan, 2024, Dir. Arun Bhattarai w/ Dorottya Zurbo, 94min, NR R) Amber travels the mountains measuring happiness for the Bhutanese government while searching for his own.
• 20:47 | In The Light Of Time (India, 2025, Dir. Jahnavi Pradeep w/ Amogh Chauhan, 12min, NR G) Centred on prehistoric rock art, exploring how the past informs our need to create for the future. Produced by Auroville Film Institute.
• 20:59 | The Voice Of Others/La Voix Des Autres (France, 2023, Dir. Fatima Kaci, 30min, NR R) A Tunisian interpreter in France faces her own history while translating the stories of exiled people.

Sunday 25 January, 2026

• 19:00 | A Few of the Winning Films

Live Music / Film Screenings at Kalabhumi Amphitheatre

Program: 18th January 2026 – 25th January 2026

Shakti Arts warmly welcomes the community to live music performances and a selection of films curated by AVFF ’26.

Sunday 18 January, 2026

Performance

• 18:00 | Live Music: Creedence Clearwater Revival

Screenings

• 19:30 | Farming The Revolution (India, 2024, Dir. Nishtha Jain, 105min, NR R) In 2020 Gurbaz Sangha, a young Punjabi farmer led thousands to Delhi protesting new Farm Laws. Joined by over half a million from diverse backgrounds they remained at borders despite COVID lockdown, vowing to stay until laws were repealed.
• 21:15 | Purna Maha Kumbh Mela (India 2025, Dir. Lalit Verma, 22min, NR G) Experience the Purna Maha Kumbh Mela. A journey within.
• 21:37 | The Waves Will Never Stop (India, 2025, Dir. Karthik Sreenivasan w/ Sai Krishna L V, Sanjana Reddy, 10min, NR G) Fisherman Narayanan carries memories of the 2004 Tsunami that shattered his village. Produced by Auroville Film Institute.
• 21:47 | The Poetics Of Change (India, 2025, Dir. Logeswaran M, 10min, NR G) Experimental narrative, exploring Ladakh as a time capsule through juxtaposed shots. Produced by Auroville Film Institute.

Monday 19 January, 2026

Performance

• 18:00 | Live Music: A Line Meant To Be

Screenings

• 19:30 | Moon Juice/Chander Rosh (India, 2025, Dir. Nefertiti Chakrabarti, 3min, NR G) Shot on a single reel of super 8 film with no editing. Premiered at Straight 8 2025 at the British Film Institute.
• 19:33 | Moribund: An Art Project (India, 2025, Dir. Birgitta Volz, 6min, NR G) Dedicated to Auroville, currently under pressure. Presents the destruction of Auroville as symbolic of environmental vandalism. Birgitta’s art reflects the crisis.
• 19:39 | Moments Of Joy (India, 2025, Dir. Santosh Manik, 11min, NR G) A poetic journey into the mind of Ladakhi poet Padma Angmo. Her verses blend with the rhythms of nature and daily life, asking us to slow down and rediscover joy in simplicity. Produced by Auroville Film Institute.
• 19:50 | Afrotōpia (Gabon, 2025, Dir. David Mboussou, 128min, NR G) Set in Equatorial Africa, in the heart of the Congo Basin, the film follows Ezekiel, a 25-year-old aspiring filmmaker who lives under the authority of his father, Maurice, a powerful businessman who opposes his artistic ambitions.

Tuesday 20 January, 2026

Performance

• 18:00 | Live Music: Suryan

Screenings

• 19:30 | The Cosmic Atomic/Brahmandam Pindandam (India, 2025, Dir. Kanchan Avchare, 20min, NR G) Traces the journey of civilization from the harnessing of fire through technology. An absurdist take on the purposelessness of the universe.
• 19:49 | Bride Of Aravan (India, 2023, Dir. Lesley Branagan, 49min, NR G) Captures the register of life as a transgender woman in south India through the protagonist Bawadharini.
• 20:39 | I Stole Your Ashes/He Robado Tus Cenizas (Spain, 2024, Dir. Felipe Olaya, 23min, NR R) Isabel has become a widow at 65. After stealing the urn of ashes, Isabel takes refuge in a park to say goodbye to the love of her life.
• 21:02 | Ballad Of The Mountain (India, 2024, Dir. Tarun Jain, 17min, NR G) An outcast girl must fight the bullies and overcome her fears to pursue her ambition to fly to the other side of the mountain.
• 21:19 | The Nightingale’s Song (UK-USA, 2024, Dir. Adam Loften w/ Emmanuel Vaughn-Lee, 40min, NR G) The voices of nightingales have lit up the forests of England for over a million years. As climate change impacts their grounds, they may disappear within 50 years.

Wednesday 21 January, 2026

Performance

• 18:00 | Live Music: Auroville Trio

Screenings

• 19:30 | Why/Чому (Ukraine-Spain, 2023, Dir. Natxo Leuza Fernandez, 22min, NR R) Why do they humiliate us? Why do they take everything from us? Why do I have to run away?
• 19:52 | The First Film (India, 2024, Dir. Piyush Thakur, 24min, NR G) In a small town of 1960’s India, where cinema is forbidden for women, a 14-year-old embarks on a quest to watch her first film.
• 20:16 | Dear Beautiful Beloved (Austria, 2024, Dir. Juri Rechinsky, 93min, NR R) There is a war going on in Europe. Our neighbors are fleeing from death and destruction. This film will give a face to some of their stories.
• 21:48 | Amudha (India, 2025, Dir, Rosann Robinson, 11min, NR G) Amudha is a young girl, who sells balloons near the beach. She and her sister are orphans.

Thursday 22 January, 2026

Performance

• 18:00 | Live Music: Jayala
• 18:30 | Live Music: Fakirah

Screenings

• 19:30 | Aloha ‘Āina (USA, 2024, Dir. Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee w/ Adam Loften, 47min, NR G) Today, Jamaica Heolimeleikalani Osorio’s poetry is focused on protecting sacred sites and creating a future for Native Hawaiians rooted in ‘love for and of the land’.
• 20:17 | A Game of Destiny (India-UK, 2024, Dir. Zorba, 9min, NR G) At 6 years of age, Tibetan Kunsang found himself living in an orphanage as a refugee. 30 years later, Kunsang shares his story of life living in exile.
• 20:26 | Trashy Film/Kuppai Padam (India, 2025, Dir. Stanzin, 86min, NR G) A writer loses his laptop just before an important meeting and must race to find it with no memory of the last 12 hours.

Friday 23 January, 2026

Performance

• 18:00 | Live Music: Vera’s Jazz Band

Screenings

• 19:30 | Village Rockstars 2 (India, 2024, Dir. Rima Das, 108min, NR G) In a village in Assam, a teenage girl passionately chases her dream of becoming a musician. Faced with harsh realities, she seeks a new harmony.
• 21:18 | How Would One Know If One Forgets Something? (India, 2025, Dir. Karthik Sreenivasan w/ Sai Krishna L W, Stanzin Angdu, 9min, NR G) Traces memory, change, and the passage of time in the fragile landscape of Ladakh. Produced by Auroville Film Institute.
• 21:27 | Kooli Koduthu Sooniyam (India, 2023, Dir. Yatra Srinivassan, 9min, NR PG-13) A family torn apart by the protagonist’s alcohol addiction.
• 21:36 | You Lift On A Stroke, There’s A Dog Shelter (India, 2025, Dir. Donny Lee Duke, 17min, NR G) A video-photo-poem documentary about the Auroville Dog Shelter and the relationship between a human and the Supreme.

Saturday 24 January, 2026

Performance

• 18:00 | Live Music: Edo & crew

Screenings

• 19:30 | Purga (Lithuania, 2024, Dir. Gintarė Valevičiūtė Brazauskienė w/ Antanas Skučas, 13min, NR R) Winter, 1942. Beyond the Arctic Circle, on an uninhabited island, deported people struggle to survive.
• 19:43 | Agent Of Happiness (Bhutan, 2024, Dir. Arun Bhattarai w/ Dorottya Zurbó, 94min, NR R) Amber is one of the many agents working for the Bhutanese government to measure people’s happiness levels among the remote Himalayan mountains.
• 21:17 | In The Light Of Time (India, 2025, Dir. Jahnavi Pradeep w/ Amogh Chauhan, 13min, NR G) Centered on prehistoric rock art sites along the Indus and Zanskar rivers, the film is a ‘love story’ between past, present, and future. Produced by Auroville Film Institute.
• 21:29 | The Voice Of Others/La Voix Des Autres (France, 2023, Dir. Fatima Kaci, 30min, NR R) Rim is a Tunisian interpreter working in France on asylum procedures. Every day, she translates the stories of exiled men and women.

Sunday 25 January, 2026

• 17:00 | Awards

Performance

• 18:00 | Live Music: Blackcurrant

Screenings

• 19:30 | Reflekt (India, 2025, Dir. Santosh Manik, 11min, NR G) Chronicles a filmmaking residency at the Auroville Film Institute. Produced by Auroville Film Institute.
• 19:41 | Where’s Masi? (India, 2025, Dir. Uttara Jadeja, 10min, NR PG-13) A homemade horror film about a young woman racing to save her friend from a sinister entity.
• 19:50 | The Strange Case Of The Human Cannonball (Ecuador, 2024, Dir. Roberto Valencia, 10min, NR R) A mysterious man is found lying in the square of a village inhabited by only six residents.
• 20:01 | Films Created In The Kino Kabaret (Auroville, 2026, Multiple Directors, 120min, NR G) All films were created within 48 hours on the 23rd and 24th of January 2026. The short films have in common one prop, one sound effect and one line of dialogue.

Screenings at CRIPA

Film program: 18th January 2026 – 25th January 2026

CRIPA warmly welcomes the community to the AVFF ‘26 screenings. Doors open 15 minutes before showtime. For everyone’s enjoyment, kindly avoid crossing in front of the screen or using mobile phones when lights are off. Food and beverages are not permitted inside the hall.

Sunday 18 January, 2026

• 19:00 | Goodbye Julia (Sudan, 2023, Writer-Dir. Mohamed Kordofani, Feature, 120min, Arabic w/ English subtitles, NR R) Wracked by guilt after covering up a murder, Mona – a northern Sudanese retired singer in a tense marriage – tries to make amends by taking in the deceased’s southern Sudanese widow, Julia, and her son, Daniel, into her home. Awarded at the 2023 Cannes Film Festival in France.
• 21:00 | The Owl-Eyed Guardian And The Banyan Dream (India, 2024, Writer-Dir. Alessandra Silver, Fiction, 59min, Tamil-English w/ English subtitles, NR G) This visually captivating and deeply spiritual film sheds light on the untold story of Andhayee, the enigmatic guardian of Auroville’s origins.
• 21:59 | Anything Or Everything Could Be Theatre (India, 2025, Writer-Editor-Camera-Dir. Divya Mani, Documentary, 22min, English, NR G) In the coastal serenity of Auroville, the 2025 Adishakti Theatre Festival unfolds as a celebration of performance, spirit, and human connection.

Monday 19 January, 2026

• 19:00 | Pushpa Ka Rickshaw (India, 2023, Dir. Aajad Singh Khichi, Documentary-Short, 16min, Nimadi-Malvi w/ English subtitles) In a remote village of Charbardi, in central India, Puspha Didi breaks the stereotype by driving the e-rickshaw, the first woman driver in the entire tehsil, not marred by people casting doubts on her capabilities.
• 19:15 | Wisdom Of Happiness (Switzerland, 2024, Dir. Barbara Miller w/ Philip Delaquis, Documentary, 90min, English, NR G) The film is a profound new cinematic exploration of the innermost world of the Dalai Lama, perfectly attuned to our times. In an intimate heart-to-heart, the world’s greatest ambassador of compassion invites everyone along for a journey to the source of happiness.
• 20:46 | Standing Alone (India, 2025, Producer-Writer-Editor-Camera-Dir. Smiti, Documentary, 75min, Tamil-English w/ English subtitles NR G) This documentary series looks at the individual life-journeys of 6 women who are single mothers from villages situated near Auroville. There are many more… Each has her own unique story and yet the hardships faced are common.
• 22:01 | Adventures Of Nono (India, 2025, Writer-Editor-Camera-Sound-Dir. Santosh Manik, Documentary, 20min, Hindi w/ English subtitles, NR G) Adventures of Nono is set in the highlands of Ladakh. It is an intimate observational documentary that follows the everyday world of a two-year-old boy “Nono”, a child full of life, curiosity, and courage. Produced by Auroville Film Festival.

Tuesday 20 January, 2026

• 19:00 | A Clay Connect (India, 2024, Editor-Dir. Serena Aurora, Documentary, 5min, English-Tamil w/ English subtitles, NR G) Traditional clay pottery in India is dying out since the younger generation has no interest in keeping the art form alive. This film captures the crossover of generations, featuring how contemporary and traditional styles blend to create unique pieces.
• 19:05 | An Afternoon With Das Anna (India, 2025, Writer-Editor-Camera-Sound-Dir. Pia Sukhija, Documentary, 6min, Silent, NR G) Set in the streets of Auroville, the City of Dawn, this no-dialogue documentary spends an afternoon with Das, a quiet cobbler in Auroville whose daily rituals unfold into the rhythm of the street. Produced by Auroville Film Institute.
• 19:11 | The Wait (South Africa, 2023, Writer-Dir. Imran Hamdulay, Short, 15min, Afrikaans-English-Xhosa w/ English subtitles, NR R) The film is an allegory of South Africa’s complex society, where a sense of powerlessness and hope exist together at all times.
• 19:26 | Go My Way/Yo Voy Conmigo (Spain, 2024, Writer-Dir. Chelo Loureiro, Animation-Short, 7min, Spanish w/ English subtitles, NR G) Elisa likes Martin, but Martin doesn’t seem to realise it. All the advice Elisa receives to make Martin fall in love with her is to change not only her appearance, but also who she really is.
• 19:33 | Gingerbread For Her Dad (Kazakhstan-Poland-Russian Federation, 2024, Writer-Dir. Alina Mustafina, Documentary-Feature-Drama, 84min, English-Kazakh-Polish-Russian w/ English subtitles) 85-year-old Lyabiba doesn’t remember her father, who died in World War II. Her only memory is of shouting joyfully about receiving ‘consolation’ gingerbread cookies after her father’s death notice. Lyabiba’s daughter and granddaughter (the film’s director) decide to find the mass grave in Poland where Lyabiba’s father was buried.
• 20:57 | Disconnected Echoes (India, 2025, Writer-Editor-Camera-Sound-Dir. Polash PK, Documentary, 18min, Bengali-English with English subtitles, NR G) In July 2024, filmmaker Polash was in Ladakh when communication with his family in Bangladesh was cut off due to civil unrest. This documentary captures his emotional journey and isolation, alongside stories of separation from local families he stayed with in Ladakh. Produced by Auroville Film Festival.
• 21:15 | Blooming Hour/மலரும் நேரம் (India, 2025, Writer-Editor-Camera-Sound-Dir. Logeswaran M, Documentary, 14min, Tamil w/ English subtitles, NR G) Trust brewing between the morning birds and the man who recently began feeding them. Produced by Auroville Film Institute.
• 21:29 | Who Do You Think You Are? (Canada, 2025, Producer-Editor-Dir. Alan Baiss w/ Joseh Garcia, Documentary, 65min, English, NR G) Inspired by Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, asking what global crises are asking of us.

Wednesday 21 January, 2026

• 19:00 | Earth-chitecture: Building With Mud (India, 2024, Producer-Writer-Editor-Camera-Sound-Dir. Sampriti Roy, Documentary, 11min, English, NR G) Demonstrations on how to make CSEB and ferro cement for buildings featuring Ayyappan, Radhika and Satprem.
• 19:10 | Green SuperHeroes 2030 (United States, 2024, Writer-Dir. Los Angeles Barea, Documentary, 79min, English, NR G) A group of 10 young environmentalists changing the world for the better. Their powers make the planet greener.
• 20:29 | Ground Zero: Self-portrait Of An Ocean Abuser (Spain, 2024, Writer-Dir. David Gaspar, Documentary, 28min, Spanish w/ English subtitles, NR R) The film invites us to become aware of the problem of pollution in the oceans and the conflict it generates within us. Through an ironic and biting perspective, it tries to make us reflect on our responsibility in this regard with the aim of helping us improve our commitment to the oceans with small gestures.
• 20:57 | Breaking Language/Romer el Español (Argentina, 2025, Dir. Sofia Castro, Documentary-Experimental, 17min, Argentinian Sign Language w/ English subtitles, NR G) Merging Argentinian Sign Language, dance, and documentary, the film presents the perspectives of four Deaf artists as they examine ideas of identity and resistance within a cultural and linguistic minority, the need for poetic and artistic creation in one’s own language, and the importance of feminism within the Deaf community.
• 21:15 | And, Towards Happy Alleys (Islamic Republic of Iran-India, 2023, Writer-Dir. Sreemoyee Singh, Documentary-Feature, 75min, Persian with English subtitles, NR R) A passionate declaration of love for the cinema and poetry of Iran, which also offers a frank view of the precarious situation for critics of the regime and shows the uncompromising daily struggle of Iranian women against their oppression.

Thursday 22 January, 2026

• 19:00 | H2O My Love/H2O Mon Amour (France, 2023, Writer-Dir. Laëtitia Martinoni, Short, 18min, French w/ English subtitles, NR R) Is it reasonable to fall in love during the end of the world? Alice and Simon meet as the water war rages.
• 19:18 | Sunday (Uzbekistan, 2023, Writer-Dir. Shokir Kholikov, Feature, 96min, Uzbek w/ English subtitles, NR R) An elderly couple is living a peaceful life in a quiet Uzbek village. The elderly parents cherish their old home and are resistant to any change, leading to a conflict between the generations, where the struggle between tradition and progress reaches a breaking point.
• 20:54 | 30 Years Of Keeping The Music Flowing – Auroville Choir (India, 2024, Producer-Writer-Dir. Serena Aurora, Documentary, 38min, English, NR G) Like the melting pot that Auroville is, the choir is an amalgamation of singers from across countries, age groups, and disciplines, performing music spanning different decades and centuries.
• 21:32 | Where Trees Weep/Donde Se Quejan Los Pinos (Spain, 2024, Producer-Dir. Ed Antoja, Short, 10min, Spanish w/ English subtitles, NR R) A rural community wakes up to a crime scene in the middle of the forest. Little by little, a series of previous situations show us the conflicts that happened in the same place.
• 21:42 | India Textile Part 1 (Russia-India, 2024, Writer-Editor-Camera-Dir. Anna-Maria Bakhtiarova, Documentary, 19min, Russian w/ English subtitles, NR G) A masters student sets out to discover the ancient art of Indian textiles.
• 22:02 | India Textile Part 2 (Russia-India, 2025, Writer-Editor-Camera-Dir. Anna-Maria Bakhtiarova, Documentary, 21min, Russian w/ English subtitles, NR G) A masters student sets out to discover the ancient art of Indian textiles.
• 22:22 | Indygama (India, 2024, Writer-Editor-Camera-Dir. Anna-Maria Bakhtiarova, Documentary, 6min, English, NR G) An anagama kiln in south India draws in ceramists with its magical and organic firings.

Friday 23 January, 2026

• 19:00 | It Comes in Waves (India, 2025, Producer-Writer-Editor-Sound-Dir. Nefertiti Chakrabarti, Documentary, 4min, English, NR G) Shot on 16mm film, hand-developed in a basement and spliced in the mountains. A kaleidoscope of a small town in India, once colonized, now free.
• 19:03 | Art Form/Kalai Vadivam (India, 2024, Writer-Editor-Dir. S. Yuvasri, Documentary, 5min, Tamil w/ English subtitles, NR G) A form of folk theatre from Tamil Nadu known as kattaikkuttu or therukoothu, featuring traditional theatre, song, dance, and ritual.
• 19:09 | Last Resort/Chareh (Islamic Republic of Iran, 2024, Producer-Writer-Dir. Samiramis Kia, Short, 15min, Persian w/ English subtitles, NR R) An Iranian mother must find the will to change her destiny to be able to obtain custody of her daughter.
• 19:24 | Junks And Dolls/Ashghal-ha Va Arousak-ha (Islamic Republic of Iran, 2023, Dir. Manijeh Hekmat, Feature, 75min, Farsi w/ English subtitles, NR R) A couple is destined to build up their life in the heart of a waste depot in the Iranian north forests. They begin to make different things with the junk they find and start to make friends with the other people… but what remains of the people who are determined to fight their nature?
• 20:39 | Sound Of Air (India, 2025, Producer-Writer-Editor-Camera-Sound-Dir. Rishi Vengadesan, Documentary, 14min, English-Hindi w/ English subtitles, NR G) Explores changes to Indian classical music after the introduction of the harmonium and the relationship between the instrument maker and musicians.
• 20:53 | Don Benjamin (Spain, 2024, Writer-Dir. Iván Zahinos, Short, 29min, Spanish w/ English subtitles, NR R) For Don Benjamín, the jungle has always been God, life, food, health, beauty and tradition. Now, the world in which he built a home for his family turns to smoke and ashes. This film is a journey both raw and poetic through a magical region in danger: the Bolivian Amazon.
• 21:22 | The Farming Land (India, 2025, Producer-Writer-Dir. Mukul Kumar, Experimental-Dance, 15min, Silent, NR G) A surreal meditation on the weight of being. Won ‘Outstanding Indian Debut’ at Manifest Dance Film Festival 2025.

