3rd i

Big in Bollywood
2012-09-30 15:30 (America/Los_Angeles) | Camera 12, 201 S 2nd Street, San Jose, CA, United States
Watch Trailer
Funny and irreverent, Big in Bollywood documents Omi Vaidya’s ascendency from an aspiring Indian American actor in Hollywood to a megastar in far away Bollywood. When 27-year-old American-born Omi, a struggling actor in L.A. miraculously lands a dream role in the Bollywood ﬁlm 3 Idiots (2010), his curious friends, armed with cameras, ﬂy to Mumbai to film and document his big premiere and better understand the world of Bollywood. Within a week of release, 3 Idiots skyrockets to the top of the box office, becoming the most successful Indian ﬁlm of all time. From relative obscurity to the heights of Bollywood stardom, Omi finds himself in the company of Bollywood stalwarts like Aamir Khan. While Omi deals with the challenges of new found fame and struggles with cultural competency in the strange, new world that is Bollywood — between language classes, calls to his wife back in the United States, a press tour that routinely gathers tens of thousands of people — he cheerfully greets strangers on the street who know him only as the “fourth idiot.”

Special Screening: Ashim Ahluwalia's "Miss Lovely"
2013-02-28 19:00 | New People Cinema, 1746 Post Street, San Francisco, CA, 94115, United States
3rd i Films is pleased to be a community partner for the Global Film Initiative and SFFS presentation of
Ashim Ahluwalia’s Miss Lovely
When: February 28, 7 pm
Where: New People Cinema
Tickets: $5 (with discount code: 3RDMEM)
Running Time: 110mins
Language: Hindi with English subtitles
Followed by an in-depth Q&A with the filmmaker, moderated by 3rd i’s Ivan Jaigirdar
Delving deep into the underbelly of India’s film industry, where back-alley producers churn out everything from pulpy horror movies to soft-core porn, Miss Lovely takes us back to Mumbai of the 1980s with lurid detail and intoxicating style. Working out of sleazy hotels and abandoned warehouses, brothers Sonu (Nawazuddin Siddiqui) and Vicky (Anil George) are prolific producers of trashy, C-grade films for Mumbai’s booming underground market. But this precarious partnership is put to the test when the brothers meet Pinky (Niharika Singh), an exquisite ingenue with a shady past.
For more information on the program and to purchase tickets, please visit the listing on the SFFS website.

3rd i co-presents CSAS' presentation of "The Mahabharata"
2013-03-16 17:00 | Chevron Auditorium, International House, UC Berkeley, Berkeley
3rd i Films is pleased to copresent
Center for South Asia Studies‘ (UC Berkeley) presentation of
The Mahabharata: A Re-Telling of an Indian Epic Poem by Jean-Claude Carriére
When: March 16, 5-8pm
Where: Chevron Auditorium, International House, UC Berkeley
Tickets: See link below for ticket information
Renowned French playwright, screenwriter, author, actor and raconteur par excellence Jean-Claude Carrière spent eleven years in India, tracing the Mahabaharata’s roots in civilization, geography and its relevance in modern India. His nine-hour magnum opus, The Mahabharata, opened in 1985 under the stellar direction of his lifetime collaborator Peter Brook and an international cast, and quickly became a watershed moment in theatrical history across the Western world. Jean-Claude Carriére gives Bay Area audiences a simple but powerful one-man rendition of the story of Mahabharata, in the style of the old wandering minstrels of India.
For more information on the program and for tickets, please visit: http://southasia.berkeley.edu/events/JCC.pdf

