Sarbjit and Aishwarya’s night out in Cannes

Omung Kumar’s upcoming real-life drama “Sarbjit”, starring Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, had two market screenings on the first weekend of the 69^th Cannes Film Festival.

The star of the much anticipated film, after a red carpet appearance for the screening of Steven Spielberg’s “Roald Dahl” adaptation The BFG on Saturday, participated in a photo call on Sunday and addressed a press conference.

“Sarbjit” was screened in the market on both Saturday and Sunday. While Richa Chadha, who plays Sarabjit Singh’s wife in the biopic, and the film’s director accompanied Aishwarya, Randeep Hooda, who essays the titular role, gave Cannes a miss.

On Monday, Sonam Kapoor, who, like Aishwarya, is a brand ambassador of French cosmetics giant L’Oreal, will witness her latest film, “Neerja”, being screened in the Marche du Film here.

But the principal Indian focus will, however, continue to be on Monday’s world premiere of Anurag Kashyap’s “Raman Raghav 2.0”, which is being unveiled in Directors’ Fortnight.  The director of the film has arrived in Cannes along with Nawazuddin Siddiqui and Vicky Kaushal and will be in attendance during the