Saturday 24 January, 2026

• 19:00 | No Other Land/Lā Arḍ Ukhrá (Falesteen-Norway, 2024, Writer-Dir. Basel Adra w/ Hamdan Ballal, Yuval Abraham, Rachel Szor, Documentary, 95min, Arabic-Hebrew-English w/ English subtitles, NR R) The film was recorded between 2019 and 2023 and shows the destruction of a Falasteenian community in the occupied area, which had been resisting forced displacement after a ‘firing zone’ was declared on their land. This movie won more than 40 international awards.
• 20:35 | My Comrade/Amar Comrade (India, 2024, Producer-Dir. Tathagata Ghosh, Short, 25min, Bengali-Santali w/ English subtitles, NR R) When a wounded rebel accidentally takes refuge in the home of a tribal villager, both men’s lives spiral into a tense interplay of politics and forbidden love.
• 20:59 | A Fly On The Wall (Switzerland-India, 2024, Producer-Dir. Shonali Bose w/ Nilesh Maniyar, Documentary-Feature, 83min, English, NR R) Loved ones pour in from different parts of the world to raise one last toast with Chika Kapadia, who has an appointment at Dignitas for physician assisted suicide in the coming week, having chosen not to be tied to tubes and wires in his last moments. A filmmaker friend tasked with shooting Chika’s countdown to death records her own feelings, weaving a tale of dignity in death through the lens of friendship.
• 22:22 | In The Wake Of The Wind (India, 2025, Producer-Writer-Editor-Camera-Dir. Pia Sukhija, Documentary, 7min, English w/ English subtitles, NR G) An exploration of a single day in the lives of a nomadic herder community on the Changthang Plateau in Ladakh. Produced by Auroville Film Institute.

Sunday 25 January, 2026

• 19:00 | In The Name Of (India, 2024, Producer-Writer-Editor-Dir. Rizwan Hussain, Short-Drama-Silent, 5min, English, NR G) In a village town, two elderly men find themselves at a bus stop, their routine interrupted by a sudden event nearby. As they spring into action, their unexpected response to the situation resonates deeply and leaves a profound impact that transcends the ordinary.
• 19:05 | Early Years In Auroville 1969-1976 (India, 2025, Producer-Writer-Camera-Dir. Lisbeth Nusselein, Documentary, 9min, English, NR G) Lisbeth’s journey in 1970 to Auroville from the Netherlands, told through archival photographs covering travel, arrival, life, work, the Mother, and community.
• 19:14 | Letter to Mother (India, 2025, Writer-Editor-Dir. Partha P Datta, Documentary-Short, 5min, Bengali w/ English subtitles, NR G) On an evening field filled with children, Partha stands apart due to an injured leg. The film is a letter to his mother, expressing his quiet loneliness. Produced by Auroville Film Institute.
• 19:19 | If/যদি (Jodi) (India, 2023, Producer-Dir. Tathagata Ghosh, Short, 26min, Bengali w/ English subtitles, NR R) An arranged marriage tears a lesbian couple apart, but with a mother’s love, perhaps another future is possible.
• 19:45 | Village Rockstars 2 (India, 2024, Producer-Writer-Dir. Rima Das, Feature, 108min, Assamese w/ English subtitles, NR G) In a charming village in Assam, India, a teenage girl passionately chases her dream of becoming a musician. Faced with harsh realities, she embarks on a journey to rediscover the profound connection between music and life, seeking a new harmony in the symphony of her dreams.
• 21:33 | Morning Star Auroville: Supporting Families Through Pregnancy, Birth, And Beyond (India, 2024, Editor-Dir. Serena Aurora, Documentary, 15min, English, NR G) A health and wellness initiative in Auroville supporting families through pregnancy, birth, and early parenting, urges a cultural shift to recognize birth as a life-changing experience for the family.
• 21:48 | Orain (Spain, 2024, Dir. Ainara Oto Barberena, Documentary, 15min, Spanish w/ English subtitles, NR G) Sara has to make a documentary about Orain, a special education school. She needs to get the perfect images, but her attempts are frustrated by a series of crazy situations that bring her to the brink of a nervous breakdown. With the help of the kids, Sara learns the importance of living in the present.
• 22:03 | Once Upon A Forest (India, 2024, Dir. Paul Blanchflower w/ Aurovenkatesh, Documentary, 13min, English with English subtitles, NR G) The film explores the Tropical Dry Evergreen Forest, the rarest forest type in India. Today less than 0.1 percent remains. It is a resilient environment, essential for the next generation on the Coromandel coast.
• 22:17 | Project Wightiana (India, 2025, Dir. Cheenu Wild, Documentary, 10min, English w/ English subtitles, NR G) The film follows the journey of a forgotten wild Indian coffee species – Coffea Wightiana – in the Silence Forest of Auroville. A native, climate-resilient species that may hold answers to the future of coffee.

AUROVILIANS

RESIDENTS OF THE BIOREGION

PONDICHERRIANS

30 YEARS OF KEEPING THE MUSIC FLOWING – AUROVILLE CHOIR

Year, Duration: 2024, 38min 25sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, English
Screening: Thursday, 22 January 2026 at CRIPA at 20:54

Synopsis:
This documentary takes us through a nostalgic journey of the Auroville Choir – thirty years of keeping the music flowing. Started by Pushkar in 1991, the choir was taken over in 1993 by Nuria, a student of music from Catalonia, Spain. She has been the conductor for the past thirty-one years. Like the melting pot that Auroville is, the choir is an amalgamation of singers from across countries, age groups, and disciplines, performing music spanning different decades and centuries.

Crew & Cast: Producer/Director/Script: Serena Aurora, Editors: Serena Aurora, Aurovenkatesh, Melusine, Camera: Serena Aurora, Aurovenkatesh, Marko, Sound: Shanks, Cast: Nuria, Anandamayi, Angelika, Tom, Otto, Praniti, Shanks

Trailer: https://youtu.be/7XnNMpv63U4
Website: www.auroraseyefilms.com
Anitya Community: Joy of Impermanence, Auroville

A CLAY CONNECT

Year, Duration: 2024, 5min 15sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, English/Tamil with English subtitles
Screening: Tuesday, 20 January 2026 at CRIPA at 19:00

Synopsis:
A CLAY CONNECT follows a meeting of hands and histories: Adil Writer, a contemporary ceramist, and T. Palanisamy, traditional master craftsman of monumental terracotta. Speaking in pantomime, only through the language of clay, they shape figures born of ritual and reimagined through fire. Lineage and experiment entwine; where ancient knowledge breathes anew, and devotion, labour and shared making form a living, lyrical conversation.

Crew & Cast: Producer/Script: Adil Writer, Director: Serena Aurora, Editor: Serena Aurora, Aurovenkatesh, Camera: Aurovenkatesh, Audio Post Production: Kadarsh, Music: Nadaka & the Basavaraj Brothers, Cast: Adil Writer, T. Palanisamy, Subtitles: Priya Sundaravalli

Trailer: https://youtu.be/NKjfqgLlqw0
Website: www.mandalapottery.com; www.adilwriter.com
Mandala Pottery, Dana Community, Auroville

A LAND BEYOND THE MOUNTAINS

Year, Duration: 2025, 7min 50sec
Genre: Experimental
Country, Language: India, English
Screening: Wednesday, 21 January 2026 at Cinema Paradiso at 20:48

Synopsis: A reflection on what happiness is, while traveling in Bhutan.

Crew: Producer/Director/Editor/Camera: Smiti, Script: Re-written by Smiti from an article by Claude, Music: Amiya Bhatia, Voice over: Ribhu Photography: Claude
Socials: Instagram: @smiti_7
Swayam Community, Auroville

ADVENTURES OF NONO

Year, Duration: 2025, 20min 21sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, Hindi with English subtitles
Screening: Monday, 19 January 2026 at CRIPA at 22:01

Synopsis:
An intimate observational documentary, set in the highlands of Ladakh, following a two-year-old boy named Nono. Filmed over several days in vérité style with a phone, the film captures his unfiltered world, his curiosity, and his resilience. Through this unstructured play, the film explores deeper questions about how children learn, what happens when we let go of control, and when we stopped being like Nono.

Crew & Cast:
Producer: Auroville Film Institute, Director/Script/Editor/Camera/Sound: Santosh Manik. Cast: Nono, Wangmo, Dechen

Website: https://filminstitute.auroville.org
Felicity Community, Old Auroville Road, Bommaiyarpalayam

AMUDHA

Year, Duration: 2025, 11min 15sec
Genre: Short
Country, Language: India, Tamil with English subtitles
Screening: Wednesday, 21 January 2026 at Kalabhumi Amphitheatre at 21:48

Synopsis:
Amudha is a young girl, who sells balloons near the beach. She and her sister are orphans. After meeting a writer who hears her story, the writer refuses to marry as requested by her mother and instead chooses to adopt the poor girls and send them to school.

Crew & Cast:
Director: Rosann Robinson, Script: S. Yuvasri, Editor: Harini P, Camera: Sruthi K.U, Sound: Gugan E.V, Josh Krajit, Cast: S. Yuvasri, Merline Joshi, Yatra Srinivassan, Yuvatri Priya, R. Raveena

Trailer: https://youtu.be/9xcaWMLAB-Q
Website: https://www.yatraartsmedia.org/
Yatra, Near New Creation Sports Ground, Kuilapalayam

ART FORM (KALAI VADIVAM)

Year, Duration: 2024, 5min 13sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, Tamil with English subtitles
Screening: Friday, 23 January 2026 at CRIPA at 19:03

Synopsis:
A form of folk theatre from Tamil Nadu known as kattaikkuttu or therukoothu, featuring traditional theatre, song, dance, and ritual. Popular in rural areas like Dharmapuri and Arcot, the term is a common name for Tamil open-air theatre today.

Crew:

• Producer: Yatra Arts Media Team
• Director/Script/Editor: Yuvasri
• Camera: Harini, Yuvasri
• Sound: Yatra Arts Media Team, YouTube Audio Library
• Cast: Senthil, Govindharaj, K. Gangadurai

Website: https://www.yatraartsmedia.org/
Trailer: https://youtu.be/mRckjeOx8ug
Yatra, Near New Creation Sports Ground, Kuilapalayam

AUROVILLE: THE CITY OF THE FUTURE (АУРОВИЛЬ: ГОРОД БУДУЩЕГО)

Year, Duration: 2023, 12min 51sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: Russia/India, Russian with English subtitles
Screening: Wednesday, 21 January 2026 at Cinema Paradiso at 21:07

Synopsis:
After an ecosystem had been destroyed by colonial forces in South India, a new colonial force vowed to restore the balance. Nominated in the student category at the Yalta Film Festival “Мы вместе” 2024.

Crew & Cast:

• Producer: Aleksei Vasilyev
• Director/Script/Editor/Camera: Anna-Maria Bakhtiarova
• Sound: Vera Lipen-Joshi, Aleksandr Kononov
• Cast: Philipp, Bernard, Deepika, Luke, Kiran Baldwin, Birgitta Volz

Saraswati House, Dana Community, Auroville

BIRDS OF PUDUCHERRY 1.0

Year, Duration: 2025, 7min 9sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, Tamil with English subtitles
Screening: Monday, 19 January 2026 at Cinema Paradiso at 19:00

Synopsis: Showcasing the beauty of birds around Puducherry to convey a message against littering in nature.

Crew:

• Producer/Director/Script/Editor/Camera/Sound: Gobinath Mounissamy

Links: https://jardindusecret.com/; Instagram: @jardindusecret
Trailer: https://youtu.be/3FETQ13onYo
Purple Apartment, Room 402, Kuilapalyam

BRIDE OF ARAVAN

Year, Duration: 2023, 49min
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, Tamil with English subtitles
Screening: Tuesday, 20 January 2026 at Kalabhumi Amphitheatre at 19:49

Synopsis:
Captures the register of life as a transgender woman in south India through the protagonist Bawadharini. The film follows her everyday life – home, NGO work, begging – and the ritual catharsis of the annual Aravan festival where trans women are elevated to goddess ‘bride’ status. A ‘therukoothu’ traditional performance parallels the events, deepening the themes of family rejection and dignity.

Crew & Cast:

• Producer/Director/Script/Sound: Lesley Branagan
• Co-producer/Director: Yatra Srinivassan
• Assembly Edit: Puloma Pal
• DOP: Jeremy Carroll
• Cast: Bawadharini S

Creativity B Block, Auroville

CONVERSATIONS (BAATEIN)

Year, Duration: 2024, 4min 32sec
Genre: Fiction
Country, Language: India, Hindi with English subtitles
Screening: Monday, 19 January 2026 at Cinema Paradiso at 20:23

Synopsis: A simple story about the feeling of ‘first love’ between two young children, who connect because they speak the same language – a reflection on the power of love and language.

Crew & Cast:

• Producer: Maitreya Films
• Director/Script/Editor/Camera: Ravikiran Rangaswamy
• Sound: Omkar Chanariya, Keshav Purohitd, Saptak Thakur
• Cast: Tamizh Iniyan, Akshiti Roychowdhury, Reeshabh Rawat

Link: behance.net/ravikiranclicks
Chez Nous, Maitreya, Near Sun Farm, Auroville

DISCONNECTED ECHOES

Year, Duration: 2025, 17min 48sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, Bengali/English with English subtitles
Screening: Tuesday, 20 January 2026 at CRIPA at 20:57

Synopsis:
In July 2024, filmmaker Polash was in Ladakh when communication with his family in Bangladesh was cut off due to civil unrest. This documentary captures his emotional journey and isolation, alongside stories of separation from local families he stayed with in Ladakh.

Crew & Cast:

• Producer: Auroville Film Institute
• Director/Script/Editor/Camera/Sound: Polash P K
• Cast: Polash P K, Habiba Bano, Mohd Nazir, Amma Khatun, Jahangir, Abida, Aisha, Swapna, Ajanta, Jean

Felicity Community, Old Auroville Road, Bommaiyarpalayam

EARLY YEARS IN AUROVILLE 1969-1976

Year, Duration: 2025, 9min 15sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, English
Screening: Sunday, 25 January 2026 at CRIPA at 19:05

Synopsis: Lisbeth’s journey in 1970 to Auroville from the Netherlands, told through archival photographs covering travel, arrival, life, work, the Mother, and community.

Crew:

• Producer/Director/Script/Camera: Lisbeth Nusselein
• Editor: Thiruamudhan
• Sound: Auroville Radio

Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xTsq5Xa9M5c
Madhuca Community, Auroville

ECM 2024

Year, Duration: 2024, 4min 12sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, Silent
Screening: Wednesday, 21 January 2026 at Cinema Paradiso at 19:05

Synopsis: The Endangered Craft Mela is a week-long educational program, highlighting the dignity of craftsmanship. This film distils the flavor of its atmosphere.

Crew:

• Producer/Director/Script/Editor/Camera/Sound: Nefertiti Chakrabarti

Link: https://youtu.be/BwpZ9uDFboo
Center Field Community, Auroville

FOOD PILLS

Year, Duration: 2024, 9min 26sec
Genre: Fiction
Country, Language: India, English with English subtitles
Screening: Wednesday, 21 January 2026 at Cinema Paradiso at 19:20

Synopsis: In the past, they killed the soil and polluted the water. Today, the same people control our food and lives. Many risk leaving the city and crossing the wall. Selected for the Street Movies Festival in Belgrade.

Crew & Cast:

• Director/Script/Editor/Camera: Jeremy Carroll
• Sound: Ishit Kuberkar
• Cast: Aamna Munjal, Gaurb Bose, Lili Dreikhausen

Nadukuppam, Kottakuppam

GARBAGE (MYCOP)

Year, Duration: 2024, 12min 34sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, English
Screening: Wednesday, 21 January 2026 at Cinema Paradiso at 20:36

Synopsis: The harsh realities of consumer society and its environmental impact in Auroville and Pondicherry, shown through the eyes of those whose job it is not to be oblivious.

Crew & Cast:

• Producer: Aleksei Vasilyev
• Director/Script/Editor/Camera: Anna-Maria Bakhtiarova
• Sound: Alexandr Kononov
• Cast: Sumit, Yogesh Kalaimani, Kali Borg

Saraswati House, Dana Community, Auroville

HOW WOULD ONE KNOW IF ONE FORGETS SOMETHING?

Year, Duration: 2025, 9min 19sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, Ladakhi with English subtitles
Screening: Friday, 23 January 2026 at Kalabhumi at 21:18 and Friday, 23 January 2026 at Cinema Paradiso at 20:55

Synopsis: Traces memory, change, and the passage of time in the fragile landscape of Ladakh as it drifts between its history and its accelerating transformation.

Crew:

• Producer: Auroville Film Institute
• Directors/Script/Editor/Camera: Kartik Sreenivasan, Sai Krishna L V, Stanzin Angdu
• Vocals: Tsering Sonam

Felicity Community, Old Auroville Road, Bommaiyarpalayam

IN THE LIGHT OF TIME

Year, Duration: 2025, 12min 16sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, English with English subtitles
Screening: Saturday, 24 January 2026 at Kalabhumi at 21:17 and Saturday, 24 January 2026 at Cinema Paradiso at 20:47

Synopsis: Centered on prehistoric rock art sites along the Indus and Zanskar rivers, the film is a ‘love story’ between past, present, and future.

Crew:

• Producer: Auroville Film Institute
• Directors/Script/Editor/Camera/Sound: Jahnavi Pradeep, Amogh Chauhan
• Cast: Viraf Mehta

Felicity Community, Old Auroville Road, Bommaiyarpalayam

IN THE WAKE OF THE WIND

Year, Duration: 2025, 6min 53sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, English with English subtitles
Screening: Saturday, 24 January 2026 at CRIPA at 22:22

Synopsis: An exploration of a single day in the lives of a nomadic herder community on the Changthang Plateau in Ladakh.

Crew:

• Producer/Director/Script/Editor/Camera: Pia Sukhija

Felicity Community, Old Auroville Road, Bommaiyarpalayam

INDIA TEXTILE PART 1 (ИНДИЯ. ТЕКСТИЛЬ. ЧАСТЬ 1.)

Year, Duration: 2024, 19min 7sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: Russia/India, Russian with English subtitles
Screening: Thursday, 22 January 2026 at CRIPA at 21:42

Synopsis: A masters student sets out to discover the ancient art of Indian textiles.

Crew:

• Producer: Saraswati Sereda
• Director/Script/Editor/Camera: Anna-Maria Bakhtiarova
• Sound: Vera Lipen-Joshi

Saraswati House, Dana Community, Auroville

INDIA TEXTILE PART 2 (ИНДИЯ. ТЕКСТИЛЬ. ЧАСТЬ 2)

Year, Duration: 2025, 20min 32sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: Russia/India, Russian with English subtitles
Screening: Thursday, 22 January 2026 at CRIPA at 22:02

Synopsis: A masters student sets out to discover the ancient art of Indian textiles.

Crew & Cast:

• Producer: Saraswati Sereda
• Director/Editor/Camera: Anna-Maria Bakhtiarova
• Script: Saraswati Sereda
• Cast: Saraswati Sereda, Ulaganathan, Priti, Bhavya Trivedi

Saraswati House, Dana Community, Auroville

INDYGAMA

Year, Duration: 2024, 5min 57sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, English
Screening: Thursday, 22 January 2026 at CRIPA at 22:22

Synopsis: An anagama kiln in south India draws in ceramists with its magical and organic firings.

Crew & Cast:

• Producer: Indrani Singh-Cassine
• Director/Script/Editor/Camera: Anna-Maria Bakhtiarova
• Sound: Aleksandr Kononov
• Cast: Indrani Singh-Cassime, Saraswati Sereda

Link: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=YJGmaTsFv60

IT COMES IN WAVES

Year, Duration: 2025, 3min 45sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, English
Screening: Friday, 23 January 2026 at CRIPA at 19:00

Synopsis: Shot on 16mm film, hand-developed in a basement and spliced in the mountains. A kaleidoscope of a small town in India, once colonized, now free. Screened at the Seoul International Women’s Film Festival 2025.

Crew:

• Producer/Director/Script/Editor/Sound: Nefertiti Chakrabarti
• Camera: Ayuj Consul, Tanvi Chitre, Richard Touhy, Nefertiti

Center Field Community, Auroville

KOOLI KODUTHU SOONIYAM

Year, Duration: 2023, 8min 55sec
Genre: Short
Country, Language: India, Tamil with English subtitles
Screening: Friday, 23 January 2026 at Kalabhumi at 21:27 and Friday, 23 January 2026 at Cinema Paradiso at 21:04

Synopsis: A family torn apart by the protagonist’s alcohol addiction. His wife and daughter work tirelessly in a cloth shop to bear the brunt of his actions.

