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Metal, electronic, and rap are not associated with Mumbai because it’s hidden in Bollywood’s shadow, but found in every suburb. The misfits who conspire to pervert the course of pop culture are our protagonists in the nostalgia trip called Back Then. April 13, 2025 at 1:30:00 AM AFS Cinema Virtual May 2 - 4, 2025 Texas Premiere BACK THEN - The Story of Live Music in Bombay India | Documentary 2024 | 57 mins | English Recorded Q&A with directors Anindita Dutta Roy and Abhishek Chandran Preceded by a 10-minute music set by Specific Thing. TICKETS TICKETS Yellowstone International Film Festival Best Documentary Film Winner 'BACK THEN - The Story of Live Music in Bombay' is a documentary film that takes the viewer back 30 years in time to explore the sounds of the city's musical counterculture as it was. It puts you into the shoes of its mercurial artists, passionate folks behind the scenes, and misfits who went to gigs through the 90s, 2000s, and 2010s. The film puts a spotlight on what happened in the shadowy world of underground live music and answers questions like what it meant to watch an artist live in 1994, what it’s like today, and what kind of underground music was played in 2006. Over the span of 53 minutes, it cruises through real and rare DIY stories all the way from the 1990s, right up to 2023. Restoration Process About the Artist Director: Director Anindita is from Calcutta. She has a Master’s in Journalism and experience in acting/directing student films, and digital films in her advertising career. Her husband’s gig-going stories and her discoveries of counterculture having lived across India inspired this debut. With her background in journalism, she never imagined that her first film would be about the subject of ‘live music.’ In the process of making this film, she has tried to recreate her desired youth days in a way the rebel in her would have wanted to live. The inspiration for this movie comes from attending several alternate and underground live music gigs with her partner. She wanted the entire world to see Bombay through this sub-culture lens and witness the magic of ‘these misfits’ featured in the movie. She is a keen observer of the cultural nuances of India and the world and has absorbed more than most, having lived across India. Next, she will document brown women and their esoteric communities. Co-Director: Director Abhishek Chandran has his roots in a small town in Thrisshur, Kerala but grew up in the maximum city, Mumbai. While pursuing mass communication, he made multiple music-videos and short films. While he’s had a career in advertising, his avocations have been musical. Next, he will archive his family tree of 120+ members across the world.This documentary is hugely inspired from his own coming-of-age story with different forms of live music in Mumbai. Trailer For English subtitles, make sure to turn on the YouTube closed captions. Credits Crew: Director: Anindita Dutta Roy Abhishek Chandran Writer: Abhishek Chandran Producer(s): Ritwik Ghosh Jitin Hingorani Film Editor: Featured Cast: Thank you to our community partners for this screening! This program was made possible in part with a grant from Humanities Texas, the state affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Fereshteh, a young student in Tehran, must hide the existence of her illegitimate two-month old baby for the night when her parents announce a surprise visit. She and her resourceful best friend must weigh up their true allies. As they traverse the city, their simple mission proves surprisingly treacherous. Filmocracy Virtual April 28 - May 1, 2023 Until Tomorrow Iran | Narrative Feature 2022 | 86 min | Persian, Farsi TICKETS TICKETS World Premiere Selection: Berlinale 2022 Official Selection: Zurich, Istanbul, Stockholm, Edinburgh, & Sao Paulo International Film Festival Fereshteh is studying and working at a printers’ shop in Tehran. She wants to go to the US but is having trouble finding the time for a language course. This is because she also has a two-month-old baby that her parents know nothing about. When they announce at short notice that they are coming to visit, Fereshteh has to hide illegitimate child and everything that would give away her existence. What at first seems resolvable with a phone call to a few friends soon develops into a difficult undertaking. Fereshteh’s quick-witted friend Atefeh offers her support, but their ensuing odyssey through the city only reveals to the pair how limited their options are. In a society that does not grant everyone the same rights, young women have to weigh up carefully who their allies are. Restoration Process About the Artist Ali Asgari