3rd Dharamshala International
Film Festival (DIFF)

Santanu Ganguly

The Dharamshala International Film Festival (DIFF) started just three years ago but, within a small span of time, it has become one of India’s most important and most discussed film festivals. In the third edition of DIFF, among fiction feature films, actor/director Rajat Kapoor’s ‘Aankhon Dekhi’ describes the story of Bauji, a 55 years old man who lives a dreary but eventful life in a small house in old Delhi. He lives in a joint family that shares a small house cramped with people and drama. One day, Bauji decides that he has been blind all his life – following other people’s truth. He decides that from now on, he would not believe anything that he has not experienced.

His truth will be the truth of his own experience. He would only believe what he sees with his own eyes, nothing else can be certain. People at home don’t take him very seriously at first. His neighbours call him mad, people laugh at him, but Bauji can‘t be deterred from his path. Bauji faces quite a few obstacles in his journey but never loses sight of what is before his eyes. Hansal Mehta’s film ‘Citylights’ is about a debt-ridden young man, Deepak, along with his small family, who leaves the quiet of his rural existence seeking a better future through the city of dreams, Mumbai. The dream of an improved life and aspirations for an income that will alter the quality of his life soon come crashing down as he finds city of lights casting a dark shadow on his survival.