Crew & Cast:

• Producer: Adhilakshmi
• Director/Script/Editor: Yatra Srinivassan
• Camera: Rajaram
• Sound: Gajadhanu
• Cast: Yatra Srinivassan, S. Kamala, S. Yuvasri, K. Mohanraj

Link: https://youtu.be/M9w7KB5neME
Yatra, Kuilapalayam

LAST DROP

Year, Duration: 2024, 7min 44sec
Genre: Fiction
Country, Language: India, Silent
Screening: Monday, 19 January 2026 at Cinema Paradiso at 21:34

Synopsis: In a drought-stricken land, a man embarks on a journey in the hope of finding the last remaining water source.

Crew & Cast:

• Producer: Rajen Parekh
• Director/Script/Editor/Camera/Sound: Jeremy Carroll
• Cast: Yatra Srinivassan

Nadukuppam, Kottakuppam

LETTER TO MOTHER

Year, Duration: 2025, 5min 23sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, Bengali with English subtitles
Screening: Sunday, 25 January 2026 at CRIPA at 19:14

Synopsis: On an evening field filled with children, Partha stands apart due to an injured leg. The film is a letter to his mother, expressing his quiet loneliness.

Crew:

• Producer: Auroville Film Institute
• Director/Script/Editor: Partha P Datta
• Camera: Santosh Manik
• Sound: Vismay Chintan

Link: https://youtu.be/bqPvPpopqkE
Felicity community, Old Auroville Road, Bommaiyarpalayam

MOMENTS OF JOY

Year, Duration: 2025, 11min 02sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, English with English subtitles
Screening: Monday, 19 January 2026 at Kalabhumi Amphitheatre at 19:39

Synopsis: A poetic journey into the mind of Ladakhi poet Padma Angmo. Her verses blend with the rhythms of nature and daily life, asking us to slow down and rediscover joy in simplicity.

Crew & Cast:

• Producer: Auroville Film Institute
• Director/Script/Editor/Camera/Sound: Santosh Manik
• Cast: Padma Angmo

Felicity Community, Old Auroville Road, Bommaiyarpalayam

MOON JUICE (CHANDER ROSH)

Year, Duration: 2025, 3min 21sec
Genre: Experimental
Country, Language: India, Bangla with English subtitles
Screening: Monday, 19 January 2026 at Kalabhumi Amphitheatre at 19:30

Synopsis: Shot on a single reel of super 8 film with no editing. Premiered at Straight 8 2025 at the British Film Institute.

Crew:

• Producers: Arnav Kakar, Krish Makhija, Nefertiti Chakrabarti
• Director/Script: Nefertiti Chakrabarti
• Camera: Krish Makhija

MORIBUND: AN ART PROJECT

Year, Duration: 2025, 5min 55sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, English
Screening: Monday, 19 January 2026 at Kalabhumi Amphitheatre at 19:33

Synopsis: Dedicated to Auroville, currently under pressure. Presents the destruction of Auroville as symbolic of environmental vandalism. Birgitta’s art reflects the crisis.

Crew & Cast:

• Producer: Birgitta Volz and Aurofilm
• Director/Script: Birgitta Volz
• Editors: Rathees, Birgitta Volz
• Camera: Rathees & Alix, Pavitra
• Sound: Shalini Shekar (vocals)
• Cast: Birgitta Volz, Visitors

Surrender Community gate 1, Auroville

MORNING STAR AUROVILLE: SUPPORTING FAMILIES THROUGH PREGNANCY, BIRTH, AND BEYOND

Year, Duration: 2024, 14min 38sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, English
Screening: Sunday, 25 January 2026 at CRIPA at 21:33

Synopsis: A health and wellness initiative in Auroville supporting families through pregnancy, birth, and early parenting, urges a cultural shift to recognize birth as a life-changing experience for the family.

Crew & Cast:

• Producer/Script: Paula Murphy
• Director/Editor: Serena Aurora
• Camera: Aurovenkatesh
• Sound: Kardash
• Cast: Gowri Dorairajan, Paula, Monique, Krishna

Link: https://youtu.be/i_-PddRnSuU

NATURE IS ALMIGHTY (இயற்கை பெரியவன்)

Year, Duration: 2024, 10min 34sec
Genre: Fiction
Country, Language: India, Tamil with English subtitles
Screening: Wednesday, 21 January 2026 at Cinema Paradiso at 19:09

Synopsis: A young man murders his mother in a rage. Haunted by guilt, he realizes that human morality is an illusion, compared to the silence of nature. A single-shot film made on a mobile phone (PG-17).

Crew & Cast:

• Producer: Rahul Dravid
• Director: Nandha Kumar
• Camera/Editor/Sound: Manoj
• Cast: Vishwa, Thirumalai Rajan

Ambedkar street, Morattandi Vanur Taluk

NEW BEST FRIENDS

Year, Duration: 2025, 2min 55sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, English
Screening: Wednesday, 21 January 2026 at Cinema Paradiso at 20:56

Synopsis: An unconventional perspective on recovery following a leg operation, designating crutches as a person’s ‘best friends’.

Crew & Cast:

• Producer/Director/Script/Editor: Birgitta Volz
• Camera: Birgitta Volz, Shanthi
• Cast: Birgitta, Shanthi, Crystal, Diego

Surrender Community gate 1, Auroville

ONCE UPON A FOREST

Year, Duration: 2024, 13min 28sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, English with English subtitles
Screening: Sunday, 25 January 2026 at CRIPA at 22:03

Synopsis: The film explores the Tropical Dry Evergreen Forest, the rarest forest type in India. Today less than 0.1 percent remains. It is a resilient environment, essential for the next generation on the Coromandel coast.

Crew & Cast:

• Producer: Auroville Botanical Gardens
• Director: Paul Blanchflower, Aurovenkatesh
• Editor/Camera: Aurovenkatesh
• Sound: Matt Littlewood, Shanks Kini
• Cast: Kathiravan Kanniyappan

Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d8e4u3joO0k

ONE SIDE OF THE ROAD

Year, Duration: 2024, 88min 2sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, Tamil/English with English subtitles
Screening: Thursday, 22 January 2026 at Cinema Paradiso at 20:17

Synopsis: A road dividing habitats in Tamil Nadu. Four Dalits reveal their struggle with debt, poor conditions in sugarcane fields, and social discrimination over three years, marked by the pandemic.

Crew:

• Producer: IRD Audiovisual
• Director/Script: Jalil Nordman
• Editor/Camera: Jeremy Carroll
• Sound: Shanks Kini, Stefano Cesca

Link: https://odriis.hypotheses.org/projects/audiovisual/one-side-of-the-road/

PROJECT WIGHTIANA

Year, Duration: 2025, 10min 02sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, English with English subtitles
Screening: Sunday, 25 January 2026 at CRIPA at 22:17

Synopsis: Follows the journey of a forgotten wild Indian coffee species – Coffea Wightiana – in the Silence Forest of Auroville. A native, climate-resilient species that may hold answers to the future of coffee.

Crew & Cast:

• Producer: Marc’s Coffee
• Director: Cheenu Wild
• Script: Marc Tormo Mir, Cheenu Wild
• Cast: Eden Uriel Tormo Mir, Agnes Mary, Deepan V

Link: https://www.instagram.com/eyeseawild/

PURNA MAHA KUMBH MELA

Year, Duration: 2025, 21min 58sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, Hindi with English subtitles
Screening: Sunday, 18 January 2026 at Kalabhumi Amphitheatre at 21:15

Synopsis: Experience the Purna Maha Kumbh Mela. A journey within.

Crew: Producer/Editor/Camera/Sound/Director: Lalit Verma

SOUND OF A LAND

Year, Duration: 2025, 13min 50sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, Hebrew/Hindi/English with English subtitles
Screening: Monday, 19 January 2026 at Cinema Paradiso at 20:09

Synopsis: A personal documentary about the unyielding feeling of being a hunted Jew. Filmed in Leh during Muharram, weaving voiceover with conversations with Israeli travellers.

Crew:

• Producer: Auroville Film Institute
• Director/Script/Editor/Camera/Sound: Yoni Vell
• Cast: David Alfandari, Avigail Karby

SOUND OF AIR

Year, Duration: 2025, 13min 30sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, English/Hindi with English subtitles
Screening: Friday, 23 January 2026 at CRIPA at 19:24

Synopsis: Explores changes to Indian classical music after the introduction of the harmonium and the relationship between the instrument maker and musicians.

Crew & Cast:

• Producer/Director/Script/Editor/Camera/Sound: Rishi Vengadesan
• Cast: Imam of Leh’s Shia mosque

Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rwuy1QIU8Qw

STANDING ALONE

Year, Duration: 2025, 74min 08sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, Tamil/English with English subtitles
Screening: Monday, 19 January 2026 at CRIPA at 20:46

Synopsis: Looks at the individual life-journeys of 6 single mothers from villages near Auroville, capturing snapshots of their perseverance and strength.

Crew & Cast:

• Producer: Last School Production, Smiti
• Director/Script/Editor/Camera: Smiti
• Sound: Agni
• Cast: Shivagami, Nalini, Selvi, Malika, Lakshmi, Radha

Link: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLIlIk1VEqYnmk4c5a8xqA4QNB-Yr6w2QK

THE COSMIC ATOMIC (BRAHMANDAM PINDANDAM)

Year, Duration: 2025, 19min 51sec
Genre: Experimental
Country, Language: India, English
Screening: Tuesday, 20 January 2026 at Kalabhumi Amphitheatre at 19:30

Synopsis: Traces the journey of civilization from the harnessing of fire through technology. An absurdist take on the purposelessness of the universe.

Crew & Cast:

• Producer: Dakshin Studios
• Director/Script/Editor/Camera: Kanchan Avchare
• Sound: Marko Bosko
• Cast: Arun Kesavan, Sidharth Radha Krishna

THE FARMING LAND

Year, Duration: 2025, 15min 10sec
Genre: Experimental Dance Film
Country, Language: India, Silent
Screening: Friday, 23 January 2026 at CRIPA at 21:22

Synopsis: A surreal meditation on the weight of being. Won ‘Outstanding Indian Debut’ at Manifest Dance Film Festival 2025.

Crew & Cast:

• Producer/Director/Script: Mukul Kumar
• Editor: Logeswaran M
• Camera: Jeremy Carroll
• Sound: Yash Pagare
• Cast: Kavi Dhruvan, T. Deva Darshan

THE MATRIMANDIR & I, EPISODE 1: FOUR PEOPLE FROM FOUR CORNERS OF THE WORLD. ONE CONNECTION.

Year, Duration: 2025, 7min 50sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, English
Screening: Wednesday, 21 January 2026 at Cinema Paradiso at 20:59

Synopsis: Four Aurovilians speak about their personal experiences with the Matrimandir.

Crew & Cast:

• Producer/Director/Script: Serena Aurora
• Editor: Shinu Satheesan
• Camera: Aurovenkatesh
• Sound: Kardash
• Cast: Aurelio, B, Lili, Mona

THE OWL-EYED GUARDIAN AND THE BANYAN DREAM

Year, Duration: 2024, 59min 13sec
Genre: Fiction
Country, Language: India, Tamil/English with English subtitles
Screening: Sunday, 18 January 2026 at CRIPA at 21:00 and Friday, 23 January 2026 at Cinema Paradiso at 19:33

Synopsis: Spiritual film, shedding light on the story of Andhayee, guardian of Auroville’s origins.

Crew:

• Producer: Inlight Productions
• Director/Script/Editor: Alessandra Silver

THE POETICS OF CHANGE

Year, Duration: 2025, 9min 44sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, Silent
Screening: Sunday, 18 January 2026 at Kalabhumi Amphitheatre at 21:47

Synopsis: Experimental narrative, exploring Ladakh as a time capsule through juxtaposed shots.

Crew:

• Producer: Auroville Film Institute
• Director/Script/Editor: Logeswaran M

TRASHY FILM (KUPPAI PADAM)

Year, Duration: 2025, 86min 4sec
Genre: Feature/Live Action/Animation
Country, Language: India, Tamil/English with English subtitles
Screening: Thursday, 22 January 2026 at Kalabhumi Amphitheatre at 20:26

Synopsis: A writer loses his laptop just before an important meeting and must race to find it with no memory of the last 12 hours.

Crew & Cast:

• Producer: Accessible Horizon Films
• Director/Script/Editor/Camera/Sound: Stanzin
• Cast: Stanzin, Sriram, Kotravai

WATER IN THE MOUNTAINS (PAHADON MEI PAANI)

Year, Duration: 2025, 12min 14sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, Hindi with English subtitles
Screening: Wednesday, 21 January 2026 at Cinema Paradiso at 21:20

Synopsis: Installing a solar pump in Spiti Valley at 13,000 feet, where natural springs are buried under frozen river beds in winter.

Crew & Cast:

• Producer/Script: Divya Kapoor
• Director/Editor/Camera/Sound: Karthik K
• Cast: Rishi Kapoor, Norbhu

WHERE IS HUMANITY? (எங்கே மனிதநேயம்?)

Year, Duration: 2024, 5min 27sec
Genre: Fiction
Country, Language: India, Tamil with English subtitles
Screening: Wednesday, 21 January 2026 at Cinema Paradiso at 19:00

Synopsis: A vlogger visits Auroville and finds a woman who teaches him that Auroville isn’t just a place, but a living question.

Crew & Cast:

• Producer: Dhanalakshmi
• Director/Script/Editor/Camera: Magheshwar Kumaran
• Sound: JaiVno
• Cast: Merline, Vishwaa Simon

WHERE’S MASI?

Year, Duration: 2025, 9min 38sec
Genre: Fiction, Horror
Country, Language: India, English with English subtitles
Screening: Sunday, 25 January 2026 at Kalabhumi Amphitheatre at 19:41

Synopsis: A homemade horror film about a young woman racing to save her friend from a sinister entity (PG-13).

Crew & Cast:

• Producer/Director/Script/Editor: Uttara Jadeja
• Camera: Rishi Vengadesan
• Sound: Niranjan Kartik
• Cast: Ahilya Bamroo

YOU LIFT ON A STROKE, THERE’S A DOG SHELTER

Year, Duration: 2025, 17min 21sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, English/Tamil with English subtitles
Screening: Friday, 23 January 2026 at Kalabhumi at 21:36 and Friday, 23 January 2026 at Cinema Paradiso at 21:13

Synopsis: A video-photo-poem documentary about the Auroville Dog Shelter and the relationship between a human and the Supreme through yoga and sadhana.

Crew:

• Producer/Director/Script/Editor/Camera/Sound: Donny Lee Duke

Films made about Auroville / the bioregion / Pondicherry

ANYTHING OR EVERYTHING COULD BE THEATRE

Year, Duration: 2025, 21min
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, English
Screening: Sunday, 18 January 2026 at CRIPA at 21:59

Synopsis: In the coastal serenity of Auroville, the 2025 Adishakti Theatre Festival unfolds as a celebration of performance, spirit, and human connection. Through the voices of visionary artists and the pulse of powerful performances, this documentary captures the soul of a festival that transcends the stage. From intimate rehearsals to electrifying acts under the open sky, we witness how theatre here is not just art – it is ritual, resistance, and revelation. Set against the lush landscapes and vibrant community of Adishakti, the film invites you to experience a journey where boundaries dissolve, stories breathe, and the stage becomes the universe of our shared humanity.

Crew:

• Producer: Adishakti Laboratory for Theatre Art Research
• Director/Script/Editor/Camera: Divya Mani
• Sound: Savfk Music (YouTube), Kabbalistic_Village (Pixabay), “So Ja Re” by Mallika Taneja
• Cast: Nimmy Raphel, Vinay Kumar, Vishwakiran Nambi, Mallika Taneja, Smita Bellur, Saz Sadiq Asin Zakir, Sooraj Shahji, Kiyomi Mehta, Ashiqa Salvan
• Additional crew: Adishakti Theatre Team

AN AFTERNOON WITH DAS ANNA

Year, Duration: 2025, 6min 02sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, Silent
Screening: Tuesday, 20 January 2026 at CRIPA at 19:05

Synopsis: Set in the streets of Auroville, the City of Dawn, this no-dialogue documentary spends an afternoon with Das, a quiet cobbler whose daily rituals unfold effortlessly into the rhythm of the street. His small, foldable shop sits tucked into a corner, barely noticeable yet always present. The film lingers on stillness and repetition, finding meaning in the quiet, everyday moments that often pass unseen.

Crew:

• Producer: Auroville Film Institute
• Director/Script/Editor/Camera/Sound: Pia Sukhija
• Cast: Das Anna

BLOOMING HOUR (மலரும் நேரம்)

Year, Duration: 2025, 14min 10sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, Tamil with English subtitles
Screening: Tuesday, 20 January 2026 at CRIPA at 21:15

Synopsis: Trust brewing between the morning birds and the man who recently began feeding them.

Crew:

• Producer: Auroville Film Institute
• Director/Script/Editor/Camera/Sound: Logeswaran M

EARTH-CHITECTURE: BUILDING WITH MUD

Year, Duration: 2024, 10min 40sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, English
Screening: Wednesday, 21 January 2026 at CRIPA at 19:00

Synopsis: Demonstrations on how to make CSEB and ferro cement for buildings.

Crew:

• Producer/Director/Script/Editor/Camera/Sound: Sampriti Roy
• Cast: Ayyappan, Radhika, Satprem

NOTES FOR THE SELF

Year, Duration: 2025, 10min 25sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, English/Tamil with English subtitles
Screening: Tuesday, 20 January 2026 at Cinema Paradiso at 19:00

Synopsis: Portrait of the filmmaker’s mother during a visit to Auroville.

Crew:

• Producer: Auroville Film Institute
• Script/Editor/Camera/Sound: Jahnavi Pradeep

REFLEKT

Year, Duration: 2025, 11min 08sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, English with English subtitles
Screening: Sunday, 25 January 2026 at Kalabhumi Amphitheatre at 19:30

Synopsis: Chronicles a filmmaking residency at the Auroville Film Institute.

Crew:

• Producer: Auroville Film Institute
• Director/Script/Editor/Camera/Sound: Santosh Manik

THE WAVES WILL NEVER STOP

Year, Duration: 2025, 10min 29sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: India, Tamil with English subtitles
Screening: Sunday, 18 January 2026 at Kalabhumi Amphitheatre at 21:37

Synopsis: Fisherman Narayanan carries memories of the 2004 Tsunami that shattered his village.

Crew:

• Producer: Auroville Film Institute
• Directors/Script/Editor/Camera: Kartik Sreenivasan, Sai Krishna L V, Sanjana Reddy

WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE?

Year, Duration: 2025, 64min 55sec
Genre: Documentary
Country, Language: Canada, English
Screening: Tuesday, 20 January 2026 at CRIPA at 21:29

Synopsis: Inspired by Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, asking what global crises are asking of us.

Crew:

• Producers/Directors/Editors: Alan Baiss, Joseh Garcia

Ashavari Majumdar a.k.a Vajrasara is the co-founder and Director of the MANIFEST Dance-Film Festival, India . She is an artist trained in classical dance and literary criticism and works across movement, text and image in different genres including . Ashavari’s current interest is the Asian dance-film. https://auroapaar.org/

T. Balasaravanan is an academic, theatre, and media professional with over thirty years of practical industry experience. His career encompasses over 100 stage productions as both a Lighting Designer and Director, as well as 15 years of experience as a professional Video Editor. His theatrical plays and edited documentary films have been showcased at national and international festivals.

Rajeev Shankar is a documentary filmmaker and photographer born and raised in Auroville, India. Rajeev began his storytelling journey at age 16 as a photographer. Rajeev’s creative work has now evolved toward filmmaking, where he focuses on real stories, real people, and highlighting stories often left untold. His visual background in photography continues to shape his cinematic style, blending striking imagery with intimate storytelling.

Gita While my long-ago academic background focused on French and culture studies, my world-of-work experience has been primarily in education and the social sector, in the USA, Haiti, France and India. Over the last five years in Auroville, I have worked as an educator with Future School and a writer / editor at Auroville Today Magazine.

Nitzan holds a MSc in Human Decision Science and has worked in research, entrepreneurship, and innovation for over a decade. Her experience includes founding tech startups, consulting on European R&D projects, and teaching in India. She now focuses on education and youth programs in Auroville. 

Synopsis

A friendship walks the distance between life and death in Nilesh Maniyar and Shonali Bose’s film. Loved ones pour in from different parts of the world to raise one last toast with Chika Kapadia, who has an appointment at Dignitas for physician assisted suicide in the coming week, having chosen not to be tied to tubes and wires in his last moments. A filmmaker friend tasked with shooting Chika’s countdown to death records her own feelings, weaving a tale of dignity in death through the lens of friendship. Ironically, the locale is beautiful Switzerland – the backdrop of many a blockbuster Indian film.

Festival Highlights

Screened at 7 festivals, among which the Busan International Film Festival 2024 (premiere) and the Los Angeles Asia Pacific Film Festival 2025. Awarded at the New York Indian Film Festival 2025.

Crew

• Producers/Directors: Shonali Bose, Nilesh Maniyar
• Editor: Tushar Ghogale
• Sound Designer: Resul Pookutty
• Composer: Tuomas Kantelinen

Synopsis

At just 6 years of age, Tibetan Kunsang found himself in a foreign country, living in an orphanage as both an orphan and a refugee. 30 years later, Kunsang shares his story of life living in exile. Set amongst the backdrop of the Himalayas in Northern India, this inspiring story captures the heart and spirit of Tibetan culture, sharing wisdom for overcoming the past, living for others, and creating a brighter future.

