A handful of cinema enthusiasts turned up for the final day of a two-day documentary film festival at Patna Museum on Sunday.

About 150 people came in for the second day of the festival, barely 90 more than Saturday’s footfall.

The organisers admitted that the turnout was low but insisted that they were not entirely disappointed. “We hoped for a better response. Still, I am not very disappointed given that documentary films have very few takers,” said Uday Pratap Singh, state assistant co-ordinator of Aman Public Charitable Trust and one of the organisers.

The trust had organised the two-day festival in collaboration with Samar and Lok Panch, two theatre groups.

On the low turnout, Singh said: “Documentary movies are not like commercial films, which have a lot of masala (spice) to attract the audience. While commercial movies hardly give any message, documentary movies portray the real picture of society.”

Singh said the turnout in the first edition of the film fest was also very low. “We organised the first edition of this film festival in 2010 and even then the maximum footfall was around 150 on a day,” he said.

Those who came to attend the event, however, were satisfied and appreciated the efforts. The audience comprised people from different walks of life —artistes, housewives, social activists and students.

For Meenakshi Jha Banerjee, a painter, this documentary film festival was a rare chance to introduce this kind of movies to her eight-year-old daughter, Mishti. “Though Mishti does not like documentaries very much, I made it a point to bring her here, as they are thought provoking, unlike commercial movies.”

The documentary films screened at the festival were Manipur Songs, Inshaallah Football, Naseem, The Men in the Tree, Had Anhad and Firaq. The films were between 60 minutes and 120 minutes long.