Senior Rediff.com Contributor Aseem Chhabra is director of the New York Indian Film Festival, an entertainment writer and author of Irrfan Khan: The Man, The Dreamer, The Star. You can e-mail the author at aseem.chhabra@gmail.com
'Find a name that changes the words honor killing and hopefully it includes the word murder.' 'If you use the words, you are trying to justify the murders.'
Aseem Chhabra lists his favorite 2023 films -- a healthy blend of Bollywood, Hindi indies and some of the best work that is being done in Tamil, Malayalam, Kannada and Bengali cinema.
2023 was a good year for international cinema with many strong films premiering at the Berlin, Cannes, Venice and Toronto film festivals.
'When democracy first came to Bhutan people had no idea and they were like 'What is that?' Oh it's that thing they have in India where the leaders are always fighting and arguing.' When I screened the film to Bhutan's film committee, they thought my film was good but they were concerned about that line. They wanted me to change that line. They said, 'We don't want to offend India.' I tried to tell them that Indians have a great ability to laugh at themselves but they insisted I change it.'
'Agra is about sexuality and sexual repression, and the relationship of sexuality to the physical spaces that we are in.'
'The idea of this movie is to trace these journeys and not to blame.' 'We could have talked what happened in 1948. This is what the Israelis did. This is what the Palestinians and Arabs did.' 'We didn't want to go there.'
'What the film shows is an India, which was headed in a completely different direction than where we are headed.'
'I guess things happen when they have to happen.' 'And the film got delayed by COVID a little bit. But yeah, it's been a decade which I do not regret.' 'I feel like I have grown so much, as an artist, as well as just a human being.' 'So much life experience to channel into films that I think is an advantage almost.'
'The only violence I have had in any film of mine is a slap.' 'When Nikhil narrated the film to me, I was blown away.' 'I was literally screaming out of my chair.'
'He killed so many people, doing the kind of horrible things he did, and yet, he believed he was making the right choices.'
If there is one lesson we get from Depp vs Heard, it is that the American legal system is deeply flawed and the court of public opinion and social media make it harder for victims to get justice, observes Aseem Chhabra.
'Once I left my photographs at Ram Gopal Varma's office.' 'I told a friend I was concerned no one had contacted me. My friend said, "Itni jaldi nahin hota idhar. Time lagega".'
Rocky Aur Rani is definitely Karan's most subversive project, discovers Aseem Chhabra.
'I never got respect as an actress.' 'But when I became a director and worked with actresses like Cate Blanchett and Jessica Chastain, I felt such pride of being an actress.'
Kohrra is a terrific ensemble piece but the two fine leads keep show glued together, applauds Aseem Chhabra.
'There's this presence, a sense of patrolling and surveillance. And it's not coming from a place of safety.' 'It's coming from a place of 'You don't belong here'.' 'It's a malevolent force, the society at large is observing them.'
Twelve days of movie madness and 36 films later, Aseem Chhabra lists his top 10 favourite films from this year's Cannes Film Festival.
'It's everyone's dream to have their pictures show up on Google.' 'In the beginning, you're not used to it.' 'It's a bit weird and even now it's weird.'
'The Iranians are very resilient people. So even when they are throttled, they try their best to survive.'
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