Crew

• Producer/Director/Writer: Zorba

Synopsis

Set in Equatorial Africa, in the heart of the Congo Basin, Afrotopia follows Ezekiel, a 25-year-old aspiring filmmaker who lives under the authority of his father, Maurice, a powerful businessman who opposes his artistic ambitions. Facing financial hardship, Ezekiel is forced to join the family logging business. Sent on a mission, he discovers that Maurice plans to exploit a sacred forest, the last refuge of an indigenous community. As he uncovers a buried colonial-era family tragedy, Ezekiel must choose between loyalty, personal freedom, and the fate of his people.

Crew & Cast

• Producer: David Mboussou
• Director: David Mboussou
• Writers: Olivier Messa, Nick Hella, David Mboussou
• Cast: Tiss Warren Mombo, Marcel Sandja, Jean-Claude M’Paka

Links

• Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fo6yW7OPBbE
• Website: https://www.mavikanaproductions.com/en

Agent of Happiness

Synopsis

Amber is one of the many agents working for the Bhutanese government to measure people’s happiness levels among the remote Himalayan mountains. The film offers a unique take on the notoriously exoticized Bhutan and its unusual happiness policy. We follow Amber as he investigates various expressions of contentment, while navigating his own struggle as a Nepali minority. The holistic philosophy at the heart of the survey he conducts challenges conventional metrics of fulfillment. The film is a heartfelt exploration of happiness in the face of adversity as Amber grapples with societal disparities and personal roadblocks, while searching for love.

Festival Highlights

Screened at Sundance

Crew & Links

• Producers: Arun Bhattarai, Máté Artur Vincze, Noémi Veronika Szakonyi
• Directors: Arun Bhattarai, Dorottya Zurbó
• Distributor: Cinephil
• Website: https://www.cinephil.com/film/agent-of-happiness

Aloha Aina

Synopsis

When Jamaica Heolimeleikalani Osorio was a teenager, slam poetry gave her an outlet and a platform to educate audiences about the history of Hawaii’s colonization. Today, her poetry is focused on protecting sacred sites and working to create a future for the next generations of Native Hawaiians rooted in an embodied understanding of Aloha Aina – ‘love for and of the land.’ Challenging linear and reductive conceptions of history, this film dismantles fantasies of Hawaii as a tourist’s playground, calling us instead toward a recognition of what’s possible when we live in loving relationship with the land, and with each other.

Crew

• Producers: Adam Loften, Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee, Devin Tellatin
• Directors: Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee, Adam Loften
• Director of Photography: Jeremy Seifert
• Editor: Adam Loften

And, Towards Happy Alleys

Synopsis

A passionate declaration of love for the cinema and poetry of Iran, which also offers a frank view of the precarious situation for critics of the regime and shows the uncompromising daily struggle of Iranian women against their oppression.

Festival Highlights

Screened at 6 festivals, including the 2023 Berlinale International Film Festival (premiere) and the 2023 MAMI Mumbai Film Festival. Awarded at the 2023 Buenos Aires Festival Internacional de Cine Independente.

Crew & Cast

• Producer: Sreemoyee Singh, Hussain Currimbhoy
• Director/Writer: Sreemoyee Singh
• Distributor: AFF Distribution, Worldwide, Theatrical
• Cast: Jafar Panahi, Aida, Mohammad Shirvani, Jinous Nazokhar

Links

• Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OLJy6bOTsKQ
• Website: https://happyalleyfilms.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/towardshappyalleys/

Ballad Of The Mountain

Synopsis

An outcast girl must fight the bullies and overcome her fears to pursue her ambition to fly to the other side of the mountain.

Festival Highlights (Selected Awards)

Screened and awarded at 6 festivals, including the Smile International Film Festival for Children & Youth in New Delhi, the Chicago Southland International Short Film Festival and the Eichsfelder Film Festival in Germany.

Crew & Cast

• Producers: Tarun Jain, Nasira Khan, Sudha Jain, Naresh Jain
• Director: Tarun Jain
• Writers: Tarun Jain, Nasira Khan, Abhijeet Phartiyal
• Cast: Diya Bisht, Kavyanjali Bisht

Links

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tar.jain/

Breaking Language (Romper El Español)

Synopsis

Merging Argentinian Sign Language, dance, and documentary, Breaking Language presents the perspectives of four Deaf artists as they examine ideas of identity and resistance within a cultural and linguistic minority, the need for poetic and artistic creation in one’s own language, and the importance of feminism within the Deaf community.

Crew & Cast

• Producers: Gonzalo Castro, Sofía Castro
• Director: Sofia Castro
• Cinematography: Nacho Aveillé
• Original Music: Mariano Moreira, Tomás Aiello
• Editor: Eric Bernardo
• Cast: Maruvic Babino, Rosa Trueno, Lucía Fauve, Milagros Cardoso

Links

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/scastrosofia/

Connection (Bailanysh)

Synopsis

The funeral of old man Meken is taking place in a distant mountain village. His brother and his nephew invite the grandson of the deceased Kelechek to his funeral, since Meken’s son is in America. With the arrival of the grandson, everyone understands that this was not a very good idea.

Crew & Cast

• Producer/Director/Writer: Zhandos Dzholdoshov
• Cast: Ulanbek Sultangaziyev, Asan Amanov, Kurmanbek Mamyrov

Cricket Dreams

Synopsis

Cricket Dreams is the inspiring story of nine former street-connected children from Delhi, who seize a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to compete in the Street Child Cricket World Cup in Chennai, India. They experience things they never thought possible, discover parts of India they’ve never seen, and forge friendships with children from around the globe. Through the cricket tournament, an arts program, and a conference on child rights, they gain a platform to raise their voices and advocate for other street-connected children worldwide.

Festival Highlights

Screened and received mentions at the Delhi International Film Festival and the Beausoleil Côte d’Azur International FICTS Festival in France.

Crew & Links

• Producers: Conrad Alleblas, Jamillah van der Hulst
• Director: Jamillah van der Hulst
• Trailer: https://vimeo.com/1029960312
• Website: https://jajafilmproductions.com/portfolio-item/cricket-dreams/

Dear Beautiful Beloved

Synopsis

There is a war going on in Europe. Our neighbors are fleeing from death and destruction. Dear Beautiful Beloved will give a face to some of their stories. The film asks: What is it like to escape a war? What will be lost forever? What cannot be taken from a person?

Crew & Links

• Producers: Thomas Herberth, Florian Brüning
• Director/Writer: Juri Rechinsky
• Cinematographer: Serhiy Stetsenko
• Editing: Andrea Wagner
• Website: https://www.horseandfruits.com/portfolio/dear-beautiful-beloved/

Dear Daughter

Synopsis

A young Burmese woman who was trafficked to China and sold into marriage tells her story. Based on the real-life protagonist’s own words and beautifully rendered in pen-and-ink, this animation portrays a woman torn between her love for the child she was forced to bear and her longing for the country to which she may never be able to return.

Don Benjamín

Synopsis

For Don Benjamín, the jungle has always been God, life, food, health, beauty and tradition. Now, the world in which he built a home for his family turns to smoke and ashes. This film is a journey both raw and poetic through a magical region in danger: the Bolivian Amazon.

Crew

• Producers: Iván Zahinos, Francesc Álvarez
• Director/Writer: Iván Zahinos

Farming The Revolution

Synopsis

In 2020 Gurbaz Sangha, a young Punjabi farmer led thousands to Delhi protesting new Farm Laws. Joined by over half a million from diverse backgrounds they remained at borders despite COVID lockdown vowing to stay until laws were repealed.

Festival Highlights

Screened at three festivals among which the Sheffield Docfest 2024 in England. Awarded at Hot Docs 2024 in Toronto and at the IDSFF in Thiruvanthapuram.

Crew

• Producer/Director/Writer: Nishtha Jain
• Sales Agent: Cinephil (Worldwide)

Free Words: A Poet From Ghaza

Synopsis

Free Words follows Pulitzer-winner Mosab Abu Toha, a detained poet from Ghaza whose art becomes a powerful voice of resistance and hope amid oppression.

Crew & Cast

• Producer/Director/Writer: Abdullah Harun Ilhan
• Executive Producer: Aslıhan Eker Çakmak
• Cast: Mosab Abu Toha

Gingerbread For Her Dad

Synopsis

85-year-old Lyabiba doesn’t remember her father, who died in World War II. Her daughter and granddaughter decide to find the mass grave in Poland where he was buried. The journey confronts post-colonial Soviet traumas and a search for lost identity.

Festival Highlights

Screened at Busan and Torino. Awarded at Iranian Documentary Film Festival and Bastau International Film Festival.

Crew & Cast

• Director/Writer: Alina Mustafina
• Cast: Alissa Mustafina, Lyabiba Sermukhamedova

Links

• Website: http://uvent.kz/gingerbread
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/gingerbread_for_her_dad/

Go My Way (Yo Voy Conmigo)

Synopsis

Elisa likes Martin, but Martin doesn’t seem to realise it. All the advice Elisa receives to make Martin fall in love with her is to change not only her appearance, but also who she really is. Will she give up being herself to get what she wants?

Crew & Cast

• Director/Writer: Chelo Loureiro
• Cast: Ana Portela, Uxía Castro

Goodbye Julia

Synopsis

Wracked by guilt after covering up a murder, Mona – a northern Sudanese retired singer in a tense marriage – tries to make amends by taking in the deceased’s southern Sudanese widow, Julia, into her home. Unaware that the country’s turmoil may find its way into her home and put her face to face with her sins.

Festival Highlights

Awarded at the 2023 Cannes Film Festival.

Crew

• Producer: Amjad Abu Alala
• Director/Writer: Mohamed Kordofani

Green SuperHeroes 2030

Synopsis

A group of 10 young environmentalists changing the world for the better. Their powers make the planet greener.

Crew & Links

• Producers/Director/Writer: Los Angeles Barea
• Website: https://www.greensuperheroesfilm.org
• Instagram: @green_superheroes_2030

Ground Zero: Self-portrait Of An Ocean Abuser

Synopsis

Ground Zero invites us to become aware of the problem of pollution in the oceans and the conflict it generates within us. It tries to make us reflect on our responsibility with the aim of helping us improve our commitment with small gestures.

Crew & Cast

• Director/Writer: David Gaspar
• Cast: David Gaspar, Elsa Punset, Manu San Félix

H2O My Love

Synopsis

Is it reasonable to fall in love during the end of the world? Alice and Simon meet as the water war rages.

Crew & Cast

• Director/Writer: Laëtitia Martinoni
• Cast: Chryssa Florou, Mehdi Djaadi

Hausnummer Null

Synopsis

Chris lives with his buddy Alex at a suburban train station. A heroin addiction determines his everyday life. The film explores how a young man can find his place in society when he hasn’t fitted in anywhere since childhood.

Festival Highlights

Awarded at DOK.fest Munich and Achtung Berlin.

Crew & Links

• Director/Writer: Lilith Kugler
• Website: https://www.hausnummernull.de/

I Stole Your Ashes (He Robado Tus Cenizas)

Synopsis

Isabel takes refuge in a park to say goodbye to the love of her life, her wife, while remembering their story and reflecting on loss. Based on the presumption of heterosexuality, this story is a mirror of love and loss.

Crew & Cast

• Director/Writer: Felipe Olaya
• Cast: Isabel Ordaz, Clara Sans

If (Jodi)

Synopsis

An arranged marriage tears a lesbian couple apart, but with a mother’s love, perhaps another future is possible.

Festival Highlights

Premiered at BFI Flare. Awarded at 8 festivals including Toulouse Indian Film Festival.

Crew & Cast

• Director: Tathagata Ghosh
• Cast: Adrija Majumdar, Shivamrita Chakraborty

In The Name Of

Synopsis

In a village town, two elderly men find themselves at a bus stop, their routine interrupted by a sudden event nearby. Their unexpected response leaves a profound impact that transcends the ordinary.

Crew & Cast

• Producer/Director/Writer: Rizwan Hussain
• Cast: Chinnaiya PV, Sundar, Ganesh K

In Ultimo

Synopsis

Claudio Ritossa is a palliative care physician with a passion for plant care. His devotion to gardening parallels his work caring for the terminally ill, restoring the naturalness of our journey on Earth.

Crew & Links

• Director/Writer: Mario Balsamo
• Website: https://lasarraz.com/

Invisible Windows (Adrishya Jalakangal)

Synopsis

A young man released from a mental asylum returns to an abandoned goods station. He starts experiencing strange things: in the night, the dead bodies in the morgue come alive and talk to him about their hopes and death.

Festival Highlights

Screened at Tallinn Blacknights. Awarded at Fantasporto.

Crew & Cast

• Director/Writer: Dr Bijukumar Damodaran
• Cast: Tovino Thomas, Nimisha Sajayan

Junks and Dolls

Synopsis

A couple is destined to build up their life in the heart of a waste depot in the Iranian north forests. They begin to make things with junk but must face the consequences of fighting their nature.

Crew & Cast

• Director: Manijeh Hekmat
• Cast: Behdokht Valian, Mohammad Valizadegan

Last Resort (Chareh)

Synopsis

An Iranian mother must find the will to change her destiny to be able to obtain custody of her daughter.

Crew & Cast

• Producer/Director/Writer: Samiramis Kia
• Cast: Leyla Shoghi, Hamid Sadri

My Comrade (Amar Comrade)

Synopsis

When a wounded rebel accidentally takes refuge in the home of a tribal villager, both men’s lives spiral into a tense interplay of politics and forbidden love.

Crew & Cast

• Director: Tathagata Ghosh
• Cast: Sounak Kundu, Aratrick Bhadra

No Other Land

Synopsis

Recorded between 2019 and 2023, the film shows the destruction of a Falasteen community in the occupied West Bank resisting forced displacement. This movie won more than 40 international awards.

Crew & Cast

• Directors: Basel Adra, Hamdan Ballal, Yuval Abraham, Rachel Szor
• Cast: Yuval Abraham, Basel Adra

Orain

Synopsis

Sara makes a documentary about a special education school. Through crazy situations and the help of the kids, she learns the importance of living in the present.

Crew & Cast

• Director: Ainara Oto Barberena
• Cast: Clara Galle, Tomy Aguilera

Patrol

Synopsis

Indigenous rangers join forces with conservationists to expose illegal cattle ranchers decimating rainforests in Central America.

Links

• Website: http://patrolmovie.com/
• Instagram: @patrolthemovie

Puffling

Synopsis

Birta and Selma rescue young puffins that get lost following city lights instead of the moon. A coming-of-age story of young adults and nature.

Crew

• Director: Jessica Bishopp
• Cinematographer: Anna MacDonald

Purga

Synopsis

Winter, 1942. Deported people struggle to survive on a remote island in the Laptev Sea. Based on memories of those who survived Soviet cruelty.

Links

• Website: http://www.purga.it

Pushpa Ka Rickshaw

Synopsis

Pushpa Didi breaks stereotypes by driving an e-rickshaw in central India, gaining a new identity and providing essential transport for her village.

Crew

• Director: Aajad Singh Khichi

Sunday

Synopsis

An elderly couple resists their sons’ plans to demolish their old home for a new one, creating a conflict between tradition and progress.

Crew & Cast

• Director/Writer: Shokir Kholikov
• Cast: Abdurakhmon Yusufaliyev

The Companions (La Compañía)

Synopsis

A young couple walks down the street for dinner. A crowd gathers around something unexpected.

Crew & Cast

• Director/Writer: José María Flores
• Cast: Alberto Amarilla, Elisabeth Larena

The First Film

Synopsis

In 1960s India, a 14-year-old embarks on a quest to watch her first film in a town where cinema is forbidden for women.

Crew & Cast

• Director/Editor/Writer: Piyush Thakur
• Cast: Priyanka Beriya, Vasudev Nishad

The Nightingale’s Song

Synopsis

Folk singer Sam Lee joins the elusive nightingale in mutual song, exploring a relationship of stewardship and love with the living world.

Crew

• Directors: Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee, Adam Loften

The Strange Case Of The Human Cannonball

Synopsis

A mysterious stranger is found in a village of only six residents. They must decide what to do before he awakens.

Links

• Website: inquietofilms.com

The Voice Of Others (La Voix Des Autres)

Synopsis

Rim is a Tunisian interpreter working on asylum procedures in France. Translating the stories of exiled people raises questions about her own history.

Festival Highlights

Awarded at the 2023 Cannes Film Festival.

Crew & Cast

• Director: Fatima Kaci
• Cast: Amira Chebli, Siham Eldawos

The Wait

Synopsis

Mzu tries to help an elderly man waiting at a police station, facing resistance from a stifling bureaucratic system. An allegory of powerlessness and hope in South Africa.

Crew & Cast

• Director/Writer: Imran Hamdulay
• Cast: Siya Mayola, Cedwyn Joel

Village Rockstars 2

Synopsis

A teenage girl in Assam passionate about music embarks on a journey to rediscover the connection between music and life amidst harsh realities.

Festival Highlights

Screened at Berlinale. Awarded at Busan.

Crew & Cast

• Director/Writer: Rima Das
• Cast: Bhanita Das, Basanti Das

Where Trees Weep (Donde Se Quejan Los Pinos)

Synopsis

A rural community wakes up to a crime scene. A series of events reveals the conflicts that preceded the event in the forest.

Crew & Cast

• Director: Ed Antoja
• Cast: Ramón Barea, Almudena Amor

Why (Чому)

Synopsis

Consists of a series of questions: Why this war? Why are they shooting at us? Why humiliate us? Why erase everything?

Crew

• Director/Writer: Natxo Leuza Fernandez

Wisdom Of Happiness

Synopsis

A cinematic exploration of the Dalai Lama’s innermost world, inviting the audience to the source of happiness and compassion.

Crew & Cast

• Director: Barbara Miller, Philip Delaquis
• Cast: Dalai Lama

Links

• Website: autlookfilms.com/wisdom-of-happiness

Submissions 2025/26 closed now!

Join us for the 9th edition of the Auroville Film Festival! We invite filmmakers to share their stories in the following categories:

• Local Voices: Films made by Aurovilians and residents of the Auroville bioregion (including Pondicherry)
• Regional Perspectives: Films about Auroville or the bioregion (including Pondicherry)
• Youth Filmmakers: Films by school students (under 17) from Auroville or the bioregion

Eligibility:
• Films completed on or after May 1, 2023
• Maximum running time: 30 minutes

Deadlines:

• Local, Regional & Youth Categories: August 15, 2025
• International “Human Unity” Category (via FilmFreeway): July 31, 2025

Held since 2009, the Auroville Film Festival is a biennial event devoted to cinema, and stands as one of the highlights of Auroville’s cultural life. It aims to further the aspiration of human unity on which Auroville was founded, by connecting with people and cultures both within and beyond it.

Expressing the non-competitive spirit of Auroville and its aspiration for harmonious growth, winning filmmakers were awarded saplings ready to plant rather than trophies. Following the conclusion ceremony in which the jury’s selections were announced, the event ended on a joyful note with a lively concert by two Auroville groups – Sound Mirage and Ronny’s Band – who moved the audience to dance to classic rock and reggae anthems by artists such as the Rolling Stones, Bob Marley and Deep Purple.

For the International category of “films that develop the theme of human unity”, the judges accorded twin Wisdom Awards to ‘Aware: Glimpses of Consciousness’ by Frauke Sandig and Eric Black and to Shaunak Sen’s All That Breathes. The documentaries, coming from Germany and India respectively, were noted as exploring the interconnectedness between all life forms, and the close ways in which humans are related to their environment.

Jury Awards were conferred on Elizabeth D Costa’s ‘Bangla Surf Girls’ and Anam Abbas’s ‘This Stained Dawn’, films featuring strong women struggling for emancipation and self-definition on the beaches of Bangladesh and in Pakistan’s maidans. The two films were inspiring for their depiction of the energy of a subcontinent’s youth striving for a better future.

The Cinema Paradiso Award for Human Unity went to Kaushal Oza’s ‘The Miniaturist of Junagadh’, a moody short starring unforgettable Naseeruddin Shah in an adaptation of Stefan Zweig’s acclaimed novella ‘The Invisible Collection’ to a household during the time of the 1947 partition. The brooding, poetic story was noted by the jury as leaving a sense of “Nambikai” – hope or trust in Tamil – in terms of the possibility for a meaningful human connection across cultural and religious lines.

The Auroville Film Festival is noted for shining a light on life in the international township itself as well as its bioregion, which encompasses a coastal area of northern Tamil Nadu and the city of Pondicherry. In the category of “films made by Aurovilians, bioregion residents and guests of Auroville”, the Cinema Paradiso Award was given to Sugumar Shanmugam for ‘Thirai Virutham’, an in-depth exploration of the folk performing art Therukkoothu practiced in the area since time immemorial.

Serena Aurora’s short, ‘When Goupi Met the Mother Mira Alfassa (Founder of Auroville) and Found Home’, earned the Jury Award for its heartwarming portrayal of an early Aurovilian. Comfortably seated in a lotus posture, French-born Goupi resembles a smooth-headed monk who, even into old age, remains as radiant as ever. A series of old photographs serve him to reflect on the remarkable encounters which surrounded his fateful journey from France to Pondicherry in 1966.

