Shankar’s Fairies, Once Upon A Time In Calcutta to be screened at New Directors/New Films

The 51st edition of New Directors/New Films (ND/NF) will showcase two Indian features, Irfana Majumdar’s Shankar’s Fairies and Aditya Vikram Sengupta’s Once Upon A Time In Calcutta, as well as the Bengali short Madhu.

Presented by the Film at Lincoln Center (FLC) and The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York, where the films will be screened, the festival is being held from 20 April to 1 May. This year’s lineup includes 26 features and 11 shorts; 21 of the directors are women.

La Frances Hui, curator at the department of film at MoMA and the 2022 ND/NF co-chair, stated, “Portraits of individuals and communities navigating uncertain and turbulent circumstances in pursuit of freedom, self-determination and survival set a remarkably contemplative tone to the lineup. This year’s new directors look inwards and draw on events past and present to reflect on our collective humanity. Together, these films reaffirm the creative power of cinema to see, critique and inspire the way we live.”

Once Upon A Time In Calcutta was premiered at the 78th Venice International Film Festival as the only Indian film at the festival. It competed in the Orizzonti (Horizons) section.

Meanwhile, Majumdar’s debut film Shankar’s Fairies was premiered at the 74th Locarno Film Festival in Switzerland last July. It was showcased in the Concorso Cineasti del Presente section of the festival.

Both Indian films will have two screenings at the festival. Tanmay Chowdhary and Tanvi Chowdhary's Bengali short Madhu follows two childhood friends who reunite in their 20s at a Durga Puja festival. The short was screened at the International Film Festival of Rotterdam earlier this year.

New Directors/New Films will open with Audrey Diwan’s Happening, which won the Golden Lion at last year’s Venice International Film Festival, and close with the world premiere of Martine Syms’s debut film The African Desperate.

“This year’s edition opens and closes with two memorable features, directed by Audrey Diwan and by Martine Syms, proving how essential cinema can still be both as an art form, and as a means to shake convictions on political, social, racial and gender issues. The committee is thrilled to showcase these intense and brilliant portraits, conveying distinct and singular female experiences and keeping open dialogues between artist and audience,” said Florence Almozini, FLC senior programmer at large and 2022 New Directors/New Films co-chair.

The feature selection for this year’s edition was made by a committee that included Almozini, La, Dennis Lim (FLC), Rajendra Roy (MoMA), Josh Siegel (MoMA) and Tyler Wilson (FLC), while the shorts were programmed by Brittany Shaw (MoMA) and Maddie Whittle (FLC).