The 17th edition of the Bengaluru International Film Festival (BIFFes) held from 29 January to 6th February 2026 opened with a significant cultural highlight: Poland as the Focus Country, marking a vibrant moment of cultural exchange between Poland and India.
The festival’s opening ceremony was held at the Vidhana Soudha, Bengaluru, in the presence of the Hon’ble Chief Minister of Karnataka, Mr. Siddaramaiah. In his address, the Chief Minister expressed his appreciation for Polish cinema and warmly welcomed Ms. Małgorzata Wejsis-Gołębiak, Minister Plenipotentiary and Director of the Polish Institute, New Delhi, acknowledging Poland’s rich contribution to world cinema. The ceremony was also attended by Mr. Raghu Rajappa, Honorary Consul of the Republic of Poland in Bengaluru.
A central pillar of the Polish Focus at BIFFes 2026 is the Centenary Tribute Retrospective of Andrzej Wajda. The retrospective celebrates Wajda’s enduring legacy through screenings of his landmark works, including Kanal, Ashes and Diamonds, The Promised Land, Man of Marble, Maids of Wilko and Afterimage.
Wajda’s films transformed national history into universal cinema, blending politics, poetry, and moral inquiry. Rooted in his personal experiences of war, resistance, and survival, his work gave voice to Poland’s collective memory and continues to inspire filmmakers and audiences across generations and borders.
Alongside the retrospective, BIFFes presented a carefully curated selection of contemporary Polish films, offering Indian audiences insight into Poland’s evolving cinematic landscape. The selection included Chopin, Chopin (dir. M. Kwieciński), Franz ( dir. A. Holland), Under the Volcano (dir. D. Kocur), and the acclaimed documentary Letters from Wolf Street (dir. Arjun Talwar).
The Polish delegation at the festival included Ms. Joanna Łapińska, Artistic Director of the Polish Film Festival in Gdynia, who also served as a jury member for the Asian Cinema Competition at BIFFes and Polish director Damian Kocur.
As part of the festival’s masterclass and discussion series, on 30 th January BIFFes hosted a panel titled Polish Cinema and the Andrzej Wajda Legacy, exploring cinema not only as storytelling, but as a powerful medium of history, memory, and identity. The panel featured: Ms. Małgorzata Wejsis-Gołębiak, Director, Polish Institute, New Delhi; Mr. Raghu Rajappa, Honorary Consul of the Republic of Poland; Ms. Joanna Łapińska, Artistic Director, Polish Film Festival, Gdynia; Mr. N. Vidhyashankar, Former Artistic Director, BIFFes. The discussion was moderated by noted film critic and journalist Murtaza Ali Khan.
Filmmaker Damian Kocur, director of Under the Volcano, participated in the festival’s professional programme at BIFFes 2026 and conducted a Directing Masterclass titled From Short Films to First Features: Finding a Language on 3 rd February. Moderated by Murtaza Ali Khan, the session explored Kocur’s journey from short films to feature-length cinema, with a focus on storytelling, authorial voice, and the development of cinematic language.
A particularly moving moment at BIFFes was the screening of Arjun Talwar’s documentary Letters from Wolf Street, which played to a full house in Bengaluru. Set on a one-kilometre-long street in Warsaw, the film follows Talwar, an Indian filmmaker who came to Poland to study cinema and found himself exploring deeper questions of belonging, migration, and home.
By presenting both the timeless legacy of Andrzej Wajda and the voices of contemporary Polish filmmakers, the festival offered Indian audiences a rich and nuanced understanding of Polish cinema—past, present, and future.
For the detailed schedule of the festival and the films presented at the 17th Bengaluru International Film Festival (BIFFes 2026), please visit the official BIFFes website at: https://www.biffes.org/
