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South Asians Take Pride at the CNE
By Shailendra Prasad
TORONTO - Bollywood’s highest-earning film
about Indian farmers winning a cricket match against colonial rulers has
been invited by a dozen film festivals worldwide, the director said.
The period film, “Lagaan” (Land Tax), will be screened at the
prestigious Toronto film festival on September 8. “We have been
invited to screen at 15 film festivals. But the dates would overlap so
we have to make a choice to exhibit the
film at a few events,” Gowarikar, who will attend the Toronto festival
next week, told Reuters.
The film which stars Bollywood’s hot favourite Aamir Khan is a story
about the triumph of the human spirit showing farmers fighting against
the imposition of a tax by British rulers. Khan plays the role of a
farmer leading the cricket team of 11 players. Gowarikar said the film
would be screened in Chicago, Bangalore in southern India and at the
Cairo international film festivals this year.
“I’m quite excited about going to Toronto. Every film festival has
its own tradition and a different attitude,” he said elated by the
response of both young and old movie buffs. Back after winning the
“Prix du Public” (audience award) for
the film at the Locarno screening in Switzerland last month, he said,
“the film had three more screenings on public demand.”
The director said he was happy that overseas film viewers, who were not
as crazy about cricket as Indians or were unused to seeing a
three-hour-long movie, had accepted the film as he had conceived it -
the farmers’ fight against oppression. “The film is a combination of
several genres coming together,” he said.
The director will be joined in Toronto by Khan who is on a promotional
tour of the film in the United States with the “Lagaan XI” cricket
team which includes the cast and lead actress Gracy Singh. The team will
visit Canada and Britain later and perform a total of 22 stage shows.
Wearing period costumes, they do skits and sing songs from the film.
Khan strikes the ball into the stands and autographs his bat for the
audience in keeping with the movie’s story, said Gowarikar. Closer to
home, Khan has tied up with a biscuit company and created a contest for
lucky winners aged between seven and 60 to form a cricket team to play
against the “Lagaan XI” in a match to be held on December 23 in
Mumbai. (Source: India Journal)
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