The grand event of local cinema:

Sarasaviya Film Festival on October 27

THE glitter of all the stars of the local silver screen under one roof, the 30th Sarasaviya Film Festival which is the much awaited milestone in the local cinema calender will be held on October 27 at the BMICH at 6.30 pm.

This momentous festival is sponsored this year by the Hatton National Bank (HNB) and the Sri Lanka Insurance Corporation (SLIC).

This year's Sarasaviya film festival has been specially titled as "Divine honours for the propagation of Cinema" by the organisers.

A unique feature of this year's festival is that the cash prizes presented to the award winners have been doubled.

Twenty-two films screened last year has been selected for this year's competition in the festival under several main categories such as Best Film, Best Director, Best Actor/Actress, Best Supporting Actor/Actress, Best Producer etc.

Altogether 33 awards will be presented this year for artistes who excelled on last year's silver screen.

Amongst the new additions to the festival is an award presented to a pioneer in local Tamil films.

The sponsorship cheques for the forthcoming event was presented recently at the Taj Samudra Hotel to ANCL Chairman Janadasa Peiris by Rajendra Thyagaraja, General Manager of HNB and Damien Fernando, Director of SLIC.

Veteran lyricist Bandula Nanayakkarawasam will handle the script of the stage direction of the main Sarasaviya Film Festival along with the TVT of Ravindra Guruge.

Jamuna Rani to grace Sarasaviya Film Festival

K. JAMUNA Rani, a popular cine-playback artiste from India will grace this year's Sarasaviya Festival as a special guest.

She has sung over 6,000 songs in various languages including Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam and Sinhalese.

Rani who sang popular songs such as Jeevaname Gamana, Pem Kekula Pipi, Seeth Sulangada, Preethiyen Sathutin, Dhutudha Indala, Premalokaya Niveegiyaa, Prema Gange, was a popular playback singer.

Rani's initial acquaintance with the film industry was at the age of seven, when she sang her first song in a Telugu movie Thyagaya in 1945.

She noted that it was picturised on a child artiste. The first time she gave playback to a heroine was in a Tamil film Valayapathy (1952) of modern theatres. The popular song Asayum, En Nesamum...' in the Tamil film Gulebakaavali (1955) became a great hit.

"My first opportunity to sing a Sinhalese song was for the movie Sujatha (1953) which was produced by Sri. Gunarathnam of Sri Lanka and Sri T. R. Sundaram of Modern Theatres, Salem. Subseqently, I sang many Sinhala songs, which were hit numbers for movies including Sadasulaang, Vanamohini, Suraya, Maathalang, Varadha Kageda, she noted.

She has extensively toured many foreign countries like Singapore, Malaysia, Australia, England, France, Germany, Switzerland, Canada, United States, Dubai, South Africa, participating in many musical concerts and cultural programmes.

Her life-time achievements have been, receiving the honour from the State Government of Tamil nadu with the 'Kalaimaamani' award in 1998, and the 'Aringnar Annadurai' award for 2002.

Dharmasiri Gamage remembered

A CEREMONY to commemorate the first death anniversary of well-known artiste, writer and journalist Dharmasiri Gamage, was held recently at the National Art Gallery, Colombo.

The ceremony included commemorative speeches by Pundit Dr. Amaradeva and Prof. J.B. Dissanayake.

The event also coincided with a photographic exhibition by Pradeep Patmaperuma who toured with Dharmasiri Gamage in most of his excursions and visits to the jungles which he penned for newspaper articles bringing thousands of readers closer to nature.

In most of his articles, Dharmasiri extensively focused on nature's beauty, country's heritage and the importance of safeguarding them.

The exhibition portrayed scenes captured by Pradeep during those excursions.

At the ceremony, veteran singer Sisira Senaratne sang a song written by Gamage. It was attended by a large gathering of artistes including Nanda Malini, Prof. Sunil Ariyaratne, Indrani Wijebandara, Deepika Priyadarshani, Kularatne Ariyawansa and Yamuna Malini. It was organised by the Soba Wana Sansadaya.