was born in Tehran, Iran. He studied cinema in Italy and began his career as an assistant director. After creating several acclaimed short films, he was selected for the Berlinale Talent Campus 2013. Early in his career his short films, MORE THAN TWO HOURS and THE SILENCE, were both selections at Cannes and nominated for a Palme d’Or. His work has premiered and competed at 600+ world festivals, including leading festivals such as Cannes, Venice, Sundance, Palm Springs, Melbourne, Durban, Stockholm, Montreal, Sao Paulo, BFI London, Leeds, & Festival Tous Courts. His films have won more than 100 international awards. UNTIL TOMORROW is Asgari's second feature film and premiered at the Berlin International Film Festival (Berlinale '22). Trailer For English subtitles, make sure to turn on the YouTube closed captions. Credits Crew: Director: Ali Asgari Writer: Ali Asgari Producer(s): Ali Asgari Raphaëlle Delauche Niki Karimi Nicolas Sanfaute Film Editor: Ehsan Vasegh i Featured Cast: Sadaf Asgari Ghazal Shojaei Amirreza Ranjbaran Nahal Dashti Thank you to our community partners for this screening! This program was made possible in part with a grant from Humanities Texas, the state affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

During a politically unstable time, a young girl tries to escape Yangon by relying on her friend. However, things may not work out as planned. Eventive Virtual May 3 - May 5, 2024 See-zar Tain (Evening Clouds) Myanmar | Short 2022 | 18 mins | Burmese TICKETS TICKETS Singapore International Film Festival - Singapore, Jio MAMI Mumbai Film Festival - India, Mini Kino Film Week - Indonesia, Toronto Reel Asian International Film Festival Since their factory closed down, San Kyi (18) and her close friend Theint Theint Oo (25) are out of work. San was set up for an arranged marriage by her mother, but since Theint planned to return to her hometown to work, San decided to run away with her. But can the two rely on one another in their plan? Restoration Process About the Artist Aung Phyoe is a writer, director and film editor. He was born in Pakokku, Upper Myanmar. He is a B.Eng graduate from Nanyang Technological University Singapore, where he developed a strong interest in cinema entering the cinema club at the university. He also began to take film classes and attend screenings at the Film Society in Singapore, which reinforced his passion for cinema. Later, he earned a Diploma in Editing from Mumbai-based film school, Whistling Woods International. His first short film ''Seasonal Rain'' was screened for Open Doors Screening at 71 st Locarno Film Festival and he edited a feature film ''Murder on the Road to Kathmandu'' (2018). In 2018, he participated in the Autumn Meeting's Director Workshop mentored by Tran Anh Hung. His second short film ''Cobalt Blue'' was selected to Pardi di domani - International Competition at 72nd Locarno Film Festival, which became the first Myanmar short film to be selected for competition. His feature film project "Fruit Gathering'' won the Main Jury Prize at Myanmar Script Fund (2017), the Autumn Meeting's Grand Prix in Vietnam (2018) and CNC Development Prize at Locarno's Open Doors Hub (2020). In 2018, he co-founded ''3-ACT Cinema Magazine': which promotes film education and national cinematic heritage and is actively involved in the Myanmar Independent film scene. Trailer For English subtitles, make sure to turn on the YouTube closed captions. Credits Crew: Director: Aung Phyoe Writer: Aung Phyoe Producer(s): Thu Thu Shein Thaiddhi Claire Marquet Vit Janecek Claire Marquet Vit Janecek Film Editor: Thu Thu Shein Featured Cast: Nandar Myat Aung Thiri May Thu May Paing Soe Mg Bhone Thank you to our community partners for this screening! This program was made possible in part with a grant from Humanities Texas, the state affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Bombay fishermen Rakesh and Ganesh are inheritors of the Koli knowledge system of harvesting the sea following the moon and the tides. Rakesh has kept faith in the traditional fishing methods; Ganesh has instead embraced technology. April 21, 2024 at 5:45:00 PM AFS Cinema Virtual May 3 - May 5, 2024 Texas Premiere Against the Tide India | Documentary 2023 | 97 mins | Koli, Marathi, Hindi Recorded Q&A with Filmmaker Sarvnik Kaur TICKETS TICKETS Sundance Film Festival 2023 World Cinema Documentary Competition Bombay fishermen Rakesh and Ganesh are inheritors of the great Koli knowledge system—a way to harvest the sea by following the moon and the tides. Rakesh has kept faith in the traditional fishing methods while Ganesh has strayed away from them, embracing technology. Against the Tide is a tale of deep friendship and rising