MUMBAI: The annual Jakarta International Film Festival (JiFFest) now in its 11th year is set to kick off this weekend.
Highlights from this year‘s festival are plentiful, including the fact that this is the first time ever that the open night film will be Indonesian itself. The film, Sang Pemimpi (The Dreamers), is the sequel to Indonesia‘s biggest box-office hit of all time, Laskar Pelangi (The Rainbrow Troops) that was released last year.
The film festival will close with an invitation-only screening of "New York, I Love You."
JiFFest will also include a Madani Film Festival, which will focus on films that have an Islamic theme. Interestingly, the Swiss Embassy will be doing some damage control with a Swiss Design in Hollywood Exhibition Master Class.
The Congeniality award will go to Balibo, an Australian film depicting the murder of the Balibo 5, a group of journalists who were allegedly killed by the Indonesian military during the country‘s 1975 invasion of East Timor.