Feroz Abbas Khan’s DEKH TAMASHA DEKH will open the 2013 New York Indian Film Festival (NYIFF) while Nitin Kakkar’s FILMISTAAN will screen as the closing night film. Now celebrating its 13th year, the festival is considered the oldest, most prestigious Indian film festival in the United States and runs April 30 to May 4, 2013.

Lyrically interwoven, DEKH TAMASHA DEKH is a social and political satire that cuts deep to the heart of many current issues, a true story based off true events. Written by renowned marathi playwright Shafaat Khan, who creates finely nuanced characters with depth and dimensions and sets them against a lush visual backdrop of a small village in India. Director Feroz Abbas Khan has directed some of India’s finest acting talent during his career of over two decades and he is at the forefront of Indian theatre today. His debut Film “Gandhi My Father” received rave reviews and won several national and international awards. He now showcases his new cinematic vision as the opening night film for the festival.  

For the closing night of NYIFF, debut director Nitin Kakkar brings his cinematic work of art, FILMISTAAN, exploring Indo-Pak relationships with subtle brilliance.  The protagonist, aspiring actor Sharib Hashmi, is assisting an American film crew shooting a documentary in the Indo-Pak border when one night he is kidnapped and held hostage in a small village in Pakistan. When the terrorist group realizes they have kidnapped an Indian and not an American, Hashmi is kept hostage until the mix-up is corrected, and he begins a burgeoning friendship with a young Pakistani.