Chotu, a young boy working at a café, dreams of one day becoming educated. Chotu has been sent away by his mother to work and he has no time to go to school. Inspired by a message from President Kalam that anyone can change their destiny and their place in life, Chotu studies on his own whenever possible. Through a chance encounter, he befriends the local prince and the two secretly spend time together, planning their perfect futures. Both learn about life through the other’s very different experiences.

This heart-warming tale shows how someone can work to overcome their destiny, and the obstacles that life sometimes puts in the way.

The film is produced by Smile Foundation, a national level development organization in India for underprivileged children and youth through education, healthcare and livelihood. India has a policy of free and compulsory education for children in India. Still, 30 million children do not go to school. Smile Foundation strongly believes that child education is the most effective tool for empowerment in a nation. I AM KALAM is an endeavor in championing the cause of empowering underprivileged children through education.

Hindi (English subtitles)

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In this standout film, first-time filmmaker Anusha Rizvi gives a satirical spin to the tragic farmer-suicide epidemic that has plagued Indian villages for the past decade.

All hell breaks loose when a journalist in the village of Peepli overhears impoverished farmer brothers Natha and Budhia decide that Natha should commit suicide,so that his family can collect government compensation given to survivors of deceased, indebted farmers. Hordes of reporters descend on their tiny village, mobilized by the suspense of will he, won’t he, and the possibility of capturing the suicide live. They sensationalize the story with relentless zeal, making Natha a cause célèbre in the days leading up to the national elections. Rizvi presents a vivid, darkly humorous portrayal of the media, politics, and the desperate predicament of the farmers.

Produced by Bollywood superstar Aamir Khan, PEEPLI LIVE was the first Indian film to be featured in the competitive section at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival. It was also India's Official Entry for the 2010 Oscar's foreign language category.

Hindi (English subtitles)
Presented by AID LA & Ektaa Center

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Lies, corruption, fraud, adultery, and even murder make up the dark underbelly of the economic boom in Indian cities like Kolkata. Real life private detective Rajesh Ji and his gumshoe staff at Always Detective Agency have seen it all, from hair dye knock offs to group dance try-outs in closets. Rajesh knows that while justice may always be fleeting on the hard streets, the draw of dance stardom will never die. In Rajesh Ji, THE BENGALI DETECTIVE introduces to the world an unforgettable character, part Philip Marlowe and part Hrithik Roshan, who faces the tragic circumstances of his wife’s illness and the cold indifference of society, with perseverance and some great dance moves.

Bengali, Hindi, English (English subtitles)
Presented by International Documentary Association

When Ganesh was born, his parents Krishna and Jayamma settled on his name quite easily. Not only did they pray to Ganesh, the elephant-headed god, for a son, but also Ganesh the baby had a facial deformity that strangely made him resemble his namesake. Ganesh’s parents hoped a simple surgery would cure their son, however the incredible complications of his condition combined with their lack of funds seemed to doom Ganesh to a lifetime of being gawked at in the street. Hearing about the elephant-headed boy, television reporters descended on Ganesh's school and family.  In a bizarre twist, national exposure of Ganesh's condition and the fascination of millions around the world gave him previously unavailable treatment opportunities. The opportunities are not without complications and Krishna and Jayamma worry about where to go and whom to trust after years of being so helpless.

At the heart of GANESH, BOY WONDER is Ganesh, a sweet boy who has been both cursed and blessed. By telling his story, filmmaker Srinivas Krishna captures the odd variety of suffering and generosity in life.

English
Presented by Pratham & ElephantMan Foundation

Aparna Sen directs and stars in AN UNFINISHED LETTER, which tells the story of the famous actress Mrinalini (Aparna Sen); her rise to stardom, struggles in her personal life, and the challenges of growing older within the film industry. What makes it even more exceptional is its casting coup. Not only does it star Aparna Sen, but the young version of Mrinalini is played by Konkona Sen Sharma, the real-life daughter of Aparna Sen, both icons of India’s film world.
 
The film begins with an aging screen diva penning a suicide note, determined to exit this life. But before taking the pills that will put her to sleep forever, she decides to destroy all her memorabilia lest it fall into the hands of the press. As she sorts through the relics of her past, she’s flooded with memories long forgotten. And through these memories, an entire life is revealed – a life of loves lost and gained, friendships and betrayals, successes and failure, agonies and ecstasies.
 
AN UNFINISHED LETTER carries resonances of time past and present through images and experiences, giving it the nuances of a period film. Drawing on her real-life experiences as an actress, director, and a woman in the film industry, Sen creates a compelling and realistic portrait of an astonishingly courageous and free-spirited woman living her life against the backdrop of the Bengali film industry of the 1970s.

