Award winning foreign language films now in India

Award winning foreign language films other than English can now be viewed on the big screen in India.

Sunil Doshi has formed two companies, Handmade Films and Forum Films, which will be releasing such films for Indian viewers.

This is an unusual phenomenon because foreign language films, in languages such as Japanese, Italian or French, were not available to cine buffs on the large screen except during film festivals.

"We plan to change that. We want to bring new foreign films into India for large-screen viewing," said Doshi, who runs a celebrity endorsement company in Mumbai that looks after the advertisement assignments of Amitabh and Abhishek Bachchan, Priyanka Chopra and Rani Mukerji among others.

"We're starting with the French documentary 'March Of The Penguins' directed by Luc Jacquet which has just won an Oscar. It's a prized acquisition," Doshi told IANS.

"And Amitabh Bachchan has agreed to do the Hindi voice-over in place of the original commentary by Morgan Freeman. I don't think this kind of an experiment has been attempted before," said Doshi, who last week married his French girlfriend Anna.

Doshi's companies are also releasing the Belgian-French co-production "L'Enfant", directed by Jean-Pierre Dardenne and Luc Dardenne, which won the Palm d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival 2005 as well as Dominik Moll's "Lemming", which was the opening film at Cannes the same year.

"We're now in negotiation with several Oscar nominated foreign films," said Doshi.

Handmade Film has produced three Hindi films -- Santosh Sivan's "Terrorist" and "Navarasa" and Rajat Kapoor's "Mixed Doubles".

"We're very happy with the way 'Mixed Doubles' has performed at the box office. It was never designed as a blockbuster. It was a small naughty comedy and it has more than earned back our investments.

"We've now completed a second film with the same team called 'Bheja Fry'. It's even zanier and saucier than 'Mixed Doubles'. It has Konkona SenSharma and Ranvir Shorey in the lead and Rajat Kapoor as director. He also plays a role."

Doshi said Handmade Films and Forum Films were not looking at short-term gains.

"I won't look at the accounts sheet after every foreign release or after every film I produce. The idea is to look at long-term creative benefits. If some financial profits are shown at the end of the year or two years, we're happy. Otherwise, the companies will continue to release and distribute the films it believes in."