In the backdrop of increasing COVID-19 cases, the Pune Film Foundation has decided to postpone the 19th edition of the Pune International Film Festival (PIFF), the organizers announced on Wednesday.
PIFF director and noted filmmaker Jabbar Patel said that screening of physical film in theaters and multiplexes has been postponed until further notice, the festival will be in online format from 18 to 25 March.
“Due to the current epidemic situation and alarming increase in cases, cinemas have expressed apprehension about enjoying PIFF screening inside theaters. Many delegates inquired to check if their registration for the festival could be converted to an online format. As organizers, we would always like this festival to be enjoyed the most at the film festival and thus decided to postpone the physical screening of PIFF to be held in theaters.
Second adjournment
This is the second postponement of the festival since the pandemic situation in Pune, appearing under control a fortnight ago, caused a worse situation.
The week-long PIFF, Maharashtra’s official film festival and largest cinema festival, was originally inaugurated on 4 March when Pune was registering a significant decline in cases and mortality.
Organizers were forced to change the event to stage the PIFF between 11–18 March as cases in the city continued to escalate.
Dr. Patel said that the new dates of physical screening would be announced in due time.
“However, we also believe that the show should remain on and instead decided to host PIFF in its online format from 18 to 25 March. The online format mainly facilitates the conversion of representative registrations from ‘ Is being postponed for a week. Off-line ‘on-line’ format, ‘”he said.
Dr. Patel said that as previously stated, 26 films in the ‘World Cinema’ category would be screened in online format.
These films are to be screened using a secure overseas platform called ‘Shift 72’, which has previously been used at international film festivals in Cannes, Berlin, Venice and Toronto. PIFF has become the first international film festival in India to use this secure platform for screening of films.
Through this, viewers will be able to log in from only one device. Films shown each day will be available to online viewers at any time over a 24-hour period and a link will be sent to registered viewers on their e-mail to prevent the risk of downloading or recording the films.
The district has been reporting a daily average case increase of over 1,800 for the last 10 days, resulting in Pune district’s active case zooming to 15,000 from the total number of 5,000 at the end of February. Out of this, Pune city has more than 7,000 active cases. The district’s death toll has so far crossed 9,300.
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