resentment between the two men, as close as brothers, against the backdrop of an adoring sea, which is increasingly turning hostile because of climate change. Restoration Process About the Artist Sarvnik Kaur is a documentary filmmaker whose work takes a skeptical stance towards the ‘grand narratives’ of modernism and ‘Scientific Certainties’. Made of moments that hide anxiety and conflict just beneath the surface of the normal and the mundane, her films speak of the predicament of being human in our times. Her latest feature documentary ‘Against the Tide’ premiered at Sundance 2023 where she bagged the Special Jury Award for Verite Filmmaking. The film since then has received several awards including the Grand Jury at the Seattle International, the Best Documentary Award at IceDocs, the UN Perception Change Award at Visions-du-Reel, the Sustainability Award at Sydney International, The Warsaw Peace Award and also the Paznun City Freedom Award at Millenium Docs Against Gravity. Her first film ‘Soz - A Ballad of Maladies’ was awarded the President of India’s 64th National Award for best debut direction besides bagging the best film at IDSFFK 2017 and the Ram Bahadur Trophy for Best Film at the Film South Asia 2018. Her films have been part of several PHD thesis of film scholars at New York University, Harvard University, JawaharLal University, Tata Institute of Social Sciences etc. She is a HotDocs Accelerator Lab, Chicken & Eggs Eggcelerator lab and IDFA Academy fellow. Her films have been supported by Catapult Film Fund, Sundance Documentary Fund, San Francisco Film Fund, IDFA Bertha Fund etc. Made of moments that hide anxiety and conflict just beneath the surface of the normal and the mundane, her work speaks of the predicament of being human in our times. Trailer For English subtitles, make sure to turn on the YouTube closed captions. Credits Crew: Director: Sarvnik Kaur Writer: Producer(s): Koval Bhatia Sarvnik Kaur Film Editor: Atanas Georgiev Blagoja Nedelkovski Featured Cast: Thank you to our community partners for this screening! This program was made possible in part with a grant from Humanities Texas, the state affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

After a night of heavy drinking, a twenty year-old virgin stumbles into Mumbai's oldest brothel, where he encounters a mythical creature who turns his first sexual encounter on its head. April 20, 2024 at 3:30:00 PM AFS Cinema Virtual May 3 - May 5, 2024 Texas Premiere Kamathipura India | Short 2022 | 7 mins | Hindi TICKETS TICKETS Atlanta Horror Film Festival 2022 (Atlanta, GA) – Nomination for Best Animated Short Named after Mumbai’s historic red light district, Kamathipura explores the decaying neighborhood with nightmarish strokes of fantasy. We follow the nervous virgin Sid as he makes a pilgrimage of sorts to a much-vaunted temptress in the area. But the mythical seductress has other plans. She turns Sid’s first time into a terrifying supernatural ordeal, where he is forced to reckon with the violence and sexual slavery that ensnares Kamathipura’s workers. Restoration Process About the Artist Aayush is an experiential creative, filmmaker, and new media artist who is happiest working on something entirely different from the last project he worked on, a road which has led him through the worlds of VR installations, real-time animation, Amazon Prime dramedies, and more. Ever since his mother went to see The Silence of the Lambs just before giving birth to him, he has been fascinated by the idea of gifting strange, meaningful experiences to audiences. https://vimeo.com/aayushman/mixtape Trailer For English subtitles, make sure to turn on the YouTube closed captions. Credits Crew: Director: Aayushman Pandey Writer: Sneh Sapru Producer(s): Wasim Khan, Priya Sreedharan Film Editor: Featured Cast: Akshay Oberoi, Priti Shroff Thank you to our community partners for this screening! This program was made possible in part with a grant from Humanities Texas, the state affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

