The 13th edition of Pune International Film Festival (PIFF) was inaugurated yesterday on January 8 by Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis at CityPride, Kothrud.

Over 350 films will be screened, during the festival, which is scheduled to be held from January 8 to January 15. The festival opened with a French film, Timbuktu, directed by Abderrahmane Sissako.

In the coming week, the jury members, comprising of eminent filmmakers like Krzysztof Zanussi (Poland), Kiran Nagarkar (India), Fernando Colombo (Spain), Helmut Groschup (Austria), Marcel Gisler (Switzerland), Marco Simon Puccioni (Italy), Peter Tweihuas (Germany) and actress-writer Nandana Sen (India) will assess over 250 films competing in different categories.

“We are looking forward to this year’s edition where we have short-listed 14 films in each category. Our jury members will select a film from each category and the winning film will be showcased on the closing day,” said Jabbar Patel, chairman, PIFF.
“Elizabeth Ekadashi, Yellow and Prakash Baba Amte are some movies shortlisted in the Marathi section,” he added.

In the International Films category, the movie, Court, which bagged the Best Director award at the Singapore Silver Screen Awards, is touted to be strong competition to foreign films from countries like UK, Israel and France.

PIFF will also screen movies by students from various film-making institutes, including those from Film and Television Institute of India (FTII).
A total of 56 films will be screened at 14 theatres as part of the Pune International Film Festival, a first for the festival.