Style-icons Sonam Kapoor, Celina Jade and Deepika Padukone were among the scene-stealers at the Closing Night ceremony of film-fest 19th MAMI-2017, co-anchored by the sultry Radhika Apte. The film festival honoured outstanding talent amongst actors and filmmakers in the fiercely-contested multiple competition categories.
While Deepika (who is also a MAMI Board trustee) presented the 'MAMI Oxfam Award for Gender Equality' to Rima Das for ‘Village Rockstars’, the ‘Newton’ star Rajkummar Rao gave away the 'Audience Choice Award' to the Hungarian cine-drama ‘On Body and Soul’ by Ildiko Enyedi. In her acceptance speech Rima was candid as she shared, ”When I started making movies, the movies were earlier selected in film-festivals, and my mother used to always ask whether I will ever win. So this is to my mom.”
The coveted Golden Gateway Award (Feature) was picked up by Nicole V. Kilsdonk for her ‘The Day My Father Became A Bush’. In the city-centric ‘Dimensions Mumbai’ category, The Golden Gateway Award was bagged by Anurag Worlikar for ‘The Vacancy’, while in the International Competition, the Gateway Award went to ‘Summer of 1993’ by Carla Simon. Emotionally moved, a grateful Carla reacted “It’s been an incredible experience. It’s my first visit to India.”
The Bolly-turn out also included Sonam Kapoor, Shahid Kapoor, Rajkumar Hirani, Ashutosh Gowarikar and Vidhu Vinod Chopra. Maverick Director Hansal Mehta’s film ‘Omerta’ was the closing film of the festival.
Meanwhile, ‘MAMI’ Creative Director, Smriti Kiran enthused, “The passion of the delegates is exhilarating. Makes us want to do better. We have already started working on the next edition of the festival, which will also mark our 20th year. I can’t wait to start work again.”