Adda general secretary Jhulan Krishna Mahanta talks to reporters on Monday. Picture by UB Photos

Oct. 31: Come December 10 and the city will host the eighth Adda short film festival with a large number of local and international entries.

This year, the daylong festival will be organised in three categories. In the invited films category, short films made by award-winning international directors will be screened. In the competition category, short films from different parts of the Northeast will compete with each other, while in the non-competition category, other films will be screened.

Adda is a socio-cultural organisation dedicated to films. To popularise short films in the state, it has been organising film festivals every year since 2004. The festivals have not only encouraged enthusiasts to make more short films, but also created awareness among people about short films.

The members of the organisation also screen short films in different parts of the state on request.

A short film is any film not long enough to be considered a feature film. However, no consensus exists as to where that boundary is drawn. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences defines a short film as an original motion picture that has a running time of 40 minutes or less, including all credits.

Bruxelles Short Film Festival and Namur Short Film Festival in Belgium, short film festival in Canada, International Student Short Film Festival and Cergy-Pontoise and International Short Film Festival in France and Landau Short Film Festival in Germany are some famous short film festivals across the globe.

The organisers said the venue of the festival would be selected in a convenient place in the city. “We are holding the short film competition to encourage the short film makers. But the participants must submit their short films (1 to 15-minute long) with relevant documents before December 1. They can visit our website or blog for further information,” Jhulan Krishna Mahanta, general secretary of Adda, said.

Mahanta said though quite a healthy number of short films are made in Assam, more emphasis is required to take them to an international level. “From our experience we can say that there is a good number of short filmmakers in Assam and other northeastern states. Sometimes, we get very good short films. But there is a need to improve their quality to be able to compete at the international level,” he said.

Last year, around 50 short films participated in the festival where several one-minute-long short films cau-ght the audience’s attention.