3rd i co-presents films at CAAMFest 2013
2013-03-17 - 2013-03-23 | Various
3rd i is pleased to co-present, with the Center for Asian American Media (CAAM), three films at CAAMFest in San Francisco, an 11-day celebration of film, music, food and digital media from the world’s most innovative Asian and Asian American artists.
The Reluctant Fundamentalist: Mira Nair’s The Reluctant Fundamentalist chronicles the life of a Pakistani man altered by 9/11. From New York City in 2001 to Lahore ten years later, Changez (Riz Ahmed) loses his grip on the American Dream and ends up disillusioned with the country he used to love.
March 17, 2013
12:00 pm
Castro Theatre, San Francisco
Reluctant Fundamentalist Panel
March 23, 2013
4:00 pm.
Union Bank Community Room, San Francisco
Midnight’s Children: Auteur Deepa Mehta (Water, SFIAAFF ’06) returns to the festival with her much-anticipated collaboration with writer Salman Rushdie, an adaptation of his award-winning novel Midnight’s Children. Born at the exact moment of India’s independence, Saleem leads “midnight’s children,” those born in India’s first hour, all with magical powers.
March 17, 2013
6:00 pm
Castro Theatre, San Francisco
Dosa Hunt: What happens when you put pianist Vijay Iyer, music critic Amrit Singh, and members of Das Racist, Vampire Weekend, Yea-sayer and Neon Indian into an Indian disco van to track down NYC’s best dosa? Plenty of Bobby Jindal jokes, heartfelt extolling of the virtues of coconut-hair oil, and even more in this journey deep into the heart of that virtuous South Asian crepe.
March 21, 2013
6:00 pm
Asian Art Museum of San Francisco
For more information about these films or CAAMFest, check out the website. Details on all the films are under the Festival Guide tab.

3rd i Films & AIF co-present an evening of Films and discussion on Education in India
2013-04-04 19:00 | Artists’ Television Access, 992 Valencia Street, San Francisco, CA, 94110, United States
AIF (American India Foundation) in association with 3rd i Films presents two short films followed by discussion.
Films: Lucky, directed by Avie Luthra and Kunjo, directed by Terrie Samundra (more info below).
When: Thursday, April 4th, 7pm – 8:30pm
Where: ATA, 992 Valencia Street, San Francisco, CA 94110
Tickets: Available on the night of the event, at the door.
Lucky
Directed by Avie Luthra, 20 min (UK/South Africa)
Lucky is an AIDS orphan desperate to leave his rural Zulu village in South Africa for the bright lights of Durban, and also to get an education there. He is full of excitement and hope but Lucky has to learn about life the hard way, not through school or education but through an unlikely bond with a prejudiced Indian elderly women.
*Lucky has won 43 international film festival awards and was shortlisted for an Oscar.
Kunjo
Directed by Terrie Samundra, 25 min (US/India)

Forced to work to support her family, Kunjo, a 12-year-old refugee, spends her days begging on the streets. When an unlikely friendship blossoms with Preeta, an educated school girl from a higher caste, Kunjo reveals her secret passion for storytelling. Faced with betrayal and the complexity of an unconventional friendship, will Kunjo stand up for herself or submit to her place in society?
*Winner, Best Narrative Short, Athens International Film Festival.

3rd i Films is pleased to present Art for Partition
2013-04-06 11:30 - 18:00 | UC Berkeley Skydeck, 2150 Shattuck Ave, Berkeley, CA, United States
A FREE event – April 6, 2013
Presented by 1947 Archive
Discover untold stories of South Asia’s 1947 Partition. Engage through lectures, discussions, music, poetry and art. Support the preservation of first-hand accounts by bidding on donated art works or attending the benefit luncheon.
When:
11:30 am – Benefit Luncheon | Buy tickets
2:00 pm – FREE Event – Understanding Partition | Reserve Free tickets
4:00 pm – FREE Film Screening – Earth 1947 | Limited Seating – Reserve Now!
Where: UC Berkeley Skydeck | 2150 Shattuck Ave, Berkeley, CA
Enjoy stunning 360-degree bay views from the penthouse ballroom.
View the art gallery online! | Browse and bid now | Ends April 6 @ 6:30 pm
Further info here.

