With the Russian invasion of Ukraine leading many to flee the country, the world fears a refugee crisis. The depth of such a predicament can be viewed in the Finnish movie Any Day Now, scheduled to be screened in a five-day international film festival in Kolkata by the Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR), in collaboration with a Goutam Ghosh-led film forum.

The ICCR, an autonomous body under the central government, is collaborating with Forum for Film Studies and Allied Arts (FFSAA) to host the 11th International Film Festival that will screen movies from five continents from 27- 31 March at Satyajit Ray auditorium. About 17 films will be screened that includes movies from Phillipines, Denmark, Germany Spain, Russia, Guatemala etc.

Commenting on the festival, the general secretary of FFSAA, Rabin Banerjee said that the film festival initially began as a part of the Kolkata International Film Festival but later on became a separate event, hosted in collaboration with the ICCR. The first day will screen movies from Philippines, Australia, India and Costa Rica.

The special draw of the festival, expectedly, will be the closing movie Biriyaani, a Kerala film that that has travelled to 50 international film festivals and has won 20 awards so far. The director, Sajin Babu will be visiting Kolkata to present it to the city audience.

The inaugural film will be Nitantoi Sahaj Saral by Satrabit Paul, a tale of an ice cream vendor, hailing from a border town of West Bengal, who acquaints himself with many shades of a human character during his journey to a village fair. The film was shown in Indian Panorama Section of IFFI 2021, in Goa. It is the first screening at Kolkata. The festival will be inaugurated by eminent film director Anik Datta and budding filmmaker Sharmishtha Maiti.

The film, Any Day Now revolves around a 13-year-old Ramin Mehdipour and his Iranian family, who are living in a refugee centre in Finland. Just when the child begins to enjoy his school holidays, the family receives the news that their asylum application has been rejected and thereafter spends each day in fear of deportation. Directed by Hamid Ramezan, it is expected to draw parallels with the ongoing refugee crisis, world over.