Meanwhile, the Wisdom Award went to Michèle Decoust’s documentary, ‘The Path of the 12 Petals: Shanta, an Initiatic Journey’, for its study of an Auroville artist’s journey of self-discovery in the light of Alfassa’s teachings and budding community. The Mongbra Award was accorded to Valentina Beatriz’s dance short, Fallin’, depicting the dynamic use of the body to illustrate the experience of falling in love.

The jury also favourably noted Saumya Srivastava’s ‘Kolam’, an experimental art film revealing Auroville’s hidden beauty via slow-motion photography, and Mélusine Schellenberger’s premiere, Meat the Vegan, a student film inquiring into an alternative dietary lifestyle.

The highlight of this year’s edition has been the Question and Answer sessions conducted in the afternoons with most participating filmmakers following the screening of their submissions. The directors appreciated the possibility to interact over conference call with fellow creators across the world, delving into their inspiration and creative process.

An independent event, the Auroville Film Festival prides itself on remaining non-commercial, and Auroville looks forward to continuing this tradition in its next edition to be scheduled for early 2026.

—

by Daniel

International category of “films that develop the theme of human unity”

Wisdom Awards:

Aware: Glimpses of Consciousness by Frauke Sandig and Eric Black

All That Breathes by Shaunak Sen

Both the movies stand out for their brilliant expressions of the meaning of the connections between all forms of life which penetrate deeper into the layers of human unity. Though both the movies are documentaries, a very specific style of filmmaking adopted by the filmmakers helps bring the authenticity of the stories, people, context and so on. While the cinematography and background score of Aware: Glimpses of Consciousness takes us into the vastness of life, the film All that Breathes connects us with the nuances of life.

Jury Awards:

Bangla Surf Girls by Elizabeth D Costa

This Stained Dawn by Anam Abbas

These two documentaries, each lasting an hour and a half, complement each other in their expression of human unity. These two films speak to us of emancipation, emancipation of oneself but also emancipation of others. We have the right to see our aspirations implemented. When we saw these two films, one phrase came to mind: “Femmes d’avenir”. The women of the future. In both films, we see women standing up to win their freedom, their right to dream, to be inspired, to be creative.

Cinema Paradiso Award

The Miniaturist of Junagadh by Kaushal Oza

This fiction movie, through its brilliant acting, sharp and poetic script full of layers and metaphors, unraveled one’s perception and imagination. It took us on a journey back in time in a seamless and gentle way bringing us into the context of households during the 1947 partition. It left us with a message of faith and hope. Hope, that despite our differences, whether cultural, religious, and whichever other label or belief it may be, that we can connect through something deeper: through poetry, through art, through creation, through emotion, through our humanity. The word that sprang to mind was Nambikai (Hope/Trust in Tamil)

Category of “films made by Aurovilians, bioregion residents and guests of Auroville”:

Cinema Paradiso Award:

Thirai Virutham by Sugumar Shanmugam

For narrating his personal journey with the art that has a long history and his deep rooted passion for this art “Therukoothu”.

Wisdom Award:

The Path of the 12 Petals: Shanta, an Initiatic Journey by Michèle Decoust

For taking the audience on Shanta’s self exploratory journey that is never ending and filled with growth, learning, challenges and creativity.

Jury Award:

When Goupi Met the Mother Mira Alfassa (Founder of Auroville) and Found Home by Serena Aurora

For its simplicity and for capturing the quote of Lao Tzu, “Journey of a thousand miles begins with one step”.

Mongbra Award:

Fallin’ by Valentina Beatriz

For an aesthetically alluring dance short depicting the dynamic use of body, energy, space and time.

Jury Mentions:

Kolam by Saumya Srivastava

Meat the Vegan by Mélusine Schellenberger

We open with the film “Kolam”, which is resounding, except it has little to no sound. It is a visual escapade. From the opening shot, it is sharply searing and visually-appealing, in slow-motion, in fast-forward and in close-ups. Gives one a totally alternative perspective on the people, artifacts and places of Auroville. It also captures an essence that usual, more commonplace cinematography cannot encapsulate.

The look of curiosity in a child’s eyes, the warmth in a baby caressing a puppy, workers dyeing cloth blue, are given a hyperaware sentience, even, in this astounding film. And so, it is with all the beloved places we know in Auroville from Matrimandir to Savitri Bhavan and so forth.

In the filmmakers’ discussion, we had some rousing conversations. The first movie to come up was “The Cloud and the Man”. The producer and director unraveled the film for us, it’s about a middle-aged lonely man who falls in love with a cloud. He wants to have his own life in a very regulated life,. Sounds familiar? Well, yes, the best of us have had our backs-to-the-wall, in a society that constantly wants to define us, to label us, to make us what it wants to make of us, call it persona/personality—I don’t care. That much of our lives is spent in the futility of trying to find our own Selves, while society wants to farm us in narrow little plantations; economical, socio-cultural, even demographic. That we have to find love to escape the labeling, defining, whether the love be of a cloud, or nature itself. To fully give in and up oneself to something outside of ourselves. To be as the man, a total misfit. For some of us, the relationships of the narrow and confined, juss ain’t good ‘nuff.

What then constitutes an identity? I think, for any question of identity there must be not only personhood, but subjectivity and agency…all of which can be aroused through loving. We are all looking for our own cloud. I mean to love is to resuscitate, to invigorate, to expand, to burgeon. Dude, I want my cloud!

By Gautam Emani

The city of Buenos Aires has been summoned to court to respond to accusations of abusing someone’s rights. On Argentina’s other side, another city – Mendoza – also seems to overlook the fact that every person has the rights to freedom, a life free from torture, mistreatment or isolated captivity. This is because not every person is human – such is the case made on behalf of Sandra the orangutan and Cecilia the chimpanzee.

It would not be the first time that legal definitions of rights have been amended, argue the revolutionary lawyers. In the not so distant past, debates raged over womens’ rights to vote and own property, and whether visible minorities such as Native Americans were human or had souls. Those debates are now past controversy. Says one campaigner: “We are evolutionists and we will not stop until the last cage is empty.”

Held for decades in inadequate conditions in zoos, mammals such as the great apes, bears and many more show apathy and depression. Many are ill and overweight, and held in isolation, where the only social behaviour they exhibit is asking for food. Apes who are accustomed to trees as an essential part of their natural environment are kept in cages with artificial poles for fear that a real tree would be used to escape.

For Proyecto Gran Simio (Great Ape Project), expanding the legal definition of personhood is a means of providing dignified lives to great apes such as Sandra and Cecilia who, unable to return to their natural habitat, would be happier in spacious wildlife sanctuaries designed by animal welfare experts rather than businessmen. But animals should not be bred in zoos to begin with, and the activists aim to preserve the natural habitats of great apes from destruction – which would naturally have consequences for the legal rights of aboriginal peoples on their land, so often pillaged and encroached upon.

Will human unity remain restricted to Homo Sapiens, or can dignity and freedom be extended to nonhuman animals? This is the question posed by Persona (no) Humana.

The character Iniyan, in the film “Iniyan”is the narrator’s link, and so our link, to an ancient civilization, now submerged in the Indian Ocean. What makes this civilization crucial and important is that it encapsulates Auroville’s credo—a place of human unity, of complete unity in diversity.

The film is an allegory. The director leads us into the story by setting up Iniyan’s character and the culture he represents. He represents History before History. He is of the ‘Amman’: a fertility cult with an agricultural tradition. To follow them would be to understand the symbols, archetypes and rituals of the ancient civilization.

Iniyan is the guide, the link, to a civilization of which we do not even know the alphabet. “Precious earth-moments when even evolution holds its breath.” The remnant descendants of the civilization stand separate from cultural, religious and caste systems…they remain aloof from it.

So, it is alluded that we are taken on this journey…with “a spirit of adventure, which grows and builds…an alchemical vessel to liberate the molten gold in the cells of man and in the atoms of matter…a house of transformation.”

This brilliant adventure ends by coming back to the beginning, a trope for the cyclical nature of History, which is about the continent that is now submerged. And yet, it has found a new home in Auroville, a new home for human unity.

The filmmaker panel discussion in the evening was a splendid occurrence, because three seemingly disparate documentaries found a commonality. The first documentary, “12 Petals” was of the spiritual exploration to design the Matrimandir. The second “Solidarity Crime” was about migrants in Europe. The third one was “Judges Under Pressure” where the Polish government has been undermining judicial independence.

The spiritual and the political found an agreement, for shouldn’t the two go about improving the lives of those involved? That going inward, spiritually, is filling a need to create dynamic compassion, which is what providing humanitarian aid to migrants, and canvassing and organizing for judicial autonomy are about anyway?

Also, I found a dynamism in each of the speakers as personalities. Juan from “Solidarity Crime” had a chatty effervescent energy, Kacper of “Judges…” had an erudite charm, holding back just that tad bit, and Michele of “12 Petals” had a warmth, and a keen sense of tying up things together which I felt helped the audience (especially at the end) create a shared space. I mean, she was talking of synchronicities, so…

Today was the screening of what I felt was my favourite documentary so far: Aware: Glimpses of Consciousness. The premises were “What is life?”, “What is consciousness?”, “What does it mean to be aware of being aware?” The conversation, the multiple frames-of-reference, the perspectives were of a Mayan healer from Chiapas, Mexico; a plant expert from Sydney, Australia; a neuroscientist; A psychedelic assisted therapy researcher from John Hopkins (I actually almost participated with their psilocybin study in Baltimore), and a Buddhist monk.

I felt there was a general tendency to ask questions more than finding solutions, given the nature of consciousness as not only on the fringes and the frontier of science, but the fact that questions arise as problematics to further research in any scientific endeavour. Questions are more compelling than blunt answers, they elicit awe and wonder, as impetus and momentum to continue searching, seeking, and exploration.

The awe and wonder leaps off the bat immediately: how did single cellular organisms evolve into the complexity of all the life we see around us? The Mayan healer says it’s not just human’s that think, but there is an essence in everything you can feel but cannot grasp. Deep. The neuroscientist: to delve into synapses and wonder where consciousness is. In all the grey goo of the brain, where is love? Or anger? Or jealousy?

Consciousness is subjective experience. But what does it mean to be?

In Buddhist science enlightenment is the direct finding of consciousness as pure awareness. The monk says science approaches consciousness from the outward in. But consciousness manifested as internal clarity is the true awareness of it.

To show us that plants also have consciousness, the plant scientist uses a Pavlovian method. Instead of food and a bell for a dog we have a light and a fan for a plant, and remarkably the outcome is much the same.

This same woman talks of feeling—and dreaming—of shamanic guides, the Mayan healer tells us all plants are sacred and some are even teachers.

Now, to go to psychedelic research with psilocybin “magic” mushrooms. “Meditation is a way to consciousness, mushrooms the crash course.” With psilocybin, feelings of transcendence, interconnectedness, even a profound feeling of “home-coming” a “remembering” occurs, even a readiness to face death in cancer patients with a sense of something continuing beyond death. Psychedelics, just like in meditation, shuts down the Default Mode Network—the circuitry of ego and Self—creating a state of mystical consciousness. As the ego and Self dissolve, one becomes fully aware of being aware…like hearing music for the first time or life’s heartbeat.

The documentary then gets deep and heavy—everything is of the same essence—there is a certain panpsychism.

Max Plank the great physicist declared consciousness as fundamental. Which I read as consciousness is irreducible, all things arise in consciousness. Let me elucidate: information from outside, say light waves, hit our sense instruments, here retina, is conveyed through the visual nerve to the occipital lobe where the waves are decoded. Does it truly reveal the world, with quarks and probabilities? Or waves beyond the visual spectrum? That sight and the seen are a common hallucination endemic to human beings, because we all have the same basic neuroanatomy.

And so, we must begin to see consciousness as irreducibly fundamental. Without a consciousness being aware what exists?

It doesn’t matter if you see yourself as a drop in an ocean, or an ocean in a drop.

The talk with Earthling Kaushalya director of “Crater” and Elizabeth Costa director of “Bangla Surf Girls”, was an energetic discussion.

I have talked earlier of the grotesqueness and gruesomeness of “Crater” before. The discussion turned out to deem the protagonist “pathological”. I hope Krishna wouldn’t mind my paraphrasing (and butchering) her comment that the acting was so bad and cliched it worked! Ha! The grandma—who is transgender—was an attempt to signify gender fluidity I found out (You learn something new every day! Ha!) I also gathered something fundamental about the repetition of the images, memories and scenes—to me they were not just imaginary but hallucinatory. Like I said, comforting, discomforting, the film contained a bit of jumping around in a very short span.

The discussion on “Bangla Surf Girls” went the way I thought it would. The girls did carry the banner of freedom through surfing. What was refreshing was that the filmmakers deliberately chose not to make it about solely “coming from poverty in a developing country”.

By Gautam Emani

Every year, thousands of migrants attempt the perilous journey from Africa to Europe. After crossing the Sahara they climb the border fences of Morocco to reach Spain’s coastal enclaves, or pay smugglers to ferry them in ramshackle boats from Tunisia and Lybia across the Mediterranean to Sicily and beyond. Fines, imprisonment and the occasional beatings are the best response the powers that be can muster to their glaring human plight. Concerned by the large numbers of refugees who routinely drown at sea off Europe’s coasts, civilians across southern Europe take the initiative to help the refugees, Challenging their own punitive governments, these warriors draw penalties to themselves.

“Solidarity Crime” documents an array of individuals willing to look beyond national and racial divides and take risks for others; from a Spanish catholic priest speaking out against the brutal treatment of refugees in Morocco, to activists meeting boats at sea, to the residents of a near-deserted south Italian village which has welcomed the newcomers into their abundant empty housing. As politicians focus on the legality of the travellers’ status, one migrant soberly explains their situation. For the few who do complete the journey into Europe after working temporary jobs in North Africa to pay the smugglers, there is no legal inclusion on the other side but only years of hard labour on European farms, without the prospect of social acceptance.

Meanwhile, on Europe’s other end, a different drama is unfolding. “Judges Under Pressure” follows the lives of members of Poland’s jurists. Three decades after their country’s liberation from Communism, these members of the judiciary serve as citizens’ strongest line of defence against police repression, yet are completely alone in their verdicts and vulnerable to slander and intimidation.

When a new government determined to consolidate power enacts a Muzzle Law, establishing a disciplinary chamber to bring its judges’ verdicts in line with their own policies, the jurists resist. It can be all too easy for those in positions of power to cave in to harassment of their family members or to the threat of losing their immunity and being locked out of the courtrooms. Yet these judges stand their ground, making the case that such policies contradict Poland’s constitution as well as EU law. They strive to continue to be present for those protesters risking arrest as they march against new restrictive legislation, refusing to see their country once again collapse into dictatorship.

Whether it is solidarity on the streets and at sea for those less priveleged, or work in the courtrooms to defend constitutional rights, Europeans are on the move to defend their ideals of freedom and compassion as evidenced in these two international documentaries. It is a struggle with no end in sight, but the outcomes will surely determine the continent’s prospects for human unity and progress.

In the villages of northern Tamil Nadu, kids secretly sneak out of home – but it is not for smoking or mischief. They go to watch and perform in Therukkoothu, a traditional performance art of south India involving theatre, song and dance, and centring on the land’s ancient gods and mythology.

In the documentary film Thirai Virutham, Sugumar shares his lifelong interest in this art form, first sparked by his performer grandfather. From childhood, he is fascinated with Therukkoothu’s instruments and stock characters such as the Buffoon, Kattiakkaran and the Mahabharata’s emperor Duryodhana. Always having wanted to learn the art, he finally gets his chance at the age of 20 upon encountering a street theatre troupe. They teach him how to play the instruments, sing background vocals and finally to act. But family insist on a sensible trade, limiting his practice time to evenings as he finishes a Bachelor of Commerce.

Even so, it is fate that Sugumar’s heart is not in his new profession. Fortunately, nearby Pondicherry University offers a program in drama, and he takes the chance to pursue this passion, opening up a whole new world of costume design, new musical instruments and literature, highly trained teachers from different parts of Tamil Nadu and much more. His journey leads him to Auroville, where he contacts and gets involved in the Auroville theatre group – which soon feels like a new family.

But his extensive study of acting methods from around the world always leads our protagonist back to his childhood passion, helping him to contextualize and understand his own cultural background and acting gifts.

The Auroville Film Festival is unique in presenting stories from Auroville’s bioregion, the extensive coastal and rural area surrounding the township. Sugumar’s film will stay with me as an introduction to a world wholly unfamiliar yet very close, fostering cultural exchange and understanding.

I attended the panel discussion with Yael Bartana of “Two Minutes to Midnight” and Aman Mann of “All That Breathes”. Although, I didn’t watch “Two Midnights…” I found the premise of a world run by women to be compelling and alluring. As an associate Cristophe said, the movie was an experimental, theatrical performance—fictional but very real. The idea is that world has come to a stalemate because of nuclear weapons, and missiles represent toxic masculinity.

“All That Breathes” is about two brothers in New Delhi who save injured black kites and heal and tend to them in their makeshift basement hospital. When it came to Aman’s chance a lot of background information was revealed. I did watch “All That Breathes” and I was struck by the visually-vibrant camera work. Aman tells us as they searched for wildlife in New Delhi, they spent days on single shots. The opening scene of the rats near a street took four days to shoot. With such care and delicate precision, it’s no wonder that the imagery was beyond scintillating.

Apparently, none of the crew on “All That…” were wildlife experts. Shaunak Sen the director studied Human Geography at Cambridge in 2018…which made him curious to find out about the human and non-human interactions, especially with such a concentration of raptors in such a small area in Delhi. Aman goes on to say that the makeshift basement hospital the brothers set up for the kites was “incredibly cinematic” with its water-logged floor and metal-cutting machines. So, the film found itself become a story of brothers and black kites, with its human and non-human interactions in a mega-metropolis of a city. Although, in Delhi the wildlife remains almost invisible.

The film, Aman says, was done in a languid style with focus shifts, which Cristophe called “poetic”.

However, in the backdrop was the protests and violence in New Delhi around the CAA and NRC Bills which was intentionally not brought to the foreground, so as not to sensationalize the violence.

The last question asked of Yael is a good segue into “This Stained Dawn”. When asked about women on both sides of the Gaza-Israel conflict could open communication, Yael gave us a vociferous: Yes!

Now, “In This Stained Dawn” the voices of the feminist women in the Aurat (Women’s) March in Pakistan is vociferous, but the results are bittersweet. There is the triumphant raising of women’s voices and yet an oddly severe backlash from Pakistan’s extreme Far-Right. The women are only claiming bodily autonomy and safety from rape and molestation through the slogan of “My Body, My Choice”. The women also want the freedoms of merely leaving the home, be it to get an education, or to work. The backlash is startling. One man goes off on a feminist on Nation TV with a “Shut up, bitch”. The women marchers are met with cowardly counter-protesters who through stones at them and run away. Nevertheless, a revolution is a carnival for the oppressed, and these oppressed, marginalized women want a fair share of their own seemingly necessary rights, through singing, dancing, carrying placards and a little bit of street theatre.

By Gautam Emani

Sometimes we need to step outside our world for a clearer view, and this is exactly what two filmmakers do in “Auroville Exchange”. Hailing from two opposite ends of India, Auroville’s Serena Aurora and Lobsang from Zanskar Valley in Ladakh each explore one another’s world on their quest for sustainable living.

With diametrically opposite climates and very different languages and cultures, it can seem as if Ladakh and Auroville were in two separate countries. Faced with melting glaciers and a rapidly rising population, Zanskar Valley, traditionally sparsely populated and self-sufficient, is threatened by water scarcity. An energetic campaigner for sustainability, Lobsang’s search for solutions for his people leads him across the country to Auroville, where he meets remarkable leaders in ecological experimentation. Meanwhile, Serena from tropical coastal oasis Auroville journeys to an altitude of 5000 m in Ladakh, where she explores traditional Buddhist culture and the authenticity of a self-reliant life in the highlands, far away from the city buzz.

Comparing their experiences, both travellers discover a deep commitment to their respective societies, which are as resilient as their residents. Their conclusion: Zanskar valley and Auroville are both spiritual communities worthy of a future. In this thought-provoking short film, Serena shows how human unity can be found even in our differences by holding true to our shared aspirations for a harmonious existence.

by Daniel

The Auroville Film Festival 2024 promises to be an electrifying immersive experience, if we are to go by the jolly good show of the opening ceremony. It sizzled and popped. What josh! The most scintillating part was the Kalaripayattu performance. With swords, and shields and steel whips and spears, I thought someone would get hurt! There was a dancing to it, a whirling, a spiralling. But the artistes were deft and adept and showed a remarkable dexterity, and I will let you know: nobody was hurt, and nobody died! The degree of control with which the artistes commanded their deadly weapons was frighteningly amazing.

There was also a minimalist musical ensemble (I am afraid I do not know the technical term for the kind of music), which began hauntingly like a whisper, a dainty whistling, before it sprang into a rhythmic, thumping display that exulted our ears.

Finally, there was a fire-dancing performance by a woman, who made sure nothing, and I mean nothing, was burnt to a cinder.

