The second edition of Red Lorry Film Festival kicked off on Friday in Hyderabad. The festival, organised by BookMyShow, has also a Mumbai edition simultaneously underway.
The festival was inaugurated with a traditional lamp-lighting ceremony led by Ramesh Prasad, owner of Prasad Studios and Multiplex. Prasad paid homage to his late father and acclaimed filmmaker LV Prasad, introducing his 1955 film Missamma, which was the opening film of the festival.
Day one of the festival saw the screenings of 2024 award favourites like Anora, Emelia Perez, and Universal Language among others. Some other acclaimed movies from last year to be screened on day one included The 47, a Spanish film about the steely resolve of an ageing man who breaks all barriers to get a connecting bus network to Torre Baro, a marginalised neighbourhood of Barcelona. A total of 24 movies played on day one at the festival.
Besides the movie screenings, day one also saw several special events like the masterclass with Krishna Vamsi, Shiva Balaji and Navadeep, following the screening of their 2007 film Chanda Mama. Renowned casting director Tess Joseph, known for her work for Life of Pi and Lion, held a session on the evolution of casting in film industry, talking about the landscape of talent discovery and impact of globalisation on storytelling. Additionally, upcoming filmmaker Shrikaran Beecharaju spoke about his debut film Four on Eleven, a documentary about the fading presence of Parsi community in Indian cricket.
However, it was the screening of beloved classics under the ‘Legacy Rewind’ section that stole the limelight on day 1. One of the earliest screenings on day 1 was the 1975 classic Deewaar. The screening had many Amitabh Bachchan fans in attendance, cheering and hooting on as the ‘Angry Young Man’ mouthed some of the most iconic lines of Hindi cinema, proving the timeless brilliance of its themes and cinematic style. The screening of Ram Gopal Varma’s 1991 film Kshana Kshanam, saw a full house, brimming with fans of the director who ushered in a cinematic language of Telugu movies in the 90s.
However, the most memorable moment of the evening was the screening of David Fincher’s 1995 film Se7en. Played on the biggest screen at Prasad multiplex, with a 630-seat capacity, Se7en drew a huge number of audience, especially impressive for a film nearly 30 years old. The restored version of the film looked particularly spectacular, drawing the film-goer’s attention to its sleek technical values and its grim, haunting portrayal of New York. If anything, with its thundering reception of the movie, Hyderabad audience lived upto its image of a bonafide cinema-lover city.