Bengali (English subtitles)

Presented by Slamdance

MUMBAI DIARIES, the directorial debut of Kiran Rao, follows the intertwining stories of four very different people as they move through the urban metropolis of Mumbai.

Shai, an investment banker, has come to Mumbai while on sabbatical to see the city through her camera lens. Her unlikely friendship with laundry boy and aspiring actor Munna allows her to see the city in a way she never imagined. At the same time, she becomes infatuated with Arun (Aamir Khan), a reclusive painter who has just moved to an up-and-coming neighborhood. Arun has his own story as he begins to follow the life of Yasmin, his apartment’s former occupant.

As all four characters move through their lives, the audience gets a chance to experience the beauty of Mumbai. Part of a new wave of Indian cinema, MUMBAI DIARIES creates a beautiful portrait of the city and its citizens.

Hindi (English subtitles)
Presented by Amoeba & Coalition for Asian Pacifics in Entertainment

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Returning to India to clean out her recently deceased mother’s home in Delhi, filmmaker Sonali Gulati regrets that she will never be able to tell her mother that she is a lesbian. Still, she wonders if her mother would even want to know. Compelled by this question, Sonali meets with closeted and openly gay and lesbian Indians and their parents. Living in a country where being a homosexual is against the law, parents and children grapple with the conflicting emotions of pride and shame.

Against the backdrop of the Indian Supreme Court’s decision on Penal Code 377 that outlaws homosexuality, we meet charlatans that claim to cure the “disease” and young adults who refuse to live in the shadows. With beautiful and haunting imagery, I AM is a story from the front lines of a changing world of individuals, families, and nations choosing between love or fear. 

Hindi, English (English subtitles)
Presented by Satrang So Cal

After a serious fight with her mother, Ruth travels to Mumbai in the hopes of locating and reconnecting with her estranged father. Running out of money and recognizing the difficulty of finding one man in a city of millions, Ruth relies on her skills as a masseuse to make ends meet. She finds work in a shady massage parlor, where she endures the soul-crushing work of providing “happy endings” to some of Mumbai’s nasty characters in order to raise the funds to continue her search. As if Ruth didn’t have enough of an uphill battle, her boyfriend Prashant has problems of his own thanks to a drug addiction and a serious debt owed to a ruthless gangster.

With spectacular performances from its cast of mostly new and up and coming actors, and a tone that deftly addresses both the tragedy and the comedy of life on the streets of Mumbai, THAT GIRL IN YELLOW BOOTS is a ray of light in the world of Indian independent cinema. Anurag Kashyap, whose previous credits include BLACK FRIDAY and DEV D, displays a mastery of his craft that belies the fact that the film was shot in a mere thirteen days using a Canon 7D digital camera. The film proves beyond a doubt that thoughtful, stylish and edgy independent filmmaking is alive and well in India. 

English, Hindi (English subtitles)
Presented by Los Angeles Film Festival

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It's a bird...it's a plane...it's Rajinikanth! He's the biggest superhero you've never heard of. One of Asia's highest paid movie stars, second only to Jackie Chan, Rajinikanth's on-screen persona and his penchant for the delightfully ridiculous has developed a cult following. In THE ROBOT (ENDHIRAN), he plays a brilliant scientist, Vaseegaran, who in the spirit of Dr. Frankenstein, creates a near-invincible humanoid robot, Chitti (obviously, also played by himself). When his competitor and mentor, the evil Dr. Bohra, denounces the creation as flawed due to its inability to feel, Vaseegaran returns to his lab and infuses Chitti with unparalleled artificial intelligence by programming it to experience human emotions.

Things go awry when Chitti begins to develop feelings for his creator's girlfriend Sana (Aishwarya Rai Bachchan). Dr. Bohra tries to use this as an opportunity to turn Chitti against his creator, but the robot has plans of his own. Chitti builds an army of his own clones, kidnaps Sana, and wreaks havoc around Chennai.

With stunts by Yuen Woo Ping (The Matrix), special effects by Legacy Effects and Stan Winston Studios, sound design by Academy Award winner Resul Pookutty, and an infectious score by two-time Academy Award winner A.R. Rahman, THE ROBOT (ENDHIRAN) is the biggest and most expensive film to ever be produced in India. This sci-fi musical is unlike anything American audiences will have ever witnessed.

TAMIL (English subtitles)
Presented by Amoeba

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Farmer Kalyan Singh has lost most of his ancestral land to the government and relinquished the bulk of his life’s savings for his daughter’s marriage. Frustrated by his circumstances, he has no kind words or warm feelings for his idle son or over-burdened wife. Yet, he lavishes affection upon his last remaining goat, Laila. In his beloved Laila, he sees salvation: if she can mate and reproduce, there is hope for regaining his livelihood and economic stability. On the same day that Kalyan sets out to mate Laila with a goat on a nearby farm, preparations for a rally featuring a VIP creates frenzy among the denizens of the area. As Kalyan leads Laila by a rope toward their intertwined destiny, he ignores a family crisis, circumvents road blocks, and defies police orders. He faces down each bureaucracy, authority, and absurdity with a single-minded determination unaware that the force of nature may be his greatest obstacle.

Murali Nair returns to IFFLA with a love story about a man and his goat. It is a sensitive satire that turns the spotlight on the devastating prospect of losing a 500-year tradition of farming with no discernible prospect to replace it. For Nair’s protagonist, hope is the great motivator and love is eternal.

Hindi (English subtitles)
Presented by Scripped

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After being expelled from an elite boarding school for his rebellious behavior, Rohan returns home to his small industrial town for the first time in eight years. A lot has changed in that time, most notably, a six-year-old half-brother whom he’s never met before. Rohan’s father, however, is the very same man he remembers – a ruthless authoritarian determined to mold his children in his own image. Furious at Rohan for his expulsion, he puts his son to work in his steel factory. Though his father forces him to study engineering, a profession that he has neither talent for nor interest in, Rohan dreams of a different life in which he can pursue his passion for poetry. Can he stand up to his father in order to be his own man? If he leaves, what will happen to his brother? 

UDAAN is a beautiful, inspiring story of self-realization against all odds. The film premiered at the 2010 Cannes Film Festival to a standing ovation. It heralds the arrival of two great new talents in first-time actor, Rajat Barmecha and first-time feature director Vikramaditya Motwane.

Hindi (English subtitles)
Presented by New Filmmakers LA

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At 23, Rekha’s life is a mess. Between her over-due rent, a dead-end job and an unreliable car, the road to adulthood has been a long and bumpy road. While her friends move on towards promising careers and challenging prospects, she boils with uncertainty and anger. Propelled by little more than rumor and a list of D. Kumars in the phone directory, Rekha decides to seek out her estranged father, Dev Kumar, to help alleviate her financial woes. She enlists the car and companionship of her ex-boyfriend Omar on a road trip destined for Seattle and the unknown. Along the way, Rekha must confront her inability to cope with the breakdown of her family, her lingering feelings for Omar and her struggles as a writer. By the time she comes face to face with the real Dev Kumar, she has a clearer vision of who he is and who she has become.

Returning to IFFLA with her first feature TROUBLEMAKER, Geeta Malik maps out the precarious road to adulthood. It is a journey filled with angst, cocktails, and indecision that anyone who still hasn’t quite grown up can relate to.

English, Hindi (English subtitles)
Presented by Screen Actors Guild

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I AM paints a compelling portrait of modern Indian society through four short stories about individuals struggling to find their identities in an increasingly complex world. In the first story, a single woman seeks to have a child on her own. In the second, a woman returns to her native region of Kashmir to sell the home that her family was forced from years ago. The third story focuses on a film director who overcame an abusive childhood in order to achieve success struggling over whether to confront his former tormentor. And the fourth and final story focuses on a gay man struggling to find love and acceptance in a country where homosexuality is illegal.

In addition to its all-star cast, complex themes and unique structure, I AM is also notable for the way that the film was produced. In the spirit of today’s interconnected and interactive culture director-producer Onir and actor-producer Sanjay Suri utilized social media to welcome the audience into the filmmaking process. Ultimately, the film was partially financed by over 400 people from 35 different cities around the world. By combining so many voices into one film, the filmmakers have managed to give voice to the sort of marginalized characters that are far too rarely heard.

Hindi (English subtitles)
Presented by Scripped

Like other actors in Los Angeles trying to make a career, Omi Vaidya auditioned for all kinds of roles in commercials, television and film. When a Bollywood film came calling for fresh faces, he was worried his poor Hindi would sink him. It did, but the producers saw him in another role. From that audition Omi was launched from relative obscurity to the heights of Bollywood stardom. His supporting role in 3 IDIOTS (2010), the biggest Indian box office hit of all time, put him in the company of Bollywood stalwarts like Aamir Khan and Vidhu Vinod Chopra, and literally changed his life. In between language classes, calls to his wife back in the United States, a press tour that routinely gathers tens of thousands of people, and award shows, Omi cheerfully greets strangers on the street who know him only as the “fourth idiot.”

Documented by his UCSC college friends, we see what Bollywood stardom looks like for the new star. Funny and irreverent, BIG IN BOLLYWOOD is the story of what happens when the “Indian myth” comes true.

English, Hindi (English subtitles)
Presented by Republic of Brown

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After a failed wooing attempt, Bittoo strikes up a friendship with Shruti. Desperate to find a way out of having to join his family's farming business, he begs Shruti to take him on as her partner in her ambitious wedding planning enterprise, "Shaadi Mubarak.” As per Shruti's wishes, Bittoo promises to keep the relationship strictly professional at all costs.

Their honesty and sincerity earn the duo valuable friends in the business, and with their support the enterprise booms. Matters get complicated when Shruti and Bittoo have an impulsive one-night-stand after a night of partying, celebrating their success. While Bittoo chooses to move on from it, Shruti realizes that for her it was more than just an impulsive moment, putting "Shaadi Mubarak" under the threat of disintegration.

BAND BAAJA BAARAAT received critical raves while enjoying fantastic box-office success in India and overseas. Energetic performances, smart writing, vibrantly colorful visuals, foot-thumping music and some very, very serious dancing make this film a memorable experience.

Hindi (English subtitles)
Presented by Amoeba

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It's a bird...it's a plane...it's Rajinikanth! He's the biggest superhero you've never heard of. One of Asia's highest paid movie stars, second only to Jackie Chan, Rajinikanth's on-screen persona and his penchant for the delightfully ridiculous has developed a cult following. In THE ROBOT (ENDHIRAN), he plays a brilliant scientist, Vaseegaran, who in the spirit of Dr. Frankenstein, creates a near-invincible humanoid robot, Chitti (obviously, also played by himself). When his competitor and mentor, the evil Dr. Bohra, denounces the creation as flawed due to its inability to feel, Vaseegaran returns to his lab and infuses Chitti with unparalleled artificial intelligence by programming it to experience human emotions.

Things go awry when Chitti begins to develop feelings for his creator's girlfriend Sana (Aishwarya Rai Bachchan). Dr. Bohra tries to use this as an opportunity to turn Chitti against his creator, but the robot has plans of his own. Chitti builds an army of his own clones, kidnaps Sana, and wreaks havoc around Chennai.

With stunts by Yuen Woo Ping (The Matrix), special effects by Legacy Effects and Stan Winston Studios, sound design by Academy Award winner Resul Pookutty, and an infectious score by two-time Academy Award winner A.R. Rahman, THE ROBOT (ENDHIRAN) is the biggest and most expensive film to ever be produced in India. This sci-fi musical is unlike anything American audiences will have ever witnessed.

TAMIL (English subtitles)
Presented by Amoeba

Watch the trailer

Like other actors in Los Angeles trying to make a career, Omi Vaidya auditioned for all kinds of roles in commercials, television and film. When a Bollywood film came calling for fresh faces, he was worried his poor Hindi would sink him. It did, but the producers saw him in another role. From that audition Omi was launched from relative obscurity to the heights of Bollywood stardom. His supporting role in 3 IDIOTS (2010), the biggest Indian box office hit of all time, put him in the company of Bollywood stalwarts like Aamir Khan and Vidhu Vinod Chopra, and literally changed his life. In between language classes, calls to his wife back in the United States, a press tour that routinely gathers tens of thousands of people, and award shows, Omi cheerfully greets strangers on the street who know him only as the “fourth idiot.”

Documented by his UCSC college friends, we see what Bollywood stardom looks like for the new star. Funny and irreverent, BIG IN BOLLYWOOD is the story of what happens when the “Indian myth” comes true.

English, Hindi (English subtitles)
Presented by Republic of Brown

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In rural Uttar Pradesh, when a woman is married at a very young age, abused by her in-laws, or falls in love with a man outside of her caste, often her only hope for justice is Sampat Pal Devi and the Gulabi Gang (aka the Pink Gang). Devi and her group of pink sari-wearing activists boldly confront customs and religion to show women there are choices other than suicide and oppression. Director Kim Longinotto shows how powerful traditions can be when - despite improving the life of others - Sampat has to confront her own family’s abuse. At times humorous and tragic, PINK SARIS demonstrates one person’s ability to make a difference in their community.

Hindi (English subtitles)

Screens with PINK CHADDIS
Presented by SAHARA- South Asian Helpline and Referral Agency

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When conservative groups use violence and shame to intimidate modern Indian youth, feminists and other activists respond with their own campaign of humor and defiance.

Hindi, English, Kannada (English subtitles)

Screens with PINK SARIS

A heart-warming and action-packed tale, ZOKKOMON tells the story of Kunal, a young orphan on a journey of transformation. After being abandoned by his uncle – a heartless school master who rules their village with cunning tricks – Kunal sets out to return home. Upon reaching the village he discovers the townspeople believe him to be dead. With the help of a lonely scientist, Kunal transforms himself into the superhero Zokkomon who fights for the rights of the children and, eventually, everyone in the village.

The first live-action feature from Walt Disney Studios India, ZOKKOMON takes its audience on a fun-filled ride. At the same time it focuses on the importance of love, respect, and believing in yourself as Kunal learns and grows along his journey.

Hindi (English subtitles)

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