Hindi
Life of Pi to premier in India at IFFI 2012
New Delhi: The Central and Goa Governments have allocated a budget of Rs 90 million for the 43rd International Film Festival of India which will be inaugurated by versatile actor Akshay Kumar.
The festival being held from 20 to 30 November will have the Indian premiere of Academy Award Winning Director Ang Lee‘s much awaited film ‘Life of Pi‘. The film‘s worldwide theatrical release is slated for November 23.
Eminent Polish film maker Krzysztof Zanussi, will be conferred the Life Time Achievement Award at the Festival, which this year will have a special Centenary Award which will be decided by an independent jury.
The inauguration will feature a medley choreographed by Maestro Saroj Khan and songs sung by Kailash Kher. Kher said he will be performing only on the Hindi film songs, keeping in view the celebration of 100 years of cinema.
Information and Broadcasting Minister Manish Tewari has said the Centre will work towards making the forthcoming International Film Festival of India (IFFI) Goa a self sustainable event.
Speaking over the weekend in Panaji, he said the Ministry will work towards this goal after the conclusion of IFFI 2012. The premier Festival is currently being financed by the Union and Goa government.
“I agree with the spirit (that festival should be self sustainable). There is road to travel. Once we are through with this festival, we will see how possibly can make this happen,” the Minister said.
Since the time IFFI moved to Goa as a permanent venue in 2004, efforts have been made to ensure that it is made self sustainable.
The Taiwanese born American Director Ang Lee and the cast and crew of the film that includes Tabu, Irrfan Khan and the main lead and debutante Suraj Sharma will be present.
The ‘Life of Pi‘ which is based on an adapted screenplay of a novel by the same name by Yann Martel, is a 3D adventure film telling the story of a 16 year old Piscine Molitor Patel (Pi) of Pondicherry (Puducheri), who survives a shipwreck along with animals like an orangutan, a zebra, a hyena and a Royal Bengal Tiger. The film explores the issues of spirituality, religion and life as a whole.
Ang Lee is the man behind some of the most prestigious and acclaimed films such as Sense and Sensibility (1995), Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000), Hulk (2003) and Brokeback Mountain (2005). His latest film, Life of Pi, besides providing a global platform for Indian artistes, also explores some of the scenic spots in India, including the countryside of Munnar and the French elegance of Pondicherry. During his interaction with the media, Ang Lee admitted that experiments like his are helping change the stereotype perceptions about Indians and the Asians in mainstream Hollywood.
Hindi
Remembering Gyan Sahay, the lens behind film, television and advertising
From a puppet rabbit selling poppadums to Hindi cinema, he framed it all.
MUMBAI: There are careers, and then there are canvases. Gyan Sahay, the veteran cinematographer, director, and producer who passed away on 10 March 2026 in Mumbai, had one of the latter. Over several decades in the Indian film and television industry, he turned lenses, lights, and the occasional puppet rabbit into something approaching art.
A graduate of the Film and Television Institute of India (FTII) in Pune, Sahay built his reputation as a director of photography across a career that stretched from the early 1970s all the way to the digital age. He was the kind of craftsman who understood that a well-composed shot is not merely a technical achievement but a quiet act of storytelling.
For most Indians of a certain age, however, Sahay will forever be the man behind the rabbit. His direction of the iconic long-running television commercial for Lijjat Papad, featuring its now-legendary puppet bunny, gave the country one of its most cheerfully persistent advertising images. It was the sort of work that sneaks into the national subconscious and takes up permanent residence.
His big-screen credits as cinematographer include Anokhi Pehchan (1972), Pagli (1974), Pas de Deux (1981), and Hum Farishte Nahin (1988). In 1999, he stepped behind a different kind of camera altogether, making his directorial debut with Sar Ankhon Par, a drama that featured Vikas Bhalla and Shruti Ulfat, with a cameo by Shah Rukh Khan for good measure.
On television, Sahay was particularly prized for his command of multi-camera production setups, a skill that made him a go-to technician for large-scale shows and reality programmes. In an industry that has never been especially patient with complexity, he was the calm hand on the rig.
In later life, Sahay turned teacher. He participated regularly in masterclasses and Digi-Talks, often hosted by organisations such as Bharatiya Chitra Sadhna, sharing hard-won wisdom on cinematography, the comedy of timing in a shot, and the sweeping changes brought by the shift from celluloid to digital. He was also said to have been involved in a project concerning a biographical film on Infosys co-founder N.R. Narayana Murthy.
Tributes from the film industry poured in following the news of his passing, with colleagues remembering him as a senior cameraman who served as a rare bridge between two entirely different eras of Indian cinema. That is, perhaps, the finest thing one can say of any craftsman: he kept up, and he brought others along with him.
