The film festival will continue during the weekend.
The three-day annual Dallas/Fort Worth South Asian Film Festival (DFW SAFF) will begin on March 3.
The event-night opens with A Billion Colour Story, directed by Padmakumar Narasimhamurthy and produced by Satish Kaushik.
A Billion Colour Story has received rave reviews at major festivals such as the Busan International Film Festival, BFI London Film Festival, Jio MAMI Mumbai Film Festival and the Palm Springs International Film Festival. The film takes on religious intolerance through the eyes of a half-Hindu and half-Muslim boy.
“We are excited and honored to welcome the Texas premiere of this film at our festival,” said Jitin Hingorani, founder and festival director in a news media statement.
“Race and immigration have, unfortunately, become such hot-button issues in our current political climate, and if a schoolboy can navigate through these topics in a film, we certainly hope our governments can attempt to do the same,” Hingorani added.
This is the third annual festival by DFW. This year’s event will be held in Perot Museum in Downtown Dallas (March 3) and AMC Village on the Parkway 9 (March 4, 5).
“Our short films make up more than 50 percent of our programming this year because the genre has really been gaining momentum in South Asia,” Artistic Director Ambica Dev said. “Our other highlights include our focus on Marathi regional films and our Indo-Pak programming, curated to commemorate India and Pakistan’s 70th year of independence in 2017.”
This year’s short films include:
- Yellow Tin Can Telephone, directed by Arunima Sharma
- Silvaat, directed by Tanuja Chandra.
- Lala Begum, directed by Mehreen Jabbar
- Guddu Engineer, directed by Nikhil Advani
- Mochi (the cobbler), directed by Saqib Pandor. Produced by Anurag Kashyap
- Babu’s Dilemma, directed by Collin D’Cunha
- Priyanath, directed by Anietie Antia-Obong
- Jacob’s Pond, directed by Sasha John.
- Mast Qalandar, directed by Divij Roopchand
- Syaahi, directed by Varun Tandon
- Amishi, directed by Malinda Kaur
- Leeches, directed by Payal Sethi
The Early Bird Festival Pass, which will provide admission to all the films, networking events and after parties, are on sale for $ 150 at: www.dfwsaff.com.