Featuring film screenings, conferences, workshops and art exhibition, the upcoming four-day festival will take place at the Expo Centre in Karachi.
With Pakistani cinema gaining momentum, film festivals across the country and beyond have become a regular fixture. While the first Pakistan International Film Festival (PIFF) – scheduled to commence from March 29, 2018 – is just around the corner, there is another festival that will begin next week. Called the Asia Peace Film Festival (APFF), the upcoming event will be held at Expo Centre in Karachi from February 23 and will run till February 26.
This will be the second edition of the festival after the first edition took place in Islamabad last year. Featuring film screenings, conferences, workshops and art exhibition during the 4-day run, the festival aims to promote cinematography as a mass medium of peace education in Asian region by celebrating diversity and harnessing harmony. Over 100 Asian movies are scheduled to be screened at the event, most of which are based on social issues while the duration ranges from 30 seconds to 30 minutes.
The festival welcomes entries from multiple Asian countries including Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Portugal, Iran, Iraq, Turkey, Indonesia, Malaysia, South Korea, Japan, China and Singapore. The line-up of work that will be featured at the event includes short films, animations, documentaries, indie films, exhibition of artwork, live painting, panel discussions, training sessions for aspiring filmmakers, screening of films made by students and a separate section for kids.
The theme for the upcoming Karachi edition is ‘Karachi Sub Ka’ that has been set to rebrand the biggest city of Pakistan as ‘Takht-e-Takhleeq’, the Capital of Creativity. For the first time ever, Karachi edition of Asia Peace Film Festival would be presenting a diverse, authentic and innovative cultural kaleidoscope resonating the curiosity, creativity and aesthetics of Karachiites. It will bring together a large number of legendary filmmakers, artists, animators, performers, media wizards, parliamentarians, academics, peace activists and dynamic students of cinematography from all over the country as well as across Asia.
Some of the films to be presented at the event include We Forgot About the Children by Gilb Baldoza from Philippines, Arz e Pakistan by Pakistani filmmaker Ali Sohail Jaura, The Salt Man by Seyed Sajad Moosavi from the United States, Ambigous by Chinese filmmaker Chi Yeung Lau and The Violet by Baqer Al-Rubaie from Iraq.