3rd i co-presents at SFIFF
2013-05-02 - 2013-05-09 | Various
Salma
Directed by Kim Longinotto
Veteran British documentarian Kim Longinotto’s latest work is the remarkable story of Salma, a South Indian Muslim woman who endured a 25-year imprisonment and forced marriage by her own family and in-laws before embarking on a political career and national renown as the most famous female poet in the Tamil language. (England/India, 2013, 90 min)
When/Where
Thursday, May 2, 6:15 PM – Sundance Kabuki Cinemas
Saturday, May 4, 2:00 PM – Pacific Film Archive
Sunday, May 5, 3:45 PM – New People Cinema

The Last Step
Directed by Ali Mosaffa
A Tehran engineer who’s mysteriously died, his actress wife (Leila Hatami of A Separation) and their physician friend form an ambiguous triangle in actor/director/writer Ali Mosaffa’s fascinating Iranian feature. It’s an enigmatic drama in which time and truth are slippery beasts whose gamesmanship nonetheless never lacks for emotional connection. (Iran 2012, 88 min) New Directors Prize Contender
When/Where
Saturday, May 4, 7:00 PM – New People Cinema
Wednesday, May 8, 6:15 PM – New People Cinema
Thursday, May 9, 1:00 PM – New People Cinema
For more information, visit the SFIFF website.

3rd i presents "From Mutiny to Bengali Harlem: Stories of the Diaspora"
2013-05-17 19:30 | New People Cinema, 1746 Post Street, San Francisco, CA, 94115, United States
(aka “Vivek Bald’s Films and Stories”)
Vivek Bald, writer, filmmaker, and MIT professor, reads from his new book Bengali Harlem and the Lost Histories of South Asian America and presents clips from his work-in-progress, the film In Search of Bengali Harlem, and an excerpt from his rarely seen 2003 documentary Mutiny: Asians Storm British Music, about South Asian youth, music, and anti-racist activism in 1970s-90s Britain.
Vivek Bald in person
San Francisco event
When: Friday, May 17, 7:30 pm
Where: New People Cinema, Japantown
1746 Post St., San Francisco, CA 94115
Cost: $12
Buy tickets online!
The program lasts for 1.5 hours.
More details below.

Mutiny: Asians Storm British Music (dir. Vivek Bald, 2003)
Combining music documentary and social documentary, Mutiny: Asians Storm British Music charts the meteoric rise of South Asian electronic music in 1990s Britain, focusing particularly on the decades of cultural cross-pollination and political struggle that led up to that pivotal decade. Shot independently on digital video between 1996 and 2002, Mutiny features Asian Dub Foundation, Talvin Singh, Fun^Da^Mental, Anjali, State of Bengal, and many others, documenting a crucial moment in the cultural and political coming-of-age of Asian Britain.
“Concert footage, TV clips, interviews and more are briskly interwoven into an energetic documentary.” –Variety
“Great fun – a journey through some of the most historic moments of the diasporic musical movement.”
–Gurinder Chadha, Bend It Like Beckham
Bengali Harlem and the Lost Histories of South Asian America
(Harvard University Press, 2013)

In the final years of the nineteenth century, small groups of Muslim peddlers arrived at Ellis Island every summer, bags heavy with embroidered silks from their home villages in Bengal. The American demand for “Oriental goods” took these migrants on a curious path, from New Jersey’s beach boardwalks into the heart of the segregated South. Two decades later, hundreds of Indian Muslim seamen began jumping ship in New York and Baltimore, escaping the engine rooms of British steamers to find less brutal work onshore. As factory owners sought their labor and anti-Asian immigration laws closed in around them, these men built clandestine networks that stretched from the northeastern waterfront across the industrial Midwest.
The stories of these early working-class migrants vividly contrast with our typical understanding of immigration. At a time when Asian immigrants were vilified and criminalized, Bengali Muslims quietly became part of some of America’s most iconic neighborhoods of color, from Tremé in New Orleans to Black Bottom, Detroit, from West Baltimore to Harlem.