The lives of three characters change when they unexpectedly have to confront and come to terms with their past. April 13, 2025 at 8:00:00 PM AFS Cinema Austin Premiere Puratawn (The Ancient) India | Narrative Feature 2024 | 100 mins | Bengali Recorded Q&A with writer-director Suman Ghosh TICKETS TICKETS Best Feature film- Washington DC South Asian Film Festival Best Actress (Sharmila Tagore)- Washington DC South Asian Film Festival Best Feature Film- Indian Film Festival at Houston Rittika returns to her ancestral house with her husband Rajeev to celebrate her mother’s 80th birthday. After reaching her house she finds that her mother is not the same as she had always believed her to be. Initially jolted with this realization, she slowly comes to terms with her condition and its irreversibility. Through her mother she comes to change her perspective on life and being. What seemed like an ostensibly routine and ritualistic event turns to a larger metaphysical enquiry into human existence and how the past dictates our current state. The film deftly braids in questions of failing memory, cherishing the past, a fear of obsolescence and reconciliation into a haunting, moving story that is at its heart about burying the ghosts of the past in order to make peace with what has happened so that one can move on. Restoration Process About the Artist Suman Ghosh is a National Award winning Indian filmmaker. He has made 9 feature films and 2 documentary films. He had his film training at Cornell University in New York. His first feature film "Footsteps" starring Soumitra Chatterjee and Nandita Das won 2 National Awards in 2008. It was shown at numerous film festivals including Vancouver, Karlovy Vary and IAAC New York. His second feature film "Dwando" also starring Soumitra Chatterjee, was a part of the Indian Panorama at IFFI Goa in 2009. His next feature film "Nobel Thief", starring the Indian megastar Mithun Chakraborty was world premiered at the Busan IFF and was an official selection at the BFI, London Film festival. The film received the "Best Indian Film"; award at the Bengaluru International Film Festival in 2012. His next feature film "Shyamal Uncle Turns off the Lights" has had a warm reception from critics and audiences all over the world. It was world premiered at the Busan Film Festival in South Korea and had its North American Premiere at the MoMA, NY. It won the "Outstanding International Feature Award"; at the ReelWorld Film festival in Toronto. It is being distributed in North America by Global Film Initiative. His next feature film "Kadambari" starring Konkona Sen Sharma and Parambrata Chatterjee. It is based on the life of Rabindranath Tagore and his controversial relationship with his sister-in-law Kadambari Devi. It was screened at several film festivals worldwide and received the Best Feature Film Award and the Best Actress for Konkona Sen Sharma at the Washington DC South Asian Film Festival in 2015. His next film “Peace Haven” world premiered at Busan IFF and was an official selection at MAMI and NYIFF. His debut Hindi feature film is titled “Aadhaar” which World premiered at the Busan IFF and is awaiting an all India release later this year. In 2023 he made the documentary on legendary film director and actress Aparna Sen titled “Parama: A Journey with Aparna Sen” which is scheduled to begin its festival journey later this year. In 2023 his film "Kabuliwala"was a major box office success in Bengal and also been to several top film festivals of the world including Shanghai Film Festival and Washington DC International Film Festival. His latest film "Puratawn" (The Ancient) is releasing in India on the 11th of April. Trailer For English subtitles, make sure to turn on the YouTube closed captions. Credits Crew: Director: Suman Ghosh Writer: Suman Ghosh Producer(s): Rituparna Sengupta Film Editor: Aditya Vikram Sengupta Featured Cast: Sharmila Tagore Rituparna Sengupta Indraneil Sengupta Thank you to our community partners for this screening! This program was made possible in part with a grant from Humanities Texas, the state affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

A middle aged Indian woman visits a Texas cattle ranch and learns the meaning of true grit. April 10, 2025 at 11:30:00 PM AFS Cinema Virtual May 2 - 4, 2025 World Premiere Cowboys and Hindus USA | Short 2025 | 16 mins | English TICKETS TICKETS A depressed, affluent, middle aged Hindu woman, ASHA, accompanies her domineering husband to a Texas cattle ranch. While there, she befriends a cattle woman who takes the Hindu woman under her wing and teaches her all about cowboy culture. Asha soon finds purpose on the ranch and in her life. She discovers the meaning of true American grit. Restoration Process About the Artist Tejal Desai is an award-winning screenwriter. He was awarded the most coveted and prestigious screenwriting award, the Nicholl Fellowship in Screenwriting for the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences (AMPAS) for his comedy script LINDA AND HENRY. Subsequently he was hired by Disney Studios to develop and write a sequel to PINOCCHIO. His screenplay, COWBOYS & HINDUS, won the Final Draft Big Break Screenplay competition and was honored on stage alongside Aaron Sorkin at Final Draft’s Hall of Fame Awards. COWBOYS & HINDUS also won the Cinestory Screenplay Competition and was named a