Kazak film 'Tulpan' clinched the prestigious Golden Peacock award and a cash prize of Rs.4 million at the 39th International Film Festival of India in Panaji. The film from popular Kazak documentary film maker Sergei Dvortsevoy has also won the best feature film and the Golden Eye awards at the Montreal Film Festival and Zurich Film Festival respectively. Tulpan also happens to be Kazakhstan's official entry for the forthcoming Oscar awards in the foreign film category.

 

The award winning Kazak film deals with the story of a family of sheep and goat herders and their survival. The most promising director's award at the 39th IFFI was bagged by the maker of Tulpan, Sergei Dvortsevoy.  Sri Lankan actress Malini Fonseca won the special jury award for her role in the Sinhalese movie "Akasa Kusum" (Flowers In The Sky). Fonseca also received the prize money of Rs.1.5 million at IFFI.

 

The jury panel was comprised of some prominent figure of cinema world including noted Indian actress Tabu, Marco Muller, South Asian film maker Lav Dias and Iranian director Nikki Karimi. About 15 films from the Asia-Pacific, Asian, Latin American regions have been considered by the jury while picking up the winners.

 

Some Indian films like Priyadarshan's "Kanchivaram" (Tamil) and Ramesh More's "Mahasatta"(Marathi) were also in the race for awards in the IFFI. The 39th IFFI which kick started on November 22 was attended by nearly 6,000 delegates from around the world. The film festival had screened over 200 films from 40 countries of the world.