3rd i co-presents at AHSC Cinema Showcase
2013-05-18 14:00 - 16:00 | Asian Art Museum, Samsung Hall, 200 Larkin St, San Francisco, CA, United States
3rd i co-presents with CAAM at the 3rd Annual Asian Heritage Street Celebration (AHSC) Cinema Showcase.
3rd Annual Asian Heritage Street Celebration (AHSC) Cinema Showcase

Date: Saturday, May 18th, 2013
Time: 2 pm to 4 pm
Location: Asian Art Museum, Samsung Hall, 200 Larkin Street
Admission to the museum will be free all day and there is no additional cost to watch the films! Click here for the full schedule of films.

3rd i co-presents "The Island President" at the EPA
2013-05-21 11:30 - 13:00 | EPA, Arizona-California Room, CA, United States
As part of The EPA (Environmental Protection Agency Region 9) Asian American/Pacific Islander Heritage employment program, 3rd i co-presents The Island President at the EPA. May 21, 2013.

3rd i Films co-presents at the SF Green Film Festival
2013-06-01 18:30 | CA, United States
Powerless
Fahad Mustafa and Deepti Kakkar, India, 2013
English and Hindi with English subtitles.
Sneak Preview.
When: Saturday, June 1, 6:30 pm
Where: New People Cinema, Japantown, SF
Would you risk your life to flip a switch? In Kanpur, India, putting oneself in harm’s way to deliver electrical power is all too common, especially for Loha Singh. He earns his living by giving electricity to those who can’t afford it, splicing lines from paying utility customers. While an admirable feat against the Goliath power company that charges well beyond reasonable fees to the people of Kanpur, Loha’s actions perpetuate the problems of the city by lessening the power supply — an amount that is distributed based on the number of paying customers. The situation intensifies for both parties and feeds into a vicious cycle of supply and demand. Somewhere in the middle of this battle is Ritu Maheshwari, the power company’s woman-in-charge, caught between two sides that do not share her understanding that change comes slowly and in increments. Powerless sheds light on the opposing corners of this political ring, from Singh’s electrical Robin Hood, tapping wires for neighbors, to the myopic utility company whose failure to understand economics forces it deeper into financial disarray. This vibrant exposé gives a whole new meaning to the words “power struggle.”
For more information on the programs and to purchase tickets, please visit the SF Green Film Festival website.

3rd i presents "Bollywood Divas"
2013-06-08 19:00 | Artists’ Television Access, 992 Valencia Street, San Francisco, CA, 94110, United States
Bollywood Divas: Queering Desi Cinema
by Kareem Khubchandani and Anuj Vaidya

When: June 8 (Saturday), 7pm
Where: ATA, San Francisco
Cost: $10 online; $12 at the door
(online ticket sales at: bollywooddivas.brownpapertickets.com)
An evening of satire, comedy and drop-down drag Bollywood ‘ishtyle’!!
In Khubchandani’s LESSONS IN DRAG, Professor Lahore Vagistan, a drag queen attempting to make it from the Chicago Stage to the Bollywood Screen, educates her classroom about the day’s topic, Fillum. By combining ethnographic interviews, works of fiction by queer South Asian novelists, comedic drag sequences inspired by Bollywood, and improvised audience interaction, Kareem stages the many ways in which film becomes a tool of survival for marginal subjects.
Vaidya’s BAD GIRL WITH A HEART OF GOLD finds the artist in conversation with his own film of the same name. The performance explores the genealogy of the vamp in Bollywood — from her origins in the Jewish stars of early Indian cinema and culminating in the iconic roles of the anglo-Indian actress Helen in the 60s and 70s. The performance weaves many of Helen’s signature roles together to pose the question: Can Helen escape her perpetual death by Bollywood?
Presented in collaboration with the APICC’s United States of Asian America Festival and QCC’s National Queer Arts Festival
This program was supported by:

3rd i is pleased to support the SF Ethnic Dance Festival
2013-06-15 20:00 | Lam Research Theater, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, 701 Mission Street, San Francisco, CA, 94103, United States
When: Saturday, June 15th, 8pm
Where: Lam Research Theater
Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco

3rd i is honored to co-present at Frameline37
2013-06-21 21:30 | Roxie Theater, 94103
3rd i is honored to co-present CHUPPAN CHUPAI / I AM GAY AND MUSLIM at Frameline37, the San Francisco International LGBT Film Festival.
When: Friday, June 21, 9:30 PM
Where: Roxie Theater, San Francisco
3117 16th Street, San Francisco, CA
Chuppan Chupai director Saad Khan in person.

