Children’s Film Festival: International shorts connect with young audience

Showing 90 films from all over the world to children of different age groups.

ISLAMABAD:

Delighted squeals and laughter echoed at Rawalpindi Cinepax as the young audience settled down to enjoy the first screening of The Children’s Film Festival on Monday. Aimed to create awareness for peace and tolerance through films, the event opened to a packed house of excited children.

The festival has been organised by The Little Art, a non-profit organisation that aims to promote learning for children through creative mediums. About 90 movies have been selected from 400 international entries received from all over the world. The festival will feature films from 26 different countries which have been picked keeping in mind the younger audience.

It was interesting to observe that the children could be seen comparing the short films to their own everyday examples. ‘This is Pakistan’s future’, yelled some 14 year olds while watching a short film about a man employed as a ‘doormat’ who is going on with his daily routine of laying around for people to step over him.

A German short film ‘The boy and the beast’ brought a hush to the audience. The film was about a boy narrating how he has to take care of his mother who has turned into a beast. Symbolism was used to depict parents’ behaviour during a painful divorce/separation and how it affects children; the mother therefore was portrayed as an upset grouchy ‘beast.’

Some of the films that have been screened are One Rat Short (USA), Hugo (Australia) and The Employment (Argentina). Foreign movies have sub-titles in English. Almost all films conveyed a message. With a bit of humour thrown in, the movies managed to captivate the audience till the very end. “We understand the message behind these movies and it was good fun watching the films with all our friends,” said Ayesha Naaz, a student of class 9 from The City School.

Over 200 invitations were sent to schools all over Islamabad and Rawalpindi, however majority of those who were attending comprised students of The City School, Beacon House and Frobel’s . The ticket cost Rs200 (food coupons not included). There were time slots recommended for different age groups, though the older crowd being a more intelligent audience seemed harder to please mostly enjoying the smarter plots.

Amid a barrage of political and high-tech animated movies without any underlying message, the festival is a breath of fresh air. It is a great effort by The Little Art that has managed to pull out our audiences to view something which hopefully would leave a positive impact on the young. Every day shows will be featured from 9:30 till 2:15pm.The festival will continue till November 4.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 1^st, 2011.