semifinalist at the Sundance Screenwriting Institute. Tejal has also written on assignment for Focus Features and Lifetime Television. He produced the feature length drama, ABCD, starring Madhur Jaffrey which premiered at the 43rd London Film Festival and won Best Independent Film at the Houston Film Festival. Currently, Tejal finished writing and directing the short films of Cowboys and Hindus and plans to shoot the feature version in 2026 with Priya Deva and Adil Hussain to star. He ha also finished writing and directing a comedy called Dad’s Final Wish, about a dying man’s final wish is to find his childhood bully and beat him before he dies. Tejal currently lives in Austin with his wife and two sons. Trailer For English subtitles, make sure to turn on the YouTube closed captions. Credits Crew: Director: Tejal Desai Writer: Tejal Desai Producer(s): Andrew Lee Kirtana Banskota Film Editor: Featured Cast: Priya Deva Samir Khan Paula Saletnik Tara Amin Thank you to our community partners for this screening! This program was made possible in part with a grant from Humanities Texas, the state affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

A middle-aged woman writes letters and phone calls to her younger self while trapped with her aging mother in their ancestral home, both yearning to escape their unfulfilled lives through a vanishing ritual. Eventive Virtual May 2 - 4, 2025 North America Premiere Sad Letters of an Imaginary Woman India | Narrative Feature 2023 | 79 mins | Hindi TICKETS TICKETS Nidhi (43) and her mother Meera (70) exist in a decaying ancestral house, a physical manifestation of their stagnant lives. Nidhi's childhood was marred by a traumatic event involving her father that left her emotionally isolated and perpetually melancholic. She grapples with her past by writing haunting letters to her younger self, lamenting what could have been and warning her of what awaits. Meera harbors deep regrets over an unrequited love affair that never came to fruition, a wistful yearning that compounds her sense of failure as a mother witnessing Nidhi's profound despair. Yet, a flicker of hope remains – the possibility of Nidhi finding solace. When Nidhi discovers an ancient mystical ritual that promises oblivion through vanishing, the idea takes root. Meera, in a last act of love, decides to join Nidhi on this metaphysical journey into nothingness. As mother and daughter perform the rites, the barriers between past and present dissolve. Memories bleed into the present, echoing their anguished cries long suppressed by society's expectations.On one transcendent night, enveloped in darkness, they disappear - two flightless birds finally freed from their corporeal and emotional prisons. An experimental meditation on the complex struggles women endure. Restoration Process About the Artist A recipient of the Asian Cinema Fund and Biennale College Cinema, Nidhi Saxena is a filmmaker whose work explores human vulnerability and existential themes through a distinctly poetic lens. With a formal background in sculpture and fine art, she transitioned to filmmaking after studying at the Film and Television Institute of India. Her approach to cinema, influenced by auteurs like Tsai Ming-Liang and Apichatpong Weerasethakul, seeks to transcend conventional narrative in search of the abstract and spiritual. Nidhi has also worked extensively with marginalized women through UN Population Fund initiatives. She is currently working on her next feature film. Trailer For English subtitles, make sure to turn on the YouTube closed captions. Credits Crew: Director: Nidhi Saxena Writer: Nidhi Saxena Producer(s): Vimukthi Jayasundara Ajender Singh Film Editor: Saman Alvitigala Featured Cast: Anamika Tiwari Bhadra Basu Pratiksha Rakesh Bhai Nabanita Chakrabortya Avinash Gupta Thank you to our community partners for this screening! This program was made possible in part with a grant from Humanities Texas, the state affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Anirudh, devastated by job loss, finds comfort in the advice of gas station clerk Sai Santosh. But when a seemingly innocent whistled tune triggers a sudden emotional outburst, the night takes an unexpected turn. April 10, 2025 at 11:30:00 PM AFS Cinema Virtual May 2 - 4, 2025 Austin Premiere Smoke Cheyyaku Bro (Don't Smoke Bro) USA | Short 2024 | 13 mins | Telugu TICKETS TICKETS Audience Choice Award for Best Short - IMFF 2025, Austin, USA Oakcliff International Film Festival, Dallas Dallas International Film Festival Shorts, Dallas Anirudh, devastated by job loss, finds comfort in the advice of gas station clerk Sai Santosh. But when a seemingly innocent whistled tune triggers a sudden emotional outburst, the