Month-long festival of Indian movies in China

New Delhi, June 21 (IANS) India will showcase in China a month-long event and an exhibition documenting the journey of its cinema to mark 60 years of diplomatic ties between the two countries.

The festival will be inaugurated at the Broadway Cinematheque Moma in Beijing June 24 after which it will travel to Chongqing July 6-12 and Guangzhou from July 16-22.

The festival will be complemented by an exhibition that will trace the history of Indian cinema from the silent era of the 1913 to contemporary Bollywood that has become a billion dollar industry globally and an Asian entertainment giant.

A delegation of 20 representatives from the industry including Yash Chopra, Bobby Bedi, Rahul Bose, Aparna Sen and Manmohan Shetty will attend the inauguration.

The festival, a part of the Year of India in China bouquet, will be hosted by the Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR) and a non-profit cultural promotion umbrella, 'Routes to Roots'.

The 10 movies as well as the exhibition have been divided into three categories - the silent era, contemporary era and the golden era.

'Posters, collages and audio visual footage will script the journey of Indian cinema from the first silent feature film, Raja Harishchandra by Dadasaheb Phalke in 1913 followed by the talkie cinema 'Alam Ara' in 1931. The festival will begin with the screening of Bollywood hit 'Oye Lucky Lucky Oye' and followed by regional films chosen by the Directorate of Film Festival,' Rakesh Gupta, director of 'Routes to Roots', said.

Gupta said a book on Indian Cinema in Chinese will be released to 'spread awareness about the rich legacy of Indian cinema to the people of China who are familiar with Bollywood'.