These two docs— one set in Pakistan and the other in Morocco — challenge viewer preconceptions about being both Muslim and gay.
I AM GAY AND MUSLIM
“My sexuality doesn’t harm my religion. I am Muslim and my sexuality keeps me Muslim.” With these words, one of the subjects of I Am Gay and Muslim gives lie to the idea that being gay and being Muslim are antithetical to each other. Director Chris Belloni follows several young men in Morocco, all of whom try to reconcile their multiple identities as gay, as Muslim, and as Moroccan. Though homosexuality is illegal in Morocco there is still space for gay men to live and love one another, and some, like 21 year-old Rayan, do so openly. His and the other stories on display in this beautiful portrait of Moroccan gay culture explode the myths about what it means to be gay and to live in the Muslim world.
— MORDECAI STAYTON
Preceded by CHUPPAN CHUPAI
Chuppan Chupai (Hide and Seek) follows the lives of four LGBT Pakistanis: activist Neeli, flighty but “famous” Kami, shy Waseem, and Jenny, a transgender woman who struggles with her transition. All live under the specter of Pakistan’s sharia laws forbidding homosexuality. Throughout the film, their lives in the urban centers of Lahore and Rawalpindi are shown to be alternately joyous and painful— symptomatic of life around the world.
More info and tickets

3rd i is pleased to co-present "The Ode"
2013-07-03 18:00 - 21:00 | Delancey Street Screening Room, 600 Embarcadero, San Francisco, CA, United States
3rd i Films is pleased to co-present The Ode
a part of Trikone Bay Area‘s DesiQ 2013
Where:
Delancey Street Screening Room
600 Embarcadero, San Francisco
When:
Wednesday, July 3
6pm-7pm
Reception with hosted wine, sparkling water and hors d’oeuvres; book signing of “Ode to Lata” by Ghalib Shiraz Dhalla.
7pm-9pm
Screening of The Ode, based on the novel Ode to Lata by Ghalib Shiraz Dhalla, starring Sachin Bhatt (Bombay Dreams), Wilson Cruz and Sakina Jaffrey. The screening will be followed inmediately by a Q&A with Ghalib Shiraz Dhalla, who co-wrote the screenplay for the movie, and Sachin Bhatt in person.
Tickets:
Tickets are $15 (complimentary for registered participants of DesiQ 2013), available at the door, and include admission to the reception, film screening and Q&A. Cash only.
For more information about Ghalib Shiraz Dhalla or “Ode to Lata”, visit www.ghalibdhalla.com.
The screening is presented as part of DesiQ 2013, a conference on South Asian lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender issues. This will be Trikone’s fourth such conference since 1995. For information about the DesiQ 2013 conference, visit www.desiq.org.

