St. Louis Film Fest

We just arrived today (bright and early) in St. Louis today. The weather is great, and our view of our hotel is beautiful and overlooks the arch. We really lucked out (the first room we got, had a door that was jammed and overlooked nothing), it's amazing what a few kind words can do.

We got to see the venue of our film at the Tivoli theater, which looks to be beautiful. It's playing on Sunday. Sachin Bhatt, our lead actor is in town as well (it's his and Pooja's hometown), so luckily we'll get to see him there. I'll post more pics as they come. 

MIAAC

Just got back from the MIAAC festival, and I had to say, it was incredible. New York is an amazing city, and there were some amazing stars.

The weirdest part was riding alongside Manisha Koirala in a cab, she was very sweet, under the weather, but really kind and friendly. The opening night festivities included a screening of Today's Special, starring Aasif Mandvi. Then there was a gala afterwards which Mansi and I attended. 

There were amazing Indian celebrities present, including Shabana Azmi, Rahul Bose, Sanjay Suri, Deepti Naval, Sarita Choudry, and Mira Nair, to name a few.

Our show was Friday evening, and I was scared no one would show up because we were against the centerpiece screening Tahaan. But luckily we had a great turnout, and people really responded well to the film. And Pooja Kumar, our actress, was able to attend and it was great to see her again.

More Pics

I just got back yesterday from Mumbai. The festival went so great, I'm sad to be back, but excited about the next festival, the MIAAC Festival in New York City which starts tomorrow! Pooja Kumar will be there so it'll be great to see her. I'm posting some more pics from our press conference, along with a picture of Bollywood Beats at the 540 Film Festival that took place in Fayetville Arkansas this last weekend.

Closing Night at the Mumbai Film Fest

Well, yesterday night was the closing ceremony. It was a great event at this posh hotel, the JW Marriot in Juhu. Some great stars turned out, Amitabh Bachan received a lifetime achievement award, so he was there, Preity Zinta, Kunal Kolhi, and many more. It was an interesting event.

Even though we stuffed those ballot boxes with votes for our film, we didn't win the Audience Award unfortunately. But all in all, it was a great fest. We did an amazing Press Conference after the film, where we got to talk with the Press about the film. You can watch the 8 parts in Youtube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WcV1p9W9YLE

Mumbai Film Festival Premiere

Well, our show actually happened today, and it went really well. People really seemed to enjoy the film and laughed at the funny parts (and some of the not so funny parts...). Sound was an issue, but I hope it didn't detract too much.

I wasn't sure if people would like the film, but the overwhelming response was good. Lilette Dubey and Sarita Joshi both made it to the festival. It was great to seem them both after a long time. I think they both enjoyed it as well.

Afterwards, we had a press conference that was interesting. Got into some (ahem) interesting discussions about 9-11, Indian actors in the mainstream, and such. I'll be uploading the vids on youtube for that.  But it happened, we showed in India and people enjoyed it!

Lilette told me that this film would definitely do well in the mulitplexes in India, so it gave me some optimism that maybe we can get a release here...

Mumbai Film Festival-Day 5

It's been an interesting festival to say the least. We finally got our badges (yay!) and film festival book today. It was really interesting to see the amount of films they are showing, it's crazy. 

Our film has a press conference arranged for after our screening on Wednesday November 4th at 3:30, so I'll try to post some video from that. I'm getting anxious to see the turnout for the film. Today's film had a pretty good crowd so I'm remaining hopeful it won't just be mine and Mansi's relatives. We'll see..

Then we went to a party at the Sun N Sands, where we'll be staying for the next few days. We met a couple of the film directors in our categories, including the Producer of Today's Special, Nimitt Mankand, who actually said he heard good things about our film, which was really nice to hear. We also met Mitsein director, Aparna, who was very kind and bubbly. All in all, a great day at the fest! (Especially since we got our badges-yay!)