night takes an unexpected turn. Restoration Process About the Artist Prithvi Raj Karreddula is a Dallas-based, award-winning filmmaker originally from Hyderabad, Telangana, India. He has been crafting compelling narratives as a writer and director, seamlessly bridging English and Telugu cinema. His multifaceted expertise extends beyond directing to include cinematography and editing, allowing him to shape every aspect of his projects for a cohesive cinematic experience. In 2024, Prithvi’s short film Smoke Cheyyaku Bro (Don't Smoke Bro), which he directed, garnered significant acclaim, winning the Best Texas Film award at the DIFF SHORTS Film Festival. The film, a dark comedy, was also featured among the best short films of 2024 by Shorted. His 2023 short film, Learning Not To Drown, which he also directed, received recognition at multiple prestigious festivals, including the Burbank International Film Festival, Indie Meme Film Festival in Austin, and the SOHO International Film Festival in New York. A strong believer in blending stories beyond language barriers, Prithvi has a diverse filmography with experience in multiple genres, always weaving his own South Asian roots into his storytelling. With a passion for cinematic innovation and cultural authenticity, he continues to make his mark in contemporary cinema. Trailer For English subtitles, make sure to turn on the YouTube closed captions. Credits Crew: Director: Prithvi Raj Karreddula Writer: Prithvi Raj Karreddula Producer(s): Prithvi Raj Karreddula Chiranjeevi Pamidi Film Editor: Prithvi Raj Karreddula Featured Cast: Sateesh Peddaiahgari Raaman BV Darcy Doyle Kaci Fullinwider Thank you to our community partners for this screening! This program was made possible in part with a grant from Humanities Texas, the state affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Amber, a happiness agent, travels the Bhutanese Himalayas surveying people's happiness. On his remote mountain journey, he searches for fulfillment. April 13, 2025 at 3:30:00 PM AFS Cinema Virtual May 2 - 4, 2025 Agent of Happiness Bhutan, Hungary, USA, Czech Republic | Documentary 2024 | 94 mins | Dzongkha, Nepali, English Recorded Q&A with Director Arun Bhattarai TICKETS TICKETS Jury and Audience Choice Award for Best Documentary - IMFF 2025, Austin, USA Sundance Film Festival 2024 71st Sydney Film Festival 2024 MAMI Mumbai Film Festival 2024 How can you measure happiness? The country of Bhutan invented Gross National Happiness to do just that, and Amber is one of the agents who travels door to door to meet people and measure how happy they really are. He is still living with his elderly mother at the age of 40, but is nevertheless a hopeless romantic who dreams of finding love: a happiness agent who is in search of his own happiness. We embark with Amber on a cross-country road trip meeting citizens from all walks of life, reminding us of the fragility and beauty of our own happiness. No matter where we live. Restoration Process About the Artist Arun Bhattarai (director, cinematographer, co-producer, Bhutan) premiered his first feature-length documentary ‘The Next Guardian’ (co-directed by Dorottya Zurbó) - an intimate family story set in Bhutan - at IDFA in 2017. The film has been screened at more than 40 international festivals (True/False, Ambulante, SFFILM, MoMA DocFortnight etc.). Before becoming an independent filmmaker, he worked as a TV director at the Bhutan Broadcasting Service for 5 years. He graduated from the first edition of DocNomads Joint Master in documentary directing in 2014. His recent short documentary ‘Mountain Man’, about Bhutan’s only glaciologist won the best pitch prize at If/Then Global Short-Pitch at IDFA 2019 and is supported by the IDA-XRM Media incubator program. The film has been screened at IDFA, DOC NYC, Chicago IFF etc. His new film ‘Agent of Happiness’ is supported by the Sundance Film Institute, Catapult Film Fund and DMZ Docs Fund among others. The project was developed at the Points North Fellowship 2022, True False Rough Cut Retreat 2023 and Doc.incubator 2023. He established his own production company - Sound Pictures - dedicated to creative documentaries in 2015. He is one of the few independent documentary filmmakers in Bhutan. Dorottya Zurbó (co-director, Hungary) premiered her first feature-length documentary ‘The Next Guardian’ (co-directed by Arun Bhattarai), - an intimate family story set in Bhutan - at IDFA in 2017. Since then, it has been screened at more than 40 international festivals (True/False, San Francisco IDFF, MoMA DocFortnight etc.). Parallelly, she worked on her first directorial debut ‘Easy Lessons’, a feature-length documentary about a young Somalian refugee