Accolade at Palm Springs

Mani Ratnam's film wrestled third place among the Top Ten Audience Favourites.

Virtually the entire spectrum of Indian cinema - from personal celluloid essays to big-budget blockbusters - registered a significant triumph at the Palm Springs International Film Festival which concluded in southern California on Monday.

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Mani Ratnam's Kannathil Muthamittal (A Peck on the Cheek) did a Lagaan by wresting the third place among the festival's Top Ten Audience Favourites. The Aamir Khan epic had won the same position at last year's PSIFF and had gone on to bag an Oscar nomination in the foreign language film category. This time around, Kannathil Muthamittal is not even in the Oscar race, having lost out to Sanjay Leela Bhansali's Devdas.

The Ratnam film, which addresses the Chennai director's pet theme, terrorism, received an additional screening on January 20, the last day of the Palm Springs event by virtue of its popularity.

Two other Indian films - Karan Johar's melodramatic multi-starrer, Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham (7th place), and Aparna Sen's low-key humanist tract, Mr and Mrs Iyer (10th place) - also made it to the Top Ten.

Madhur Bhandarkar's stark Chandni Bar and Anwar Jamal's critically acclaimed Swaraaj - The Little Republic were also accorded additional screenings on popular demand. "Films from India garnered much success at the PSIFF," says Therese Hayes, who put together the festival's Indian package. "I hope that indicates a strong future for Indian cinema."

Especially heartening for India watchers was the success that actor Rahul Bose's directorial debut, Everybody Says I'm Fine, achieved: the quirky but taut English-language film missed the John Schlesinger Award for best debut film by a whisker but won an Honourable Mention.