The film that grasped me by the scruff was “All That Breathes” is a quaint (as in “unusually beautiful” not “old-fashioned”) quixotic tale. It’s spacetime-gravity is warped by beautiful philosophical and metaphysical speculations. Two brothers in the convoluted mega-metropolis of New Delhi, take care of the birds of prey, the black kites, which are essential to the ecosystem of Delhi, yet are being suffocated out of existence. In their aviary of a basement, a makeshift hospital is set up. The narrative contains the story of one brother’s dreams and aspirations since childhood of becoming an astronomer or geologist, till he makes it to the US for higher education. There are striking lines in this charming film like, for instance, on the profound reality of Darwinian evolution—how that over generations kites have altered themselves to fit in with the whole mess of a city that is Delhi. The images in this charming movie are visually-vibrant; it’s top-notch cinematography. The story is direct and told with candour and clarity of the kind that drags you into its narrative. Deep, explorative with sly, light humour, this is a jewel of a film.

Overall, the first day of the Festival was pregnantly expectant (as they say—I guess). It started with the right dazzling kind of ambience, through the Opening Ceremony, which drew the crowd in, to anticipate some sheer artistry, be it the Ceremony itself, the music, the food, and of course the films.

It is January 22nd, and the blowing of a conch marks the start of the 8th Auroville Film Festival at the Town Hall campus. The audience are treated to a concert by the Saragam drummers, a martial arts show by Kshetra Kalari demonstrating the use of swords, daggers, a spear and other weapons, and a fire baton performance by Aurovilian Monica. Soon, dinner is served to the music of The Trio Jazztified, a band of Auroville musicians.

All That Breathes

There is an old belief that feeding kites – a common predatory bird – purifies one’s karma. This informs the life journey of brothers Nadeem and Saud, as documented in the opening film by Shaunak Sen. The siblings have devoted the past 20 years to a wildlife rescue centre caring for injured birds. Kites have adapted to Delhi’s chaos, feasting at its gargantuan landfills and hunting from rooftops. But in this city where monkeys scale the jungle of electric cables and chimneys spew pollution into the air, more and more birds are falling from the sky.

The brothers, meanwhile, can not ignore the political turmoil and flooding which are the background for their noble pursuit. It is 2020, and hatred erupts into violent religious riots and arson in their city. Yet the duo continue washing birds behind their ears, in the way that a mother washes her children. Transcending the species barrier is not something they have to fake or try to achieve. The two spontaneously feel oneness with all that breathes.

Two Minutes to Midnight

Yael Bartana asks a simple question: What if women ruled the world? A fictional country elects an all-women government on a platform of disarmament and pacifism. But are they naïve? When the routine puerile bullying of familiar-sounding President Arnold Twittler, the leader of a large foreign nation, takes on the increasingly ominous tone of a serious nuclear threat, their high ideals are tested.

Female experts and leaders gather in Dr. Strangelove’s “War Room”, now transformed into a Peace Room to experiment with dispelling the horrors of Mutually Assured Destruction. President Fouéré is supported by a circle of women committed to a different path, but the difficult choice is hers alone to make.

Adithalam (Basic Education)

It’s all too easy for children from farming families to get discouraged from education, especially when faced with shaming and the lack of support from teachers and family. Yatra Srinivassan’s film dramatizes one such situation, focusing on Saraswathi, a 6th-grader still struggling with reading and writing.

Yet a caring teacher at the right time can make all the difference between despair and the willingness to persevere in the pursuit of a better life than one’s parents had. Science teacher Sumathi has what it takes to give Saraswathi confidence, becoming her greatest inspiration in this sweet affirmation of inclusion and social responsibility.

—

by Daniel

On DAY 1 January 22, Monday:

In the venue of Cinema Paradiso at 21:07 is Adithalam (“Basic Education”)

It’s a charming low-budget film. The most striking feature is its believability. There seems to be nothing fake or phony about the film, it comes across as genuine and authentic, from the acting to the simple plot to the reality of education in a small backward village.

The young girl who plays the protagonist Saraswathy steals the show. Saraswathy struggles with her studies—she is in the sixth standard and can’t even sign her own name. Dismissed from school by the Principal, the heart-warming turning point occurs when a dedicated teacher takes a personal interest in teaching Saraswathy. The film ends with Saraswathy not only taking part in an essay-writing competition, but winning it.

Zoom Details:

Link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/82715680700?pwd=8SGdaKQYy494hoGDXnP7YobNsb34WD.1

Meeting ID: 827 1568 0700

Passcode: 214005

We recommend updating your Zoom application to the latest version for the best experience. You can also chose “join meeting from your browser”. The room will be open 30 minutes prior to each discussion for any technical queries. You are more than welcome to share the invitation link with friends and colleagues and/or join other discussions as well.

Here is the detailed schedule of the 8th Auroville Film Festival 2024 film discussions.

The discussions will be hosted via Zoom and are scheduled for 23rd – 26th January 2024 from 17:00 – 18:00 IST, and 27th – 28th January from 15:30 – 16:30 IST.

You will find the recordings of each discussion below here…

We will have daily music concerts every day 6pm – 7.15pm.

Performing bands are Aurocats, Beginnings, Collective Song, Deep Dawn, Dog Days, Jazztified, Noizegate, Ronny’s Band, Sound Mirage and The Trio.

All performances will be live streamed and the recording will be available afterwards (see below):

DAY 1: https://bit.ly/TheTrio_Jazztified_AVFF

DAY 2 *: https://bit.ly/DeepDawn_AVFF

DAY 3: https://bit.ly/NoizeGate_AVFF

DAY 4: https://bit.ly/Aurocats_AVFF

DAY 5: https://bit.ly/Beginnings_AVFF

DAY 6: https://bit.ly/DogDays_AVFF

DAY 7: https://bit.ly/SoundMirage_RonnysBand_ComeTogetherAuroville_AVFF

* Deep Dawn is an experimental jazzy funky rocky hip-hop poppy loopy trippy international instadimensional jam collective born in Auroville, India.
https://www.instagram.com/thedeepdawn?igsh=bHloeGE0d2Y4NzM5

Vocals: Mal (aka Helicopter Man aka Perumal the Poet aka The Big Black)
https://www.instagram.com/yep.that.malcolm?igsh=MWZod251ZWc4MmdxMg==

Drums: Mehul (aka Mehul Oblongata aka Drum & Drummer)
https://www.instagram.com/galacticfalcon?igsh=MW52cXZ3dzdlajd4Nw==

Bass: Henrik (aka Henny on the Rocks aka The Low-down Dirty Bassist)
https://www.instagram.com/henrikdutz?igsh=NGF0eHM5d25mMmth

Keys: Santosh (aka Santocracy aka Santo Domingo aka The Rock-hard Pianist)
https://www.instagram.com/santoshathreya?igsh=MTRndHIzNmRrZHltZw==

Guitar: Edo (aka Fettuccine Alf Edo aka Drop-dead Edo aka Mr. Plays-hard-to-Guitar)
https://www.instagram.com/edo_ardo1986?igsh=MXg4NTJxejR1dnJkdw==

All films will be available to watch from January 22 – 28, 2024. All films are available for free. 

All films of the Auroville categories are available worldwide. Most films of the Human Unity category are available online (some films in this category will only be screened live in Auroville as the filmmakers did not give permission for online screening), some of which are accessible in India only.

How to use the online platform:

1. Go to https://app.entertainmentoxygen.com/festivals/aurovillefilmfestival

2. Click “Sign up/in” on top right, enter email, follow instructions for varification and return to https://app.entertainmentoxygen.com/festivals/aurovillefilmfestival

3. Click “Buy Tickets” and choose “All Access Pass – Free“

4. All films will only be available to watch from January 22 – 28, 2024.

Kino Kabaret is open to anybody ready to become a producer, writer, director, actor, cameraman, soundman, or editor for 2 days, even if you don’t have any clue how it could be. 

The 5^th Kino Kabaret will start on Thursday 25^th Jan 2024 at 4 pm at Le Morgan cafe’ and ends on Saturday 27^th Jan with the screening of the films.

If you want to participate, please send an email to kinoauroville@gmail.com.

All films must be between 30 seconds and 6 minutes long and contain the 3 beforehand chosen items (Prop, Sound Effect, Line of Dialogue)

All films must be uploaded by Saturday 27 Jan at 4pm, and will be screened at MMC, Cinema Paradiso, from 4.30 to 6pm

For any info you can write to kinoauroville@gmail.com

For general info: http://www.kinokabaret.org/

Good luck and have fun!!

Kino Kabaret Team (Julietta, Marco, Moghan)

click to download screening schedule as pdf

Induja Gandhiprasad

I, Induja Gandhiprasad, am from Tamil Nadu, India. Having had a deep rooted passion to work towards bringing positive changes in the society and environment, I was inspired by the ideals of Auroville. I have integrated myself into Auroville over the past 7 years and have been engaging in different activities. The experimental spirit of Auroville has been instrumental in boosting my confidence to engage in new things and discover myself. I am curious to learn about people’s connections with nature across different contexts. Because I believe that retaining, restoring and renewing those connections will bring answers to the biggest challenges that humanity faces today. My other interests are traveling, making new connections, exploring the depths of Tamil literature, and so on.

Jean Francois Claude

I have a background in social sciences and management. I have always sought to understand people, society and people in society. Very early on I became interested in cinema. I was involved in film clubs (as a teacher in a high school or as a volunteer in non-profit organizations or communities). Until recently, I was the administrator of a non-profit organization which promotes documentary cinema (production assistance, residencies for filmmakers, organization of public screenings). Since my arrival in Auroville, I have continued my anthropological photography activity. I am mainly interested in “people at work”. Beside my main activity as a French Teacher, I practice photography with Auroville units and in villages from the Auroville bio region. I make photo booklets that I offer to people I have worked with.

Jean Leduc-Corbet

I am Jean, I come from a French and Aurovillian background, many of you might know me as I grew up here. Spending almost 20 years of my life in Auroville. Only recently returning after having spent several years abroad travelling and collecting experiences. I am a passionate student in the arts of film and photography. The evolution of the tools and techniques for photography and film making is something I’m very interested in. I’m eager to learn about and use more of the old, and the new technologies as these evolve. However what lies at the heart of it for me is storytelling. Or how stories are crafted, captured, and shared through these means. With that being said, I look forward to seeing your stories and thank you for this opportunity. 

Jury for “categories of Auroville films“

Ezhil Mathy

From freedom comes learning is my core belief. I hail from a family of first generation learners and always stayed curious on life and learning. I have my masters in education and that has always been close to my heart . Like a spider web I see connections and I apply it to all that I do. I enjoy designing costumes; I have worked for the film Super Deluxe (Tamil film) and Modern Love Chennai (Amazon Prime) as producer and costume designer.

Premendra Mazumder

Premendra Mazumder is the Vice President of the Federation of Film Societies of India (FFSI) and Secretary of the Asia-Pacific Section of the International Federation of Film Societies (IFFS). He has been writing on cinema for more than four decades and also edited many books and journals. He is the General Secretary of the India Chapter of International Federation of Film Critics: FIPRESCI. He edits a quarterly online film journal “E-CineIndia” and an annual printed journal “Cine-India”. He is working as the Advisor to many International Film Festivals in home & abroad and runs a couple of Festivals as its Chairman/ Program Director/ Coordinator. He has served as the Jury Member in thirty six International Film Festivals so far worldwide.

Sivakumar Mohanan

A graduate in Mathematics and an alumnus of Film and Television Institute of Tamilnadu in Direction and Screen play writing discipline; he has directed and produced over 120 films that include Corporate AV, Documentaries, Commercials, NGO films and short films. First senior producer in CDIT, Trivandurm between 1991 -94, during this period he has produced over dozen films on Popular Science and development issues. His films Sasthra Gauthagam, a science magazine program and Declining Birth rate – Lessons from Kerala won awards from Government of Kerala and later were shown in Tokyo film festival. His film: “Pesticide Trap who is trapped? Pest or Peasant” and “Nano Magic” were screened in Mumbai International film festival for shorts and documentaries (MIFF). He served as selection committee member for International Competition Section of MIFF 2012 and National Competition section of MIFF 2016. He has authored 6 books on cinema in Tamil. Worked as II unit director and an AD in two international productions; founder secretary of Chennai Film Society; involved in teaching and mentoring film direction and script writing students over the last ten years. He was a faculty and Head, Direction department for five years (2014 – 2019) at L V Prasad Film and TV Academy, Chennai. Currently a teacher and mentor for film students and regular visiting faculty at Loyola College, Chennai and BOFTA (Blue Ocean Film and Television Academy), Chennai, LV Prasad Film and TV academy, Chennai.

All That Breathes

2022, India, Documentary, Hindi (with English subtitles), 94 minutes

Screening on: Monday 22nd January, 19:30 – Cinema Paradiso

Trailer: https://youtu.be/fYiC8gdfdqk

In one of the world’s most populated cities, two brothers — Nadeem and Saud — devote their lives to the quixotic effort of protecting the black kite, a majestic bird of prey essential to the ecosystem of New Delhi that has been falling from the sky at alarming rates. Amid environmental toxicity and social unrest, the ‘kite brothers’ spend day and night caring for the creatures in their makeshift avian basement hospital. Director Shaunak Sen (Cities of Sleep) explores the connection between the kites and the brothers who help them return to the skies, offering a mesmerizing chronicle of inter-species coexistence.

Director: Shaunak Sen

Executive Producer: Sean B., Carroll David, Guy Elisco

Producer: Teddy Leifer, Aman Mann, Shaunak Sen

Associate Producer: Guy Horlock, Sam Stanley

Consulting Producer: Joshua Oppenheimer

Co-producer: Florrie Priest

Production Company: Rise Films

Assistant Camera: Sundarram Arjun, Raju Biswas, Salim Khan

Sound Recordist: Moinak Bose

Additional Sound Recordist: Prasenjit Das

Mix Stage Engineer: Simon Ellegaard

Associate Sound Effects Editor: Shashank Kothari

Audio Description Writer/Narrator: Ketan Majmudar

Additional Sound Recordist: Ramandeep Malhotra

Senior Sound Design Consultant: Susmit Nath

Additional Sound Recordist: Anurag Pant

Re-recording Mixer: Jacques Pedersen

Sound Designer / Sound Recordist: Niladri Shekhar Roy

Foley Artist and Editor: Yuki Shizuoka

Dialogue Editor: Seby Varghese

Editor: Charlotte Munch Bengtsen        

Co-Editor: Vedant Joshi

Associate Director: Rohan Ranganathan

Chief Assistant Director: Siraj Sharma

Second Unit Director, Assistant Director: Vedant Joshi 

Cast: Salik Rehman, Mohammad Saud, Nadeem Shehzad

Website: https://www.allthatbreathes.com/

Apnea

2023, Italy, Documentary, Italian (with English subtitles), 64 minutes

Screening on: Saturday 27nd January, 19:34 – Outdoor Venue

Trailer: https://youtu.be/BBclSuj8UuI

The voices of 14 migrants leaving their home, moving through Libya, and arriving in Italy after crossing the Mediterranean Sea merge into a single story, representing thousands of other narratives lost beneath the sea.

Director: Stefano Poggioni, Claudia Cataldi, Elena Poggioni

Producer: The Factory PRD

Production Company: The Factory PRD

Script: Stefano Poggioni, Claudia Cataldi, Elena Poggioni

Music: Giovanni Magaglio

Animation: Pietro Elisei

Website: http://www.thefactoryprd.it/

Aware: Glimpses of Consciousness

2021, Germany, Documentary, English, Nepali, Spanish (with English subtitles for Nepali and Spanish only), 102 minutes

Screening on: Thursday 25th January, 20:13 – Outdoor Venue

Trailer: https://youtu.be/aDHD7QhBtJ0

AWARE opens as a science film but emerges well beyond the explicable, ultimately leading one on a voyage upon the ocean of consciousness, a contemplative, sensual, cinematographic meditation. The networks of consciousness are reflected in ‘grand’ imagery revealing the vast interconnectedness of Nature – from the smallest organisms, to the world of plants and animals and on to the cosmos. It invites one to experience the awe and mystery of life as the researchers do, to dive in with them, returning to see the world anew, to review long-held beliefs and assumptions and initiate one’s own oceanic journey. Ultimately, to be aware one is aware. 

Director: Eric Black, Frauke Sandig

Producer: Frauke Sandig

Production Company: Umbrella Films

Script: Redaction by Nicole Baum

Cinematography: Eric Black

Sound Mixer: Martin Grube

Sound Designer: Niklas Kammertöns

Dialogue Editor: Thomas Wallmann

Musicians:  Causeyoufair, David Hykes, Zoe Keating, Jörg Seibold

Grader: Matthias Behrens

Supervising Editor: Sven Heußner

Editors: Rune Schweitzer, Franziska von Berlepsch

Cast: Richard Boothby, Mary Cosimano, Justine Fritz, Monica Gagliano, Roland Griffiths, Christof Koch, Josefa Kirvin Kulix, Matthieu Ricard, Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche

Website: https://aware-film.com/ ; https://umbrellafilms.org/

Bangla Surf Girls

2021, Bangladesh, Documentary, Bengali (with English subtitles), 86 minutes

Screening on: Wednesday 24th January, 20:27 – Outdoor Venue

Trailer: https://youtu.be/MQqy_xMsMpM

“Bangla Surf Girls” is an immersive documentary capturing the journey of young girls in a Bangladesh slum who join a local surf club to seek freedom from a life of hardship. The film showcases their struggles, triumphs, and determination, leading to an international competition in India, demonstrating the strength of community amidst poverty’s confines.

Director, Cinematography: Elizabeth D. Costa

Production Company: InSync Media

Producer: Elizabeth D. Costa, Lalita Krishna

Executive Producer: Vijay Vaidyanathan

Production Assistant: Md. Sukkur

Additional Camera: Hira Azad, Shahadat Hossain, Kenneth Woo

Camera Assistant: Jewel, Jishan, Md. Sukkur

GoPro Operator: Md. Mannan, Rammohan Paranjape, Md. Roshid, Md. Sagar, Md. Sukkur

Drone Operator: Joeri van der Well

Script: Lalita Krishna

Sound: Elizabeth D. Costa, Masrur Rahman

Additional Music: Lydia Ainsworth

Re-recording Mix Supervisor / Sound Designer: Grant Edmonds

Editing: Matthew E. Cohn, Jordan Kawai

Translations: Tanveer Abid, Mily Chowdhury, B.H. Jowal Chy, Sabiha Hosnine, Tanazzum Kaiser, Arafat bin Kashem,

Leonard Perera, Mahbubur Rahman, Zana Shammi

Location Production Accounts: Bridget D. Costa

Footage Organization, development Phase: Sagar Sarwer, Zana Shammi

Cast: Suma Akhtar, Ayesha Akter, Rifa Akter, Rashed Alam, Shobe Meheraz

Website: https://insyncmedia.ca/documentary/bangla-surf-girls/

Dagh Dagh Ujala (This Stained Dawn)

2021, Pakistan, Documentary, Urdu (with English subtitles), 90 minutes

Screening on: Tuesday 23rd January, 19:30 – Cinema Paradiso

Trailer: https://youtu.be/rGjSgwzDwQ0

Detailing the preparation of the multi-city Aurat March (Women’s March) in Pakistan, This Stained Dawn tells the story of a feminist movement asserting itself in the country’s urban spaces through the eyes of the march’s organizers.

Director & Producer: Anam Abbas

Producer: Other Memory Media

Cinematography: Roger Goula, Anam Abbas, Haya Fatima, Iqbal Gul, Nayani Tazeen, Bari Mahnoor Mahar, Sadia Khatri

Director of Photography: Anam Abbas, Ben Bernhard, Riju Das, Saumyananda Sahi

Editor: Omar Majeed

Online Editor: Darren Hinchy 

Colorist: Arlene Moelker, Mahak Gupta

Assistant Colorist: Prithvi Buddhavarapu, Aaryaman Kutty

Supervising Colorist: Sidharth Meer

Additional Editor: Ayelet Gil Efrat, Daphna Keenan, Michal Oppenheim, Walter Solon

Production Counsel: Dermot Desmond 

E&O Insurance: Paul Hillier 

Production Assistant: Krishna Khakhria

Science Editor: Aileen O’Hearn 

Post-Production: Sim Canada

Production Counsel: Russell Smith

Original Score: Rahema Alam

Vocals: Aliya Rasheed

Narrator: Kulsoom Aftab

Animation: Aziza Ahmad

IMDB: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt14663858/?ref_=tt_mv_close

Do Not Feed the Pigeons

2021,UK, Stop-Motion Animation, 9 minutes

Screening on: Friday 26nd January, 20:10 – Outdoor Venue

Trailer: https://youtu.be/0z9vfmOoy-E

At a desolate coach station during the wee hours, a group of weary and isolated travelers awaits the last coach. Amidst the cold and gloomy atmosphere, the resident pigeons orchestrate a magical connection among these individuals for a fleeting yet beautiful moment.