girl who tries to adapt to Hungary, premiered at the Locarno Film Festival Critics Week section in 2018. The film participated in more than 40 international festivals (HotDocs, Camden IDFF, Sarajevo IFF etc.) receiving awards such as the Hungarian Critics Award for Best Documentary in 2019. Her new film ‘Agent of Happiness’ is supported by the Sundance Film Institute, Catapult Film Fund and DMZ Docs Fund among others. The project was developed at the Points North Fellowship 2022, True False Rough Cut Retreat 2023 and Doc.incubator 2023. Besides filmmaking, she has been teaching at the prestigious DocNomads Joint Master program in Europe. Trailer For English subtitles, make sure to turn on the YouTube closed captions. Credits Crew: Director: Arun Bhattarai Dorottya Zurbó Writer: Producer(s): Noémi Veronika Szakonyi Máté Artur Vincze Arun Bhattarai Film Editor: Péter Sass Featured Cast: Amber Kumar Gurung Sarita Chettri Guna Raj Kuikel Hemlata Gurung Yangka Lhamo Wangmo Lhamo Dophu Dem Dechen Selden Tshering Lham Tshering Tashi Tshomo Karma Lhamo Kezang Yuden Karma Wangdi Thank you to our community partners for this screening! This program was made possible in part with a grant from Humanities Texas, the state affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

The life of an expat Nepali woman in the United Arab Emirates turns upside down when she loses a small amount of money while trying to buy a laptop for her son in Nepal. April 20, 2024 at 6:00:00 PM AFS Cinema Virtual May 3 - May 5, 2024 North America Premiere Helena Nepal, United Arab Emirates | Short 2023 | 13 mins | English, Hindi, Nepali TICKETS TICKETS Official Selection - Focus South Asia, Jio MAMI Mumbai Film Festival 2023 Helena works in the UAE as a waitress. Her son in Nepal has been asking for a laptop for the last four months and has now stopped going to school. Finally, when she’s saved enough money to buy one, she finds out that she’s lost a small amount of cash. When the son calls her, she lies to him saying that she’s bought the laptop and is sending it with her friend. Deep into the lies, in between the pressure from work and from her family, how will she get through this? Restoration Process About the Artist Ayarush Paudel was born and raised in Nepal. After high school, Paudel moved to the United Arab Emirates in order to pursue his passion for storytelling while studying undergraduate education at New York University Abu Dhabi. With his interest lying primarily in narrative stories, Paudel has written and directed a number of projects in the last five years revolving around different issues in Nepal such as the schooling system, gender inequality, the impact of the pandemic, and racism. Trailer For English subtitles, make sure to turn on the YouTube closed captions. Credits Crew: Director: Ayarush Paudel Writer: Ayarush Paudel Producer(s): Sophiya Paudel Film Editor: Ayarush Paudel Featured Cast: Ayushma Shrestha George Jose Yoshina Gautam Sajil Jimmy Samman Sharma Ramesh Rijal Thank you to our community partners for this screening! This program was made possible in part with a grant from Humanities Texas, the state affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Problems in a relationship come to the surface during a cinematography group exercise. Filmocracy Virtual April 28 - May 1, 2023 Faces USA | Short 2023 | 11 mins | English In-Person Q&A with Texas director Kumar Mayank TICKETS TICKETS Restoration Process About the Artist Kumar Mayank completed his engineering from Indian Institute of Technology, Varanasi and worked a few corporate jobs before getting into filmmaking. Since then he has assisted on and off in TV commercials and feature length films in Mumbai and has worked as a freelancer. He is currently pursuing a Master's degree in filmmaking from UT Austin. His short films have screened internationally at Split Film Festival, Santa Fe Film Festival, Carmarthen Bay Film festival, Filipino Arts and Cinema International, Trenton Film Festival and IntimaLente Ethnographic Film Festival among others and have been awarded at Festival International Signes De Nuit, Bare Bones International Film Festival etc. He is interested in exploring new ways of filmic storytelling to bring to screen the tragedy, comedy and the not-so-extreme of the human condition. Trailer For English subtitles, make sure to turn on the YouTube closed captions. Credits Crew: Director: Kumar Mayank Writer: Kumar Mayank Producer(s): Film Editor: Featured Cast: Olivia Tovar, Jasper Jones Thank you to our community partners for this screening! This program was made possible in part with a grant from Humanities Texas, the state affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities.