INDIAN FESTIVAL DIRECTOR ON IRIS JURY
Sridhar Rangayan, festival director of KASHISH Mumbai International Queer Film Festival was on the Jury for Iris Prize Festival 2013 which awards the highest cash award for LGBT films in the world.
Sridhar Rangayan (extreme right) with the 2013 Iris Prize Jury
Iris Prize Festival at Cardiff Wales, UK gives out the highest cash award for a LGBT film – £25,000, no less! A 10 member strong jury comprised of festival directors, filmmakers, and actors from India, Australia, Ireland, and UK decide on the winner. The 2013 jury, chaired by Kirsten Schaffer the Executive Director at Outfest, Los Angeles included Sridhar Rangayan, festival director of KASHISH Mumbai International Queer Film Festival.
“I am indeed proud and honored to be part of such an eminent Jury. It definitely is a big onus on us to decide the winner, since it is the biggest LGBT film cash award”, said Rangayan.
30 LGBT short films from around the world compete for the Iris Prize with a diversity of stories – from sexy and erotic to painful and distressing. A montage of the shorts can be watched at: http://youtu.be/EoqfCtNq1VI One of the films competing is an Indian entry – ‘Urmi’ by Jehangir Jani, which won the Best Indian Narrative Short Award at KASHISH 2013.
The £25,000 Iris Prize supported by The Michael Bishop Foundation, and will be announced during the Iris Awards presented by Amy Lamé on Sunday 13 October 2013 in Cardiff.
The Iris Prize Festival also hosted a Producers Forum which focussed on the latest issues affecting low-budget film making addressing issues of funding, distribution, and exhibition.
“The Producers Forum offers filmmakers from the UK a chance to interact with professionals from all four corners of the globe in a friendly but business-like manner. Expanding the Producers Forum beyond gay and lesbian production has been a natural and easy process. 99% of business issues affecting LGBT film content is relevant to anybody working in film and TV today,” said Berwyn Rowlands, festival director of Iris Prize Festival.
“This indeed is a great opportunity for fledgling filmmakers, and crowdfunding definitely is a new way forward to finance short and independent films. It also shows the support of the community and builds a large audience. We have seen this with the crowdfunding campaign we have carried out for the past two years to support KASHISH. While we have raised gap funding through this, it has built us a lot of goodwill and participation”, said Rangayan.
KASHISH crowdfunding was one of the most successful campaigns by Wishberry, a mainstream crowdfunding platform.
Link: www.irisprize.org