3rd i Co-presents at Laborfest
2013-07-26 19:30 - 22:00 | Unnamed Venue, 518 Valencia Street, San Francisco
3rd i Films co-presents at
Laborfest, the FilmWorks United International Working Class Film & Video Festival
BHOPALI
With introduction by Dr. Jaysi Chander
In 1984 in Bhopali, India, at the Union Carbide plant, a deadly gas leak killed over 20,000 people. The company now owned by Dow Chemical refused to properly maintain the safety equipment in the plant, and their criminal negligence cost the lives of workers and members of the community. Today, hundreds of thousands of Bhopal families are still suffering from this man-made catastrophe, and are fighting for compensation and justice.
It was the worst industrial accident in the world, yet, Union Carbide executives have not spent a day in jail, and Dow refuses to properly care of the thousands of workers and their families who are still suffering for their cutting of costs.
This film was made to continue to struggle to break the information censorship by the corporate media.
Continuing industrial disasters show that these corporations are not only out of control, but also flagrantly engaged in practices leading to the murder of workers and residents in the drive for greater profits at any cost.
Also on the Program:
THE MACHINIST
50mins, 2010
Directed by Hannan Majid & Richard York
This important film shows the story of Bangladeshi garment workers by following three Dhaka garment workers. It looks at their everyday lives, their struggles at home, the constant battles they face with their factory owners, and puts a face to the men and women who make clothes for GAP, Walmart, and other companies. The owners of these factories, who are also in the Bangladesh parliament, have murdered union organizers and violently prevent their workers from gaining any labor and human rights.
Through illuminating the lives of these workers, the film explains why the recent industrial disasters are a logical result of the corruption and corporate control of the government of Bangladesh.

3rd i co-presents at CAAM Festival in San Jose
2013-08-18 17:00 | Camera 3, 288 S 2nd St., San Jose, CA, 95113, United States
Let’s Be Out, the Sun is Shining is about a romantic Indian-American girl named Diya who falls in love with a hip Brooklyn bartender, Paddy, to whom everyone is disposable and no relationship is meant to last. Diya becomes immersed in his world of struggling actors/musicians/artists who live potentially displaced in Bushwick, a Latino immigrant neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York.
Sunday, August 18th at 5 pm at Camera 3 Cinema.
Tickets can be purchased via CAAM’s website here.

Deewaar: Bollywood Under the Stars
2013-08-30 21:00 | India Community Center, Lotus Room, 556 Los Coches St, Milpitas, CA, 95035, United States
Join 3rd i Films and ICC, Milpitas for an outdoor screening of Yash Chopra’s classic Deewaar. Bring a blanket and a picnic dinner and come prepared for our special dialogues contest and sing-along.
The story of two brothers, one a criminal (Amitabh Bachchan) and the other a police officer (Shashi Kapoor), who go head-to-head is a quintessential Bollywood-style face-off between good and bad. Known for its excellent dialogues and stylish editing, Deewaar was a box office phenomenon on par with Sholay! The film also reflected the concerns and frustrations of a young India epitomized by Amitabh Bachchan as the Angry Young Man, and Parveen Babi as the face of the new liberated Indian woman. Deewaar was awarded the Filmfare Best Picture award in 1975 cementing its place in the history of Indian cinema as one of the top twenty-five films of all times.
Please register for this free event by sending an email with your name and the # of tickets you would like to outreach3rdi@gmail.com

The Revolutionary Optimists
2013-11-06 19:15 - 23:00 | CA, United States
Filmmakers in person!
Emmy-nominated Bay Area filmmakers Monsen-Grainger and Newnham capture the inspiring stories of young South Asians as trail-blazing agents of change. In the slums of Calcutta, Amlan Ganguly and his proteges – Shika, Salim, Kajal and Priyanka – use street theater, dance, and data as their tools to mount vaccination drives for polio, turn garbage dumps into playing fields, and conduct education campaign around health issues. It’s truly extraordinary to bear witness to the undeniable sea change Ganguly has set in motion.
With short: Bhiwani Junction (Abhi Singh, India/USA, 2013, 18mins), about a young boy’s dreams of becoming a star pugilist.

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Mohammed to Maya
2013-11-07 19:15 | CA, United States
Filmmakers in Person!
Meet Maya Jafer (formerly Mohammed): a Tamil, Muslim originally from Chennai, India. Incredibly accomplished, Maya has two doctorates in holistic medicine and a successful professional career in Los Angeles. Jeff Roy’s intimate documentary follows one year in her life as she travels to Thailand to undergo sexual reassignment surgery. Throughout her transition, Maya battles to redefine her spiritual and cultural devotion, and to maintain her faith. A perceptive and engaging take on modern rites of passage, and the difficulties of letting go and starting new again.
With short: Performing Girl (Crescent Diamond, USA, 2013, 25mins), a portrait of acclaimed Sri Lankan transgender performance artist D’Lo.