Director: Antonin Niclass

Producer: Jordi Morera

Writer: Vladimir Krasilnikov

Cinematography: Taylor Shulin

Animation: Shirel Lebovich, Ollie Griffiths

Sound Design: Joe De-Vine

Composer: Fabio Amurri

Editing: Lorene Dewett

Production Designer: Eve Finnie

Model Maker: Agatha Roudaut

Instagram: https://instagram.com/do_not_feed_the_pigeons_

Jhini Bini Chadariya (The Brittle Thread)

2021, India, Fiction, Hindi, Bhojpuri, Hebrew, English (with English subtitles), 97 minutes

Screening on: Saturday 27nd January, 20:15 – Cinema Paradiso

Trailer: https://youtu.be/-xdd0LjWdRA

The ancient city of Varanasi, India, serves as home to Rani, an orchestra dancer, and Shahdab, a traditional Muslim saree weaver. Rani, a strong-willed mother to her deaf daughter, and Shahdab, a shy weaver, encounter a new world through an Israeli backpacker, Adah. Rani’s complex relationship with her father, Baba, and Shahdab’s unlikely friendship with the traveler, pave the way for self-discovery in cultural and political identity.

Director: Ritesh Sharma

Producer: Visvesh Singh Sehrawat

Co-Producer: Abhinav Pareek, Sampat Singh Rathore, Ritesh Sharma

Line Producer: Vishwanath Tiwari

Production Company: Hardhyaan Films

Co-Production: Veda Film Factory

Screenplay and Dialogue: Ritesh Sharma

Cinematography and DOP: Priyashanker Ghosh

Sound Effects Editor: Rahul Gujar

Sound Recordist: Mangesh Jadhav

ADR Mixer, Sound Editor: Akshay Sathe

Sound Design and MIx: Piyush Shah

Boom Operator: Faeez Shaikh

Editor: Bhisma Pratim 

Color Grading: Shashank Jha

Associate Director: Ashish Kumar

Third Assistant Director: Vinod K Maurya

First Assistant Director: Rahul Raina

Second Assistant Director: Gaurav Singh

First Assistant Director: Vishwanath Tiwari

Colorist: Shashank Jha

Associate Writer: Shailendu Kumar

Festivals and Publicity: Chaitanya Tulsyan

Cast: Megha Mathur, Muzaffar Khan, Sivan Spector, Syed Iqbal Ahmed, Roopa Chaurasiya, Nishant Kumar, Shweta Nagar, Ashutosh Singh, Utkarsh Srivastava

Website: https://www.riteshsharmafilms.com/

Manikbabur Megh (The Cloud and the Man)

2021, India, Feature Film, Bengali (with English subtitles), 96 minutes

Screening on: Friday 26nd January, 20:30 – Outdoor Venue

Trailer: https://youtu.be/sCNg-To1On8

In artful black and white, “The Cloud and the Man” (Manikbabur Megh) delves into a surreal and philosophical exploration centered around a recently-bereaved middle-aged man and his unexpectedly intricate yet meaningful relationship with a cloud.

Director: Abhinandan Banerjee

Assistant Director: Susmita Biswas

First Assistant Director: Chandrika Chandran

Producer: Bauddhayan Mukherji, Monalisa Mukherji

Production Company: Little Lamb Films

Story, Screenplay: Abhinandan Banerjee 

Dialogue: Abhinandan Banerjee, Bauddhayan Mukherji

Cinematography: Anup Singh

Gaffer: Deepak Kanojiya

Assistant Camera: Atanu Mandal, Agnijita Mukherjee

Sound Editor: Muppala Kiran Kumar 

Re-recording Mixer / Sound Designer: Tenny 

Editor: Abhro Banerjee

Costume and Styling: Monalisa Mukherji

Cast: Chandan Sen, Debesh Roy Chowdhury, Bratya Basu, Nimai Ghosh, Arun Guhatharkurta

Website: https://mubi.com/en/in/films/the-cloud-the-man

Persona [no] Humana ([Non]-Human Person)

2022,Spain-Argentina, Documentary, Spanish (with English subtitles), 109 minutes

Screening on: Friday 26nd January, 20:08 – Cinema Paradiso

Trailer: https://youtu.be/Li2sLoKUABs

Sandra and Cecilia, two great apes living in terrible conditions in Argentine zoos, become the focus of a legal battle led by NGO Proyecto Gran Simio and a team of Argentine lawyers. The objective: to secure recognition of three fundamental rights for these apes—life, liberty, and freedom from torture. Against them stand zoo managers with ties to animal trafficking, driven by economic motives. Candela, a photojournalist, investigates to highlight the scientific and evolutionary similarities between humans and the apes.

Director: Alejandro Cuéllar, Rafa G. Sánchez

Executive Producer: Xavier Crespo

Production Company: DACSA Produccions

Script: Alejandro Cuéllar, Rafa G. Sánchez

Camera Operator: Juan Meseguer Navarro

Sound Mixer: Fabio Pécoro 

Sound Designer: José Serrador Villanueva 

Mixing Engineer: Tomás Santibañez Bustos 

Music Mastering: Pablo G. Schuller 

Score Mixer: Tom Bailey 

Score Engineer: Mat Bartram 

Score Coordinator: Ed Marquis 

Editor: Estefanía Mora

Production Secretary: Lucía Ros Serra

Unit Production Manager: Kate Brower

Second Unit Director: José María de Luxan

Cast: Candela Moreno

Website: https://www.agenciafreak.com/peliculas/persona-no-humana/

Sędziowie pod presją (Judges Under Pressure)

2022,Poland, Documentary, Polish (with English subtitles), 85 minutes

Screening on: Thursday 24nd January, 20:25 – Cinema Paradiso

Trailer: https://youtu.be/wPwhELBEBbM

They were taught to speak only through their decisions, maintain distance, and engage in public life with restraint. Yet, professional ethics demanded that they boldly defend judicial independence. Kacper Lisowski and Iwona Harris spotlight Polish judges who upheld ethics during the assault on free courts. Judges like Igor Tuleya, Waldemar Zurek, and Dorota Zabludowska emerged as judge-citizens defending independent courts alongside prosecutors, lawyers, and civil society.

Director, Script, Cinematography: Kacper Lisowski

Producer: Iwona Harris

Production Company: Lollipop Films

Editor: Bartosz Pietras, Marcin Sotysik

Website: http://judgesunderpressure.com/

Siege in the Air

2022, India, Documentary, Kashmiri (with English subtitles), 30 minutes

Screening on: Tuesday 23rd January, 21:15 – Cinema Paradiso

Trailer: https://youtu.be/qJYFwGgLfJo

“Siege in the Air” delves into the lives of women in Indian Administered Kashmir, unraveling the experiences of perpetual uncertainty and continuous lockdowns, especially focusing on the aftermath of the 2019 communication blockade post the abrogation of Article 370. It weaves together their memories to paint a vivid portrayal of life under such circumstances.

Director, Producer, Writer: Muntaha Amin

Production Company: Not specified

Cinematography: Ghania Siddique

Sound: Mohammad Fibin

Music: Reneesh Basheer, Vimal Nazar

Color: Thamjeedh

Solidarity Crime

2022, Switzerland-Spain-Argentina-Italy-France-Morocco, Documentary, Spanish, Italian, French, Arabic (with English subtitles), 54 minutes

Screening on: Thursday 25nd January, 19:30 – Cinema Paradiso

Trailer: https://youtu.be/AnDgAwAD8Us

Across Europe, civilians face severe penalties, including hefty fines and lengthy imprisonment, for providing humanitarian assistance at the continent’s borders. This documentary, filmed in fourteen cities across five countries, follows individuals committed to aiding refugees, highlighting the criminalization of humanitarianism and its impact on democratic EU values.

Director, Writer, Cinematography, Producers: Nicolás Braguinsky Cascini, Juan Pablo Aris Escarcena

Production Company: Mandorla Films

Sound Design: Wilmer

Design & Art: Agustin Merlo

Cast: José Antonio “Onio” Reina, Kristina Touzenis, Cédric Herrou, Bastien Stauffer-Cart, Abdul Jalil Isah, Vander & Farmarco, Ousmane Biaback Anoung, José Palazón, Esteban Velázquez, Omar Naji, Alikhali Leigh, Seikou Fofana, Faousto Melluso, Giovanni Maiolo, Luca Quirolo Palmas, Nino Trillo, Julia Melichar, Delia Bounuomo, Manuela Vanzonneveld, Ana Elena Altuna, Roberta Ferruti, Angela & Rosina, Insa Moussa Ba Sané, “Didi”, Ruby Katz

Website: https://facebook.com/SolidarityCrime/

The Great Indian Kitchen

2021, India, Feature Film, Malayalam (with English subtitles), 101 minutes

Screening on: Monday 22nd January, 20:17 – Outdoor Venue

Trailer: https://youtu.be/uydrNjJdE_I

Post her marriage, a woman endeavors to conform to society’s conventional expectations for married women. However, she gradually realizes that this prescribed life is not the one she desires.

Director: Jeo Baby

Associate Director: Swathi R

Production Company: RDC Media

Executive Producer: Omsaran

Producers: Durgaram Choudhary, Neel Choudhary

Script: Jeo Baby

Cinematography: Balasubramanyam

Sound Designer: A. SathishKumar

Editor: Leo John Paul

Cast: Yogi Babu, Kalairani, Poster Nandakumar, Mekha Rajan, Aishwarya Rajesh, Rahul Ravindran, Nimisha Sajayan, Sindhujaavijii, Suraj Venjaramoodu

IMDB: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt13299890/

The Miniaturist Of Junagadh

2022, India, Fiction, Hindi (with English subtitles), 30 minutes

Screening on: Friday 26nd January, 19:40 – Outdoor Venue

Trailer: https://youtu.be/6dsL5ZMIhcA

In 1947, the ramifications of Partition led an elderly artist, Husyn Naqqash, to sell his ancestral home in Western India and relocate with his family to Karachi, Pakistan. Kishorilal, the buyer of the house, discovers Husyn’s renowned stature as a miniature painter and the presence of a valuable collection. Intent on obtaining the collection, Kishorilal finds that there’s a secret surrounding it, kept not only from him but also from Husyn.

Director: Kaushal Oza

Producer: Girish Jotwani, Ashwani Sharma, Nachiket Waikar

Executive Producer: Charu Oza, Rajnikant Oza

Co-Producer: Ranjan Singh

Production Company: Luminoso Pictures

Script: Kaushal Oza

Continuity Department: Vishal Padwal

Script Supervisor: Archana Ghangrekar

Cinematography: Kumar Saurabh

First Assistant Camera: Shashwat Saxena

Second Assistant Camera: Saumya Joshi

Assistant Cinematographer: Prateek Lokhande

Assistant Cinematographer (Second Unit): Navgath Prakash

Sound Mixer: Pradyumna Chaware

Sound Designer: Bigyna Dahal

Boom Operator: Aliullah Khan

Music by: Nayantara Bhatkal, Aditya N., Chhavi Sodhani

Editor: Amit Malhotra

Subtitling Editor: Soham Hazra

Art Direction: Sanjeev Sharma        

Costume Design: Nivedita Das        

Construction Coordinator: Israr Ahmad

Graphic Designer: Siddhi Ashar

Assistant Art Director: Arvind Keshri   

Set Dresser: Anupam Sharma)

Props: Krishna Sharma

Set Designer: Kaushal Thakkar

Property Master: Kaushal Trivedi 

Assistant Costume Designer: Kishor Ojha   

Miniature: Ved Chandra Madesia 

Marketing Manager: Sagar Shah    

Production Design: Nitin Zihani Choudhary

Cast: Babar Imam, Kaushal Oza, Ashish Pandey, Aslam Parvez, Stefan Zweig, Naseeruddin Shah, Rasika Dugal, Raj Arjun, Padmavati Rao, Uday Chandra

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/luminosopicturesindia/

Two Minutes To Midnight

2021, Germany-Netherlands, Fiction, English (with English subtitles), 48 minutes

Screening on: Monday 22nd January, 19:30 – Outdoor Venue

Trailer: https://youtu.be/MJG2hvh7uCA

What if women ruled the world? Yael Bartana stages the question in her performative ‘Two Minutes to Midnight’, where an all-women government of a fictitious country must take a stand on an imminent nuclear threat from a foreign nation.

Director: Yael Bartana

Producer: Yael Bartana, Naama Pyritz

Co-Producer: Zsuzsanna Kiràly

Post Production Producer: Anja Lindner

Executive Producer (Live Performance): Jo Paton

Production Company: Studio Bartana

Script: Alex Barrett

Co-writer: Yael Bartana

Cinematography: Uri Ackerman

Director of Photography: Agnesh Pakozdi, Matan Radin, Claudia Schröder, Sophie Winqvist

Sound Designer: Daniel Meir

Editor: Yael Bartana

Additional Editing: Ayelet Gil Efrat, Daphna Keenan, Michal Oppenheim, Walter Solon

Cast: Olwen Fouéré, Anat Saragusti, Samira Saraya, Jo Martin, Alix Wilton Regan

Website: www.yaelbartana.com

A MAATTRAM (A Change)

2023, 23 minutes, Tamil (with English subtitles)

Screening on: Wednesday 24th January, 20:04 – Outdoor Venue

Trailer: https://youtu.be/eAiHxRYAgJo

How the lives of five different people intertwine and inadvertently change in a single day.

Director, Editor, Script: Yatra Srinivassan 

Cinematography: R. Rajaram

Producer: Saiharini Ramakrishnan, Ramki Seetharaman 

Production Company: HariRam Films in association with Yatra Talkies 

Music: Sada Sudarsanam 

Keyboard: Balaji Gopinath 

Sound Engineer: Gajapathy 

Story Discussion: Ramki Seetharaman, Yatra Srinivassan, Saiharini Ramakrishnan, Stalin Michael, Dennis James, and others

Co-Direction: Ramki Seetharaman 

Art Director: Danasu 

Title & VFX: S. Yuvasri 

Associate Director: G. Udhaicharan 

English Subtitles: Louise Robinson 

Production Support: S. Adhilakshmi, Dr. S. Priyadharashini, Vasantha 

Assistant Directors: J. Jayabharathi, E. Mathivannan 

Cinematography Assistant: HJ. Sanjay

Cast: R. Rajaram, C. Elumalai, V. Jayaraj, Ramalingam Thanikachalam, Ovyer VK. Durai,G. Udhaicharan, R. Raveena  and others

Contact: No. 2, 6th Cross, Bharathi Natar, Pondicherry, 605008 – Tamil Nadu,  India

Email: ramki.seetharaman(at)gmail.com

Website: https://www.yatraartsmedia.org/

Link: https://youtu.be/B5R2QvbS0b4

ADITHALAM (Basic Education)

2023, 37 minutes, Tamil (with English subtitles)

Screening on: Monday 22th January, 21:07  – Cinema Paradiso

Trailer: https://youtu.be/-tJmwyvqPYY

This film emphasizes the importance of basic education for children. Saraswathi is a girl studying in the 6th standard at a government school. She has difficulties reading and writing in Tamil and English. Humiliated by the headmaster, she struggles to even write her name. With the help of Sumathi, the science teacher, Saraswathi gains newfound confidence and becomes the highest achiever in the school.

Director: Yatra Srinivassan 

Producer: EcoPro, Auroville 

Script and Editing: Yatra Srinivassan 

Cinematography: R. Rajaram

Assistant Cameraman: Bharathiraja 

Music & Special Effect: Gajaadhanu – PRG Studios 

Co-Directed and Story by: Ramki Seetharaman 

Art Direction: Dr. S. Priyadharshini, J. Jayabharathi, S. Yuvasri 

Associate Director: M K. LourduG 

Costumes and Makeup: S. Adhilakshmi, J. Jayabharathi 

English Subtitles: Louise Robinson 

Titles & Design: S. Yuvasri 

Production Support: S. Adhilakshmi, R. Tamizh Selvi, Vasantha, R. Ramachandiran, R. Santha 

Assistant Director: Bharathiraja Cast: Dr. S. Priyadharshini, R. Raveena, Yatra Srinivassan, Uvathi Priya, T. Nandagopal, and others 

Dubbing Artists: A. Rani, Oviya Priya, Durai Sree, Gowtham, Thamiz Iniyan, Harish, Yokesh, Balamurali, Anusri, Dhanuja, Sarvitha

Contact: No. 2, 6th Cross, Bharathi Natar, Pondicherry, 605008 – Tamil Nadu,  India

Email: lucasdl(at)auroville.org.in 

Website: https://ecopro.aurovilleconsulting.com/

Link: https://youtu.be/VNt5wa4pOEE

Auroville Exchange: Two filmmakers. Two perspectives. One goal.

2023, 15 minutes, English

Screening on: Tuesday 23th January, 21:00 – Cinema Paradiso

Trailer: https://youtu.be/lavuzyEl2AM

In 2021, an exchange program was initiated by Auroville, an experimental global township located in Southern India. The two participants for the exchange were Lobsang, an environmentalist and filmmaker from Zanskar Valley, Ladakh in the Himalayas, and Serena Aurora, a documentary filmmaker from Auroville. Through this program, Auroville aims to bring together people from different communities, cultures, and walks of life with Aurovillians. The goal is to acquaint them with the culture of Auroville and find a common ground to work towards and nurture human unity. It serves as a window through which an outsider can glimpse into Auroville and see what it offers the world. For an Aurovillian, it provides an opportunity to live in unique communities and regions, learn, and then enrich their own global community in Auroville. This is the first step, with many more to follow. To realize human unity, one needs to reach out, share experiences, absorb experiences, and grow together.

Director: Serena Aurora

Production Company: Aurora’s Eye Films 

Co-Producer: Auroville Learning Exchange

Script: Serena Aurora 

Cinematography: Serena Aurora, Aurovenkatesh, Marko, Waleed, Lobsang 

Audio Postproduction: Kardash, Serena Aurora 

Editing: Serena Aurora 

Additional Crew: Aurovenkatesh, Lobsang, Serena Aurora

Contact: Anitya Community Joy of Impermanence, Auroville, 605101 Tamil Nadu, India

Email: serena_aurora(at)auroville.org.in 

Website: http://auroraseyefilms.com/

Link: https://youtu.be/jII25meOkKI

Crater

2023, 34 minutes

Screening on: Wednesday 24th January, 21:11 – Cinema Paradiso

Trailer: https://youtu.be/Nb4KnTdJHI4

A performer caught in a vicious loop of a stereotype cast in the so-called real-world, comforts himself with the solace he receives from another caring soul in and out of reality, memories and imagination.

Director, Script, Editing: Earthling Koushalya

Production Company: Accessible Horizon Films

Producer: Stanzin Raghu, Iyarkaiyaar Ramesh

Cinematography: Maverick Dass, Auro Venkatesh

DI & Color: Acchor Labs

Audio: Maverick Dass

Sound Mastering: Acchor Studio

Music & Sound Design: Holger Jetter

Production Design: Earthling Koushalya, Barath, Maverick Dass

Location Support: Sou Sou Bee, Ezhilarasan Thara, Jeganathan, Radha Jeganathan

Production Support: Aravindan, Gopinath Ram, Stanzin Raghu, Madhu India, Anbumathi, Christina, Sasikanth Somu, Anand, Bharat, Mithran

Cast: Auro Venkatesh, Stanzin Raghu, Sonu Bharath, Arun, Sou Sou Bee, Gopi, Harish Uthaman, Asha Amma

Stills: Arun

Contact:No. 13, 8th Cross Tagore Nagar, Puducherry, 605101 – Tamil Nadu, India

Email: acchorfilms(at)gmail.com

Website: http://www.accessiblehorizonfilms.com/

ENDANGERED CRAFT MELA AUROVILLE 2023
2023, 2 minutes, English

Screening on: Tuesday 23th January, 19:30 – Outdoor Venue

The Endangered Craft Mela is intended to be a gathering of local craftspeople and children from the Auroville bio-region schools, including outreach schools, after-school programs and children from under-served communities. The children and craftsmen create objects and projects which stimulate hands-on ingenuity and reconnect the children with local cultural traditions. A film by Nefertiti Chakrabarti in collaboration with Fertile community Auroville.

For more information on the upcoming mela, please visit – fertile.org.in

Director, Producer, Camera, Editor: Nefertiti Chakrabarti
Production Company: Jolchhobi
Sound: anonymous local musician

Contact: Centerfield, Auroville, 605101 – Tamil Nadu, India

Email: catchtitli(at)gmail.com

Website: http://jolchhobi.in/

Link: fertile.org.in/ecm

Fallin’

2021, 5 minutes, English

Screening on: Wednesday 24th January, 20:01 – Cinema Paradiso

Two dancers are simultaneously attracted to and repelled by each other, embodying the dynamic of addictive attachment and codependency, commonly categorized in modern culture as the experience of falling in love.

Director: Valentina Beatriz

Production Company: Ineffable Films 

Producer: Valentina Beatriz 

Script and Direction: Valentina Beatriz 

Choreography and Dance by: Gopal Dalami and Valentina Beatriz 

Cinematography: Hemanth Kumar 

Assistant Director: Sarine Arslanian 

Assistant Producer: Huong Pham 

DOP Assistant: Marko Bosco 

Lights / Electrician: Kshitij Bhatt 

Music “Fallin'” by: Alicia Keys 

Edited by: Valentina Beatriz 

Sound Post Production: Valentina Beatriz 

Color Post Production: Hemanth Kumar

Contact: Arati 2, Ground Floor, Auroville, 605101 – Tamil Nadu, India

Email: valentina.beatriz.s(at)gmail.com

Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1QdhSk115qo

Galaxy & Ganesha

2023, 4 minutes, English

Screening on: Thursday 25th January, 20:08 – Outdoor Venue

This film is a strong appeal for peace and human unity within the Auroville community. It shows that a paradox is possible by manifesting the Galaxy from the bark of a tree. Birgitta’s strong images give visual proof that all nature around us is animated and willing to cooperate with us. It is a message to humanity to raise awareness to honor nature and to protect the planet.

