Hindi
IFFI competition should strive for premiere films: Dan Wolman
PANAJI: International Jury member Dan Wolman feels the International Film Festival of India (IFFI) should strive at getting only new films that have not been to other festivals for its competition section.
Films which have won awards at other festivals can be screened in the World Cinema section, he said, taking part in the last Open Forum at the current Festival on ‘Success of Film Festivals: Quality of films‘.
He wanted IFFI to take pride for what it had achieved, instead of always trying to compare itself with Cannes or Berlin. He said IFFI is already one of the top festivals of the world, but a lot has to be done to take it to the very top. He said the ambience is good, the selection is very good, and there is no reason why India should not be able to attract the best films from the world over particularly as it has such high prize money.
He felt that delegates from overseas should work as some kind of ambassadors for IFFI when they go back, and the Indian missions could also play a major role in this respect.
He said film culture can grow if cinema studies are introduced at the school or college levels, and wanted the IFFI Secretariat to invite the best in the world for master classes or workshops.
Renowned filmmaker AK Bir who is also a member of the Steering Committee said Festivals are voyages of discovery and one get to see films made in the cultural milieu of their country of origin.
Eminent filmmaker Laxmikant Shetgaonkar regretted that there is little representation of India in foreign film festivals. But he wanted to know if India should replicate Cannes or have its own identity. The aim should be to use the festival to improve the quality of Indian films.
Referring to media reports, he said not getting enough sponsors is no reason for shifting the Festival from Goa.
Referring to some complaints, he said the IFFI this year is in a changing phase having been separated from the Directorate of Film Festivals. Furthermore, the local arrangements are the responsibility of the Entertainment Society of Goa. He agreed that the ESG should take films to other parts of the state.
Both he and U Radhakrishnan who moderated the Open Forum said there should be a separate section for Konkani cinema.
Hindi
Jio Studios unveils AI-powered Krishna teaser at NAB Show 2026
Global first look of Krishna uses Galleri5 AI pipeline on Azure, Historyverse slate as Jio’s Dhurandhar crosses Rs 3,000cr worldwide.
MUMBAI: Krishna has just dropped a divine teaser and this time the gods are powered by silicon, not just scripture. Jio Studios and Collective Studios’ Historyverse stole the spotlight at the NAB Show 2026 in Las Vegas with the world’s first teaser for their upcoming theatrical feature Krishna, directed by Manu Anand. The big reveal happened during Microsoft’s keynote “Powering Intelligent Media, From AI Experimentation to Real-World Impact,” where the film’s AI-native production pipeline took centre stage alongside Collective Artists Network’s in-house platform, Galleri5.
At the heart of this mythological spectacle lies a fresh cinematic workflow built by Galleri5 on Microsoft Azure’s advanced AI and cloud infrastructure. Forget bolting AI onto traditional VFX or animation, this is an end-to-end, production-grade system woven into every layer: world-building, character creation, shot design and final output. Yet the storytelling remains firmly director-led, emphasising emotional depth, stillness, music and performance rather than pure spectacle. The result? Large-format theatrical cinema rooted in Indian history and culture, but conceived in ways that were simply not possible before.
Collective Artists Network runs Galleri5 natively on Azure, leveraging Microsoft Foundry and cutting-edge AI tools to handle film, episodic and advertising workflows in a secure enterprise environment. Microsoft highlighted Collective as a “Frontier” organisation successfully moving AI from pilot projects to real production-scale deployment in cinema. The technology is also on display at Microsoft’s NAB booth in the West Hall (Booth W1731).
Jio Studios (Media & Content Business, Reliance Industries), president Jyoti Deshpande said the project advances the studio’s mission to take Indian stories global with scale, ambition and authenticity, “With Krishna, we are embracing cutting-edge AI-led filmmaking while democratising these tools to make them more accessible, intuitive and cost-effective for storytellers everywhere.”
Collective Artists Network founder & group CEO Vijay Subramaniam added, “We’re using technology developed in India to carry our culture and history to audiences worldwide at a scale never seen before.”
Microsoft, vice president for telco media & entertainment, gaming Silvia Candiani noted that the media industry has reached an inflection point, “AI is no longer about experimentation but delivering real impact at production scale… By building AI-native creative systems on Microsoft Azure, Collective exemplifies how storytellers can unlock new formats, move faster and realise a true return on intelligence while keeping human creativity at the centre.”
Krishna forms part of Historyverse, Collective Studios’ ambitious slate of history and culture-driven IPs. The slate draws from iconic figures and traditions that shaped the Indian subcontinent, including stories inspired by Kali, Karna and Durga. It builds on the already-released Mahabharat: Ek Dharmayudh series, showing how ancient narratives can be reimagined for modern screens.
Jio Studios, India’s leading content studio and the media and content arm of Reliance Industries, continues its blockbuster run. The studio’s Dhurandhar franchise led by Dhurandhar and Dhurandhar: The Revenge has become the first Indian film series to cross Rs 3,000 crore worldwide. It also delivered three consecutive years of India’s highest-grossing Hindi films: Stree 2 (2024), Dhurandhar (2025) and Dhurandhar: The Revenge (2026). In just eight years, Jio Studios has assembled a library of over 160 films and series, with more than 60 titles winning over 500 awards. Other notable successes include Laapataa Ladies (India’s official Oscar entry 2025), Stree, Article 370, Shaitaan and Mrs.
The NAB unveiling marks another step in Jio Studios and Collective’s push to blend Indian storytelling talent with frontier technology proving that the future of cinema may well be both ancient in spirit and thoroughly modern in execution. For audiences who love epic tales with a fresh twist, Krishna promises to deliver divine drama, this time with a little help from the cloud.
