The best of India and the Middle East, now at the Dharamsala Film Festival.
'Sonakshi Sinha, Imran Khan and other stars say MFF is their film festival. In reality, the festival belongs to Mumbaikars, who wait in long lines, rushing from theatre to theatre.'
'After living in the US for over three decades, where I would spend Diwali nights with close friends and eat Indian meals, I have recently started to return home during the festival. But none of that old Diwali exists for me.'
'When the phone's battery is running out, it will make a charming statement like "I'm feeling a little low. Please recharge me".'
'When I least expect it, I start to find traces of India in foreign lands.'
Brilliant movies from China, Ethiopia, Austria and India line up for Mumbai.
Kanu Behl's Titli is one of the best films from India in recent years, says Aseem Chhabra from the Zurich film festival.
It is always wonderful to discover a gem of film at an international film festival. It is even more exciting when that film is from India.
Aseem Chhabra picks his favourite movies from the Telluride Film Festival.
'That night -- when Gandhi won Best Picture at the 1983 Oscars -- belonged to India and it meant a lot to a young student like me, who was trying to establish his Indian identity among the Americans around him.' Aseem Chhabra/Rediff.com, who worked as an extra on Richard Attenborough's acclaimed biopic, salutes the late legend.
'I realised I didn't have to wait for a spectacular event or a character to emerge. All stories of ordinary people, of your family, are extraordinary,' novelist Yasmeen Premji tells Aseem Chhabra/Rediff.com
Can a film and the voice of its actor really influence us, and change our lives? I like to believe so, says Aseem Chhabra.
The Hundred-Foot Journey treats its Indian characters with respect, discovers Aseem Chhabra/Rediff.com
>What happens when two teenagers -- one Israeli and one Palestinian -- discover that they were accidentally switched at birth? The Other Son is a wonderful vision of Israel and Palestine. There is no positive future for the region and its people without this vision, feels Aseem Chhabra.
Aseem Chhabra mourns the passing of the gentle and knowledgeable Mr K D Singh, who owned a quaint bookshop in New Delhi.
Why has a nation created on strong secular principles slowly chipped away those essential values? Why are so many Indians willing to compromise their freedoms and those of their compatriots for the cause of economic progress and to see a shining India,' asks Aseem Chhabra.
2 States, for all its modern touches, is a very regressive film, deeply rooted in old fashioned values that surely make no sense in the India of 2014.
'I wish I could find a party that could offer the best of the three parties,' best-selling novelist Chetan Bhagat tells Rediff.com's Aseem Chhabra in New York.
'It is rare that a Hindi language film delivers so much promise in the first half. And so it is extremely disappointing when the director and his script lead us on the journey that starts to meander and eventually fizzles out, collapses and dies in front of our eyes.'
'We are blessed, that in this age of crass, commercial filmmaking, there is a special corner reserved for Wes Anderson to inhabit this wonderful, magical life. And we thank him from the bottom of our hearts for letting us experience his dreams in full colour and grandeur,' says Aseem Chhabra after watching The Grand Budapest Hotel.
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