NEW DELHI: Mukti Bhawan (called as Hotel Salvation) has bagged the UNESCO XXIIIrd Prix "Enrico Fulchignoni" at the Venice International Film Festival.
The jury said: The award to the film by Shubhashish Bhutiani was being given "for the values finely expressed on the importance of family, time spent together in respect and with love, and those values of human rights which we all share. The maturity and depth of emotions and cinematic vocabulary used to display these belie the young age of the director, and we look forward to seeing many more of his films in the future.”
The film – which received a 10-minute ovation after its screening at the festival -- is a part of the Biennale College-Cinema program at the Venice Film Festival which gives support since 2012 to the young filmmakers to bring their vision to the big screen and, in this case, the effort has borne marvelous fruit."
CICT-Unesco Jury comprised Jasmina Boijc (founder and director UNAFF, Stanford University), Pierpaolo Saporito (President of OCCAM, the UN Observatory on Cultural Communication and v.president of CICT-UNESCO, Gabriel Griffin-Hall (Author and Poet), and Eliana Bantchev (CICT-UNESCO General Secretary Delegate).
In the past, the Prix Enrico Fulchignoni was awarded to, among others: 'Beasts of No Nation' by Cary Fukunaga, 'Miral' by Julian Schnabel, 'Land of Plenty' by Wim Wenders, 'Tsion, Auto-emancipatie' by Amos Gitaï or 'Porto da minha infancia' by Manoel de Oliveira.
Three years ago, Shubhashish Bhutiani’s short film Kush had won the Orizzonti Award for Best Short Film.
The audience in Venice this time was carried away by this universal story of love, redemption and mourning.
When Daya, a 77 year old man, wakes up from a strange nightmare, he knows his time is up and he must get to Varanasi immediately in the hope of dying there to attain salvation. His dutiful son, Rajiv, is left with no other choice but to drop everything and make the journey with his stubborn father, leaving behind his wife and daughter.
The two of them check into Mukti Bhawan/Hotel Salvation, a hotel devoted to people hoping to spend their last days there. Rajiv finds himself having to live and take care of his father for the first time in his life.
The festival which began on 31 August concluded today (10 September 2016) and this film was scheduled for three public and delegate screenings on 2 and 3 September apart from one web streaming.
The 103-minute film stars Adil Hussain (Life of Pi), Lalit Behl, Geetanjali Kulkarni, Palomi Ghosh, Navnindra Behl and Anil K Rastogi.
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