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These Birds Walk
2013-11-07 21:30 | CA, United States
PLEASE NOTE:
• All ONLINE TICKETS to this film are now sold out.
• There will be a LIMITED number of tickets available AT THE DOOR.
• Please arrive EARLY (we recommend at least 45 mins before showtime) to ensure that you get a ticket.
• RUSH tickets will be released 10 mins prior to the start time of the film.
In Karachi, Pakistan, a runaway boy’s life hangs on one critical question: where is home? A lyrical, ethereal portrait of youth and street-life in Karachi, this stellar piece of cinema verite is simultaneously heart-wrenching and life-affirming. Seen through the eyes of an ambulance driver and a runaway boy, the film is an ode to childhood and has been rightfully compared to Truffaut’s The 400 Blows. Produced by the Sundance Film Institute, this is one film that should not be missed!

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Peddlers
2013-11-08 19:15 | CA, United States
Filmmaker in Person!
Representative of the new wave spawned by indie-guru Anurag Kashyap, this stylish psychological thriller set in Mumbai, tells the tale of two young drifters caught in Mumbai’s seedy narcotics world. Hot on their trail is a rookie cop whose sexual impotence drives him to frustration and violence. Bala’s vision conjures up a powerful and dramatic finale, where the destinies of all three players collide. The film had an explosive debut at Cannes’ Critics Week last year.

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Simple Superstar
2013-11-08 21:50 | CA, United States
Filmmaker in Person!
Wilbur Sargunaraj, India’s first YouTube star, makes his feature debut! Witness the creative genius of this “champion for the common man,” as he takes on bullies in the street, counsels young lovers, and sings about the mouth-watering “Chicken 65!” Through all the twists and turns, Wilbur delivers a sharp reading of India’s divise class and caste structures. Part autobiography, part road trip, and part instructional video, this wacky musical will have you laughing and cheering for the simple man from Southern India. The film was entirely crowd-sourced, and the cast and crew is made up of Sarunaraj’s social media followers.

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Beyond All Boundaries
2013-11-09 13:00 | Castro Theatre, 429 Castro Street, San Francisco, CA, 94114, United States
Filmmaker in Person!
Producer Kunal Nayyar (of The Big Bang Theory fame) in person!
For Prithvi (a boy wonder who hopes to be the next Sachin Tendulkar), Sudhir (a fanatic who bikes across India from game to game), and Akshaya (a young girl who sees the game as a way out of poverty), cricket is a religion. The doc follows the story of these three characters, leading up to the World Cup of Cricket in the spring of 2011, and chronicles their struggle to celebrate this beloved sport against overwhelming odds in life. Both entertaining and enlightening, this is a window, not just into the world of cricket, but also into life in India in the 21st century.

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Gulabi Gang
2013-11-09 15:30 | Castro Theatre, 429 Castro Street, San Francisco, CA, 94114, United States
Filmmaker in Person!
Nishtha Jain (City of Photos, Lakshmi and Me) returns to the Bay Area with this thriller disguised as a documentary! In Bundelkhand, India, a revolution is in the making as the fiery women of the Gulabi Gang take up the fight against gender violence, caste oppression and widespread corruption. Undeterred by sneering policemen and condescending bureaucrats, founder Sampat Pal leads the pink sari-clad women on a remarkable, and impressive crusade for truth and justice. Watching this documentary makes one want to redefine the term “heroine” in Indian films!

