The 11th edition of the Chennai Film Festival (CIFF) is dedicated to presenting the best of international and Indian panorama cinema. The festival also showcases the best of Tamil cinema. Scheduled for December 12 to 19, the festival will also have a competitive segment open only for Tamil films. The trend of awarding the producers and directors of the best and second best Tamil feature films and a special jury award for individual excellence started from the 7th edition onwards. It was brought in to promote the idea of intelligent content over commercial success.

The audience will also have something to compete for and win. A special award will be given to the most passionate film buff (any member of the audience who watches the most number of films and gives their personal review of the films watched during the 11th Chennai International Film Festival).

The Advisory committee of the festival include Mohan Raman, Suhashi Maniratnam, Purnima Bhagyaraj, Manobala, Lizzy Priyadarshan and several other renowned members of the cinema community.

The festival gets its due of star power as well. "Last year, Amitabh Bachchan was so impressed with the festival, that he donated Rs 10 lakhs to help this year's festival. We are using that money to institute the Amitabh Bachchan Youth Icon Award," said Mohan Raman, well known film and television personality and member of the advisory committee. Aamir Khan will be at the opening ceremony of the event this year.

Speaking about the festival (also known as CIFF), Raman said, “This is the only film festival where professionals from the industry are actively involved in running the festival. It does not happen anywhere else in the world.” Explaining that student volunteers have actively pitched in to support the festival, Raman said, “We have student-volunteers of the Visual Communications Department from SRM University to help with the festival.”

Films from Iran and Tehran will be screened at the CIFF, along with retrospectives of Claire Denis (France), István Szabó (Hungary), Goran Paskaljevic (Serbia). Award winning films from the film festivals of Cannes, Berlin and Venice will be screened as well. A special section on contemporary films from Turkey and current Indian panorama films has also been planned.

During the festival, films will be screened across various theatres such as Abirami Mega Mall, Woodlands Complex, Inox and Theatre Casino. For a detailed list of theatres and the schedules, you can visit the official website of the event www.chennaifilmfest.com.