Mumbai to get 100-seater theatre for serious cinema

Mumbaikars who love serious cinema will soon have a 7,000 square-feet two-storied building at Bandra's Carter Road dedicated to their tastes. The space, called FilmBay is an initiative of the National Film Development Corporation (NFDC) and the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC).

The initiative will be headed by filmmaker Kiran Rao, while prominent industry people Anurag Kashyap, Dibakar Banerjee, Rohan Sippy, Zoya Akhtar and Anupama Chopra will serve as the advisory panel.

The building, which has been leased to NFDC by the BMC for 30 years starting January 2 this year, will be revamped to accommodate a 100-seater digital theatre, an exhibition hall, a reading and research hall, a bookshop and cafeteria.

Apart from industry people, the board will have two NFDC representatives, and an MCGM official. The centre located at Sherly Rajan Village in Bandra West is somewhat akin to New York's IFC Centre. It will start operations on December 1.

Nina Lath Gupta, managing director of NFDC, said, "We have planned this as a research centre which acts as a common point between academics and ground love for good cinema."

Gupta, widely acclaimed for her sustained efforts towards furthering laudable independent cinema through various initiatives at NFDC like Film Bazaar and NFDC Labs, said that she was thankful for the sort of talent the project attracted. "I have always maintained that it is a battle to attract people with skill sets attuned to producing enviable content, but I'm thankful the project has such good names attached to it."

Apart from films for general audiences, special screenings will be held for children studying in municipal schools, to hone their love for good cinema. There will also be director-audience meets after screenings. Master classes, workshops and indie film premieres are also on the pipeline.