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Good Morning Karachi
2013-11-09 18:30 | Castro Theatre, 429 Castro Street, San Francisco, CA, 94114, United States
Filmmaker in Person!
Sumar, best known for her astonishing feature Silent Waters, makes a triumphant return with this uplifting tale. Chance and willfulness propel Rafina’s rise as a fashion model in the city of Karachi. As she climbs the social ladder, Rafina is caught between two men with very different visions for Pakistan and on the role of women. In Sumar’s deft hands, this becomes the story of today’s Pakistan, trying to reconcile the demands of tradition and the aspirations of modernity. The film weaves these contradictions through the very landscape of Karachi, where political extremism and the world of fashion can – and do – co-exist.
Followed by: an on-stage conversation between Sumar and Anusha Rizvi (director of Peepli Live) on the changing role of women in South Asian cinema.

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3rd i's Castro Reception with the Filmmakers
2013-11-09 20:15 | Castro Theatre, 429 Castro Street, San Francisco, CA, 94114, United States
Join us for a special reception at the Castro Mezzanine where you’ll get to meet all the festival filmmakers up close and personal! Enjoy food and drinks, get your photograph taken with our celebrity guests and let the DJ get your feet wet for our Bollywood at the Castro screening.
3rd i’s guest list for the 2013 festival includes:
• Kunal Nayyar (of The Big Bang Theory fame), producer of Beyond All Boundaries
• Nishtha Jain from Bombay and Sabiha Sumar from Karachi
• indie directors Vasan Bala (from India) and Prasanna Vithanage (from Sri Lanka)
• from the Diaspora, Canadian filmmaker Wilbur Sagunaraj and British filmmaker Pratibha Parmar
• and a host of California voices including the LA-based D’Lo, Sushrut Jain, Meena Nanji, Maya Nasser, and Jeff Roy, and the SF-based Cary McClelland, Crescent Diamond, Amit Dubey, Shane Gill, Cara Jones, Arpita Kumar, Maren Grainger-Monsen, Nicole Newnham, and Abhi Singh.
Music by DJ Gandharv
Food provided by:

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Shuddh Desi Romance
2013-11-09 21:15 | Castro Theatre, 429 Castro Street, San Francisco, CA, 94114, United States
Bollywood at the Castro!
A remarkably fresh comedy, with lots of sizzle and eye candy to boot! Two professional wedding guests, with commitment issues, find themselves in a modern desi love triangle that’s anything but conventional. In fact, for anyone raised on Bollywood’s classic love stories, this contemporary take may prove delightfully shocking. Rising star Parineeti Chopra is charming and vivacious, television heartthrob Sushant Singh Rajput is unassumingly sexy. Bollywood-veteran Rishi Kapoor is a ‘mustachioed’ delight, and the city of Jaipur sets a gorgeous backdrop for the film. Official Selection, Toronto International Film Festival 2013.

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Celluloid Man
2013-11-10 12:00 | CA, United States
A celebration of 100 Years of Indian Cinema, and a must-see for cinephiles and Indian history enthusiasts! Over 12,000 films have been preserved, since the National Film Archive of India was founded in 1964. However, over the last 40 years, in a culture that is apathetic to the artistic value of cinema, the archive has grown increasingly dilapidated. Featuring interviews with the veritable who’s who of the Indian film industry, Dungarpur creates a compelling portrait of the NFAI’s heyday and of P.K. Nair — the founder of the National Film Archive of India and a man with a passion for celluloid.

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With You, Without You (Oba Nathuwa, Oba Ekka)
2013-11-10 15:15 | CA, United States
Filmmaker in Person!
Acclaimed Sri Lankan director Vithanage skillfully transposes Dostoevsky’s The Meek Ones to post-war Sri Lanka, to create this moving meditation on the trauma of war. When lonely pawnbroker Sarathsiri meets the enigmatic Tamil refugee Selvi – he thinks he has finally found a way to escape his past. But a chance visit from an old army friend reveals a terrible secret and forces the two lovers, from opposite sides of the civil war, to confront their histories and demons. With a tight script, wonderfully nuanced plot and haunting cinematography, this is Sri Lankan independent cinema at its best.

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