‘Load Wedding’ nominated at Indian Film Festival

Mehwish Hayat, Fahad Mustafa starrer will be competing for Best Feature at upcoming event

DUBAI: The critically acclaimed, Fahad Mustafa and Mehwish Hayat-starrer Load Wedding has been nominated as the Best Feature by the Jaipur Film Festival in India.

Speaking to The Express Tribune, the film’s writer and director Nabeel Qureshi said, “It feels great to be nominated! It’s a prestigious film festival and we really hope we win.” Producer Fizza Ali Meerza also responded to the nomination saying, “It’s very humbling and it already feels very rewarding”.

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The Jaipur Film Festival – started in 2009 – receives thousands of film submissions from countries around the year. The 11th edition of the event will be held in Jaipur from January 18 to January 22 and Qureshi and Meerza will be attending.

Load Wedding was fun-filled watch with a strong message regarding one of the drawbacks of South Asian societies: dowry. The film depicts the love story of a young man named Raja (played by Mustafa) who cannot get married due to various family responsibilities. One of these is trying to get his sister Baby (played by Faiza Hasan) married off.

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Baby Baji is overweight and due to Raja’s bleak economic conditions, his family cannot afford a lot of dowry. He himself wants to marry Mehru (Hayat) and his mother (Samina Ahmed) is scandalised by the idea that he would want to marry before his sister.

Another highlight of Load Wedding was a heroine who goes against society and eventually becomes a polio worker. The film also had guest appearances from Mohsin Abbas Haider, Hania Aamir and the soundtrack of the film was composed by Shani Arshad.

Load Wedding released in August this year. It marked Qureshi and Meerza’s fourth collaboration with Mustafa and third time working with Hayat.

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