Director: Birgitta Volz

Production Company: Unity Pavilion 

Producer: Birgitta Volz 

Script: Birgitta Volz 

Cinematography: Gustavo Barbachano 

Sound: Gustavo Barbachano

Music “Innocence” by Suraj Nepal 

Editing: Gustavo Barbachano, Birgitta Volz 

Additional Crew: Jagan Loganathan, Devashish Diman

Contact: Kalabhumi, Auroville, 605101 – Tamil Nadu, India

Phone: +919442300574

Email: birgittavolz(at)hotmail.com

Website: www.birgittavolz.de

Link: https://youtu.be/xccOHzFslsk

In the Light of Sri Aurobindo – Plays and Savitri in Auroville

2023, 31 minutes, English (with English subtitles)

Screening on: Wednesday 24th January, 19:30 – Cinema Paradiso

This film documents the inner journey of individuals to understand and experience Sri Aurobindo through art, especially theater. It follows the journey of these plays over the last 20 years, along with the inner transformation of the individuals involved. The aim is to document both the outer and inner processes involved in creating these expressions of Sri Aurobindo, with the hope of inspiring others in discovering the unique material Sri Aurobindo offers.

Director: Madhusudan Agrawal

Production Company: MAM Movies

Producer, Cinematography, Sound, Editing: Madhusudan Agrawal

Concept: Aryamani & Madhusudan

Interviews with Aryamani, Aurelio, Michael, Srimoyi, Nidhish, Charu, Khushmita, Deven, Megha, Varun, Anandamayi, Joy, Patricia

Photos: Ireno Guerci, Edoardo Grassi, Manohar, Ashwin, Anonymous.

Video Footage : Manohar, Rakhal, Alessandra

Background Music : Joy

Address: Apt 13, Citadines, Auroville, 605101 – Tamil Nadu, India

Email: mammovies(at)gmail.com

Website: https://www.pilgrimstoryteller.com/sriaurobindo

Link: https://youtu.be/B0YL0QKdnk0

Iniyan

2022, 37 minutes, Tamil (with English subtitles)

Screening on: Friday 26th January, 19:30 – Cinema Paradiso

This film is based on a legend written by Aurovilian Ruud Lohman, tells the story of an elderly Tamil man who traces his lineage back to Lemuria, an ancient island civilization that sank beneath the Indian Ocean thousands of years ago. Iniyan tells Ruud that he carries secrets from the past, awaiting a time when they can be linked to the future of humanity.

Director: Yatra Srinivassan

Production Company: Yatra Talkies & Svaram

Producer: Svaram

Cast: Thiru C. Elumalai, S. Athirathan, J. Ansika, Yatra Srinivassan, Uvathi Priya, and others.

Script, Editing, and Direction: Yatra Srinivassan 

Cinematography: R. Rajaram 

Sound: SFX & Sound Mixing by Gajaadhanu – PRG Studios, Music by Sunil Bhattacharya

Assistant Directors: J. Jayabharathi, D. Sasidaran 

Production Support: S. Adhilakshmi, Dr. S. Priyadharshini, S. Yuvasri 

English Subtitle: Louise Robinson

Contact: No. 2, 6th Cross, Bharathi Natar, Pondicherry, 605008 – Tamil Nadu,  India

Email: aurelio(at)auroville.org.in

Website: https://svaram.org/ ; https://www.yatraartsmedia.org/

ISLAND REVERIE
2023, 5 minutes, English

Screening on: Saturday 27th January, 20:09 – Cinema Paradiso

After several years, a young man returns to the very islands that shaped him, only to realize that a part of him never left.

Director, Script, Editing, Sound Design: Nefertiti Chakrabarti

Production Company: Jolchhobi

Producer: Arnav Kakar and Nefertiti Chakrabarti

Cinematography: 

On Land: Anhjin Kakar, Nirbhay Kuppu, Vikash Nowlakha

Underwater: Arnav Kakar, Nefertiti Chakrabarti

Sound: Pruthu Parab

Editing: Nefertiti Chakrabarti

Music and Mix: Pruthu Parab

Guitar: Ramanan Chandramouli

Voice: Zahan Kapoor

Sound Recordist: Zahaan Adenwala

Executive Producer: Mitali Kakar

Production Manager: Rupesh Salunkhe

Production Assistant: Varun Kakar

Drone: Milind Bhimrao Shirsat, Siddesh Chandrakant Gundye, Ovi Arun Hatkar

Accounts: Shanker Vithoba Mandve

Cast: Jonak Chakrabarti

Contact: Centerfield, Auroville, 605101 – Tamil Nadu, India

Email: catchtitli(at)gmail.com

Website: http://jolchhobi.in/

Link: jolchhobi.in/island-reverie

SEA CHANGE

2023, 3 minutes, English

Screening on: Monday 22nd January, 21:04 – Cinema Paradiso

The “Sea Change” programme is an educational initiative exploring the latest scientific findings on marine plastic pollution. This program offers interactive learning materials comprising games, experiments, and stories, empowering children to become proactive change-makers in preserving our oceans.

Director, Script, Editing, Voice Over, Cast: Nefertiti Chakrabarti

Production Company: Jolchhobi, WasteLess

Production Team: Nefertiti Chakrabarti, Ribhu Vohra, Savarigiri Moorthy (Dinigar), N. Sathiyamurthy

Cinematography: Nefertiti Chakrabarti, Mimi Chakrabarti, Arnav Kakar

Graphics: Neha Nagar, Impprintz

Color: Arnav Kakar  

Drone: The Drone Zone

Music: Palash Kothari (Hedrun)

Sound Mixing: NEPSOUND

Voiceover Recordist: Stefano and Zech

BTS: Ribhu Vohra, Neha Nagar

Contact: Centerfield, Auroville, 605101 – Tamil Nadu, India

Email: catchtitli(at)gmail.com; wasteless(at)auroville.org.in

Link: jolchhobi.in/sea-change ; wastelessindia.org/seachange

Website: http://jolchhobi.in; http://wastelessindia.org

SRI AUROBINDO & THE EARTH’S FUTURE – PART I: FROM DARKNESS TO LIGHT

2023, 144 minutes, English (with English Subtitles)

Screening on: Tuesday 23rd January, 19:32 – Outdoor Venue

This movie tells the extraordinary life of Sri Aurobindo, from his birth in 1872 till he came to Pondicherry in 1910. It covers his childhood in Calcutta, Darjeeling, and England, his life in Baroda after returning to India in 1893, his actions as a secret revolutionary leader, and his complete involvement in the Indian freedom struggle after the partition of Bengal in 1905. Sri Aurobindo, regarded as the first leader to advocate publicly for complete independence from British rule, was considered by Lord Minto, the Viceroy of India, as ‘the most dangerous man’ in the British Empire.

Director, Sound, Editing: Olivier Barot

Production Company: Andakosha Pictures (Auroville), Sri Aurobindo Trust (London)

Producer: Andakosha Pictures (Auroville), Sri Aurobindo Trust (London)

Written and realized by Olivier Barot with the help of Bob Zwicker and Christine Devine

Cinematography: Photography and documents related to Sri Aurobindo & his family: Courtesy Sri Aurobindo Ashram Archives Pondicherry. Photography of Contemporary India, Indian Temples and Sculptures: Olivier Barot

Illustrations: India Letizia

Voice-over: Shrishti Dangi, Hamish Boyd, Aravinda Maheshwari

Contact: Olivier, Revelation, Auroville 605101 – Tamil Nadu, India

Email: olivier.barot(at)gmail.com

Link: https://youtu.be/47yhMAAjRyM

THE BLUE MARBLE

2023, 4 minutes, English

Screening on: Saturday 27th January, 19:30 – Outdoor Venue

The film follows the story of a girl who wants to inspire change and share the latest cutting-edge science on microplastic pollution. She finds change is difficult but in the end discovers the power of education. The film is specially made for the Sea Change Education Programme developed by WasteLess in Auroville and funded in part by the National Geographic Society.

Director, Cinematographer, Sound, Editing, Script: Jeremy Carroll

Production Company: WasteLess

Producer: Ribhu Vohra

Assistant Director: Ranjithoudea

Assistant Camera: Eshan Anderson

Assistant: Savarigiri Moorthy (Dinagar)

Cast: S. Yuvasri, Liladharan

Contact: WasteLess, RE-CENTRE, Auroville Service, 605101 – Tamil Nadu, India

Email: ribhu(at)wastelessindia.org

Website: http://www.wastelessindia.org/

Link: https://youtu.be/08GjC5rkvas

THE BOTTLE’S JOURNEY

2022, 4 minutes

Screening on: Saturday 27th January, 19:30 – Cinema Paradiso

An educational film showing the journey of plastic waste from inland water bodies to the ocean.

Director, Producer, Script, Sound, Cinematography: Jonak Chakrabarti

Production Company: WasteLess

Production – Mimi Chakrabarti, Savarigiri Moorthy

Editing: Qudrat

Cast: K. Keerthana, S. Madhivathani, A. Rohit, N. Sathiyamurthy, Savarigiri Moorthy

Contact: Jonak Chakrabarti, Auroville, 605101 – Tamil Nadu, India 

Email: jonak.joey(at)gmail.com

Website: https://jonak.world

The Clean Up

2023, 9 minutes

Screening on: Wednesday 24th January, 21:02 – Cinema Paradiso

Is the clean-up of the mind the prerequisite for the clean-up of the room, or is it vice versa? It’s all about moving towards the guiding light of the divine.

Directors: Rupam Mishra and Pinar Ekinci

Production Company: Auroapaar 

Producer: Ashavari and Abhyuday (Auroapaar)

Script: Rupam and Pinar 

Cinematography: Archita Wadhwani 

Editing: Ved Murarka

Contact: Humanscape, Auroville, 605101 – Tamil Nadu, India

Email: rupammissra(at)gmail.com

Link: https://youtu.be/_10jpOZkqEg

THE CYCLES OF THE MIND

2023, 65 minutes, English (with English subtitles)

Screening on: Saturday 27th January, 20:50 – Outdoor Venue

The film made by Ilion-Auroville explores the influence of cosmic forces on the human brain and on the whole direction of our civilizations. It proves that humanity is going through cycles of change and development exhibiting different patterns depending on which force – separating or unifying – is predominant at a particular historical period. A fascinating journey through history and an answer to the question of what our immediate future is going to be like!

Director: Alexander Pereverzev

Production Company: Ilion-Auroville

Producer: Claude de Warren

Script: Based on the book “The Cycles of the mind throughout the history of humanity” by Claude de Warren

Cinematography: Piero Cefaloni

Original Score: Hartmut von Lieres 

Background Music: Hania Rani, Jesse Gallagher

Editing & Image Processing: Piero Cefaloni, Sanjay Mohanachandran

Script Consultant: Claude de Warren

Narrators: Miko Sloper, Asha Krishnan, Lakshmi Dhanaraj, Charles Atkinson, Malcolm Griot

Special Thanks for Assistance in Image and Video Selection: Elka Sinha

Contact: Ilion-Auroville, Savitri Bhavan, Auroville, 605101 – Tamil Nadu, India

Email: ilion(at)auroville.org.in

Website:https://www.greekmyths-interpretation.com

Link: https://www.youtube.com/atilion7264

The Galaxy Project

2023, 11 minutes, English

Screening on: Friday 26th January, 20:19 – Outdoor Venue

The first part of Birgitta’s Galaxy Project is an artistic feast of colors and sound projecting us into the universe. It is amazing to see the birth of Birgitta’s bark print images, their artistic completion, and their digital evolution into a fusion with the cosmic soundtrack by Caroline Cohen. It is followed by a fascinating explanation of how those magical bark prints manifest. Birgitta’s fractal deity images are quite unbelievable and suggest that nature is animated and willing to cooperate with us.

Director: Song-Wan Park

Production Company: Aurofilm 

Producer: Birgitta Volz 

Script: Birgitta Volz 

Cinematography: Song-Wan Park, Birgitta Volz 

Sound: Song-Wan Park

Original Music: Caroline Cohen 

Editing: Song-Wan Park, Birgitta Volz

Additional Crew: Damien Salens, Devashish Diman, The Drone Zone

Aurofilm Team: Surya, Susanna, Abhijit

Contact: Kalabhumi, Auroville, 605101 – Tamil Nadu, India

Email: aurofilmteam(at)gmail.com

Link: https://youtu.be/zT1rcPCu3Mo

The Path of the 12 Petals: Shanta, an Initiatic Journey

2023, 38 minutes, English

Screening on: Thursday 25th January, 19:30 – Outdoor Venue

Trailer: https://youtu.be/87ysyQxkskE

Responding to an inner call, Chantal Gowa (Shanta), arrived in Auroville in 1991, her son and her painter’s catalog under her arm: she was supposed to pass by for just a week. Three days later, she met Roger Anger, who, struck by her paintings, immediately asked her to work with him, first at the Matrimandir, then at the realization of the Petals. Realizing the twelve Petals then became Shanta’s mission. It would last thirteen years and revealed itself as a magnificent tool of evolution and transformation. After thirty years, Shanta tells us this story.

Director: Michèle Decoust

Production Company: French Pavilion 

Producers: Claude Jouen, Jean Pietri, Patricia Lachaud 

Script: Michèle Decoust, Alessandra Silver 

Cinematography: Alessandra Silver 

Music by Frédéric Chopin, Claude Debussy, Interpretation by Heinrich K. Weihrauch, Recording by Coriolan Weihrauch 

Editing: Alessandra Silver

Cast: Chantal Gowa (Shanta)

Contact: New Creation Community, Auroville, 605101 – Tamil nadu, India

Email: latarasque84(at)orange.fr

Website: https://auroville.org/page/french-pavilion

THE STORY OF MICROPLASTIC

2022, 3 minutes, English

Screening on: Saturday 27th January, 20:38 – Outdoor Venue

An educational film describing the formation of microplastics from plastic waste.

Director, Producer, Script: Jonak Chakrabarti

Production Company: WasteLess

Editing: Qudrat

Sound: Auroville Radio

Tamil Voice Over: Yatra Srinivassan

Animation: Suvajit Roy

Translation: Savarigiri Moorthy

English Voice Over: Manas Chakrabarti

Contact: Jonak Chakrabarti, Auroville, 605101 – Tamil Nadu, India

Email: jonak.joey(at)gmail.com

Website: https://jonak.world

THIRAI VIRUTHAM (Curtain Poesy)

56 minutes, Tamil (with English subtitles)

Screening on: Wednesday 24th January, 20:06 – Cinema Paradiso

The documentary film Thirai Virutham delves into Therukkoothu, the folk performing art that thrives in Southern India, especially in North Tamil Nadu. Sugumar Shanmugam, a research scholar from a Therukkoothu family background, compares Western Acting Theories and Acting Strategies in Therukkoothu using his experiences and explorations.

Director, Script: Sugumar Shanmugam

Editor, Audio Mixing: Dheeparajan S.A.

Funded by India Foundation for the Arts

Cinematography: Gowtham Abi

Camera Assistants: Vishal.M, Anif

Other Cameramen: Aravind, Kannan, Mohan, Jackie Sheraf, Kavin

Drone Camera: Black Nerve Studios

Music Design, Sound Mastering: Suren Sekaran

Singer & Music Composer: Dr. P. Samanaraja

Live Sound: Naru Parai Isai

Sound: Sandeep Kumar

Title Kootthu Song Singers: Dr. P. Murugavel, Suren Sekaran, Azhagar

Production Manager: V. Bremnath

Production Coordinators: Satheesh, Vinoth

Key Cast: Sugumar Shanmugam and others

Contact: Department of Performing Arts, Pondicherry University 605014 – Puducherry, India

Email: pondicherrytheatreartsacademy(at)gmail.com

Turning Waste into Money in the Himalayas

2023, 8 minutes, English

Screening on: Saturday 27th January, 20:41 – Outdoor Venue

Can we look at waste not as waste but as something useful? In this video, we try to explore that path with Rohit Joshi. As the population and tourism grow in the Himalayas, the problem of waste is exploding. Additionally, the number of military personnel has increased manyfold due to troubles at the border. Sustainable solutions for waste management are the need of the hour. This film depicts some solutions found in the Himalayas which can easily be replicated anyplace where there is a culture of use-and-throw rather than repair and reuse. The only way forward is to create value from waste to motivate people to do the right thing by recycling. Making recycling sustainable and profitable, economically and for planet Earth…

Director: Serena Aurora

Production Company: Aurora’s Eye Films 

Producer: Serena Aurora 

Script: Serena Aurora 

Cinematography: Serena Aurora, Waleed, Digonta Bordolai 

Sound: Kardash 

Music: Onyx Music – Arise; Ben Winwood – Tibet; Mystic Flute – Enchanting Rain 

Editing: Francis Tessier 

Additional Crew: Aurovenkatesh 

Starring: Rohit Joshi

Contact: Anitya Community Joy of Impermanence, Auroville, 605101 Tamil Nadu, India

Email: serena_aurora(at)auroville.org.in

Website: http://auroraseyefilms.com/

Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r2VBkoDIE3g

When Goupi Met the Mother Mirra Alfassa and Found Home

2023, 6 minutes, English

Screening on: Saturday 27th January, 20:02 – Cinema Paradiso

In this video, Goupi tells his story about how he met the Mother in the early 1960s. Mirra Alfassa, who founded Auroville in her later years, was a spiritual guru, recognized by Sri Aurobindo as the Mother and became the mother of Auroville. As a young Parisian, Goupi was in search of spirituality and yoga, which led him to the Mother’s son in Paris and then ultimately to Mother in Auroville. In 1966, he came for a two-month visit to Sri Aurobindo’s Ashram, and then to Auroville, and never left. He had found his spiritual home.

Director: Serena Aurora

Production Company: Aurora’s Eye Films 

Producer: Serena Aurora 

Script: Serena Aurora 

Cast: Goupi 

Color Grade: Aurovenkatesh 

Cinematography: Aurovenkatesh & Serena Aurora 

Sound & Audio Post Production: Kardash 

Editing: Serena Aurora 

Additional Crew: Christine Roland, Jean Louis

Contact: Anitya Community Joy of Impermanence, Auroville, 605101 Tamil Nadu, India

Email: serena_aurora(at)auroville.org.in

Website: http://auroraseyefioms.com/

Link: https://youtu.be/VkBdoXrdM14

Official Selection in the category “films made about Auroville”

KOLAM
2023, 28 minutes, English

Screening on: Saturday 27th January, 19:37 – Cinema Paradiso

Kolam is an experimental art film directed by Saumya Srivastava. This film reveals the hidden pearls of Auroville, an international township which aspires to embody human unity. Prepare to be captivated by a contemplative journey, as Kolam aims to capture the quintessence of Auroville. Immerse yourself in the beauty of Auroville as you are guided to unexpected places through a captivating non-verbal narrative. 

Director: Saumya Srivastava

Production Company: Blue Drop Pictures

Executive Producer: Seshadri Venkatesan

Writer: Saumya Srivastava

Cinematographer: Seshadri Venkatesan

Assistant Cinematographer: Vishal Nair

Music Composer: Pranjal Gupta

Editor: Emanuel Savio, Rajat Kumar, Rohan Kapoor 

Assistant Editor: Aman Thakkar

Technical Head: Abhishek Kanjilal

Contact: Blue Drop Pictures, D 291, Defence Colony, 110024 – New Delhi, India

Email: saumya(at)bluedroppictures.com

Website: http://www.bluedroppictures.com/kolam

Official Selection in the category “films made by students of Auroville or the bioregion”

MEAT THE VEGAN

2023, 34 minutes, English (with English subtitles)

Screening on: Wednesday 24thJanuary, 19:30- Outdoor Venue

The film is about Veganism and explores the differences in everyone’s eating preferences. The story is told through an exchange between a couple of friends meeting after a long time by means of sharing interviews conducted by a Vegan Aurovilian through her journey of adopting Veganism.

Director: Mélusine Schellenberger

Production Company: Aurofilm Productions

Producer: Surya C. Rimaux

Script: Snehal D Roy

Cinematography: Gustavo Barbachano, Damien Salens

Sound: Gustavo Barbachano

Editing: Damien Salens

Creative Director: Abhijit Roy

Production Assistant: Abhijit

Mentorship: Damien

Cast: Rotem Abady, Shaily Shah, Prerana Das

Shot in: Marc’s Coffee and Aurofilm Studio

Contact: Kalabhumi, Auroville, 605101 – Tamil Nadu, India

Email: luluschellen(at)gmail.com

Website: https://auroville.org/page/Aurofilm

Entries for the international category of “Films that develop the theme of human unity” are to be submitted via FilmFreeway.

Films for the three local categories

“Films made by Aurovilians, bioregion residents or guests of Auroville“,

“Films made about Auroville / bioregion”

and “Films made by students of Auroville / bioregion”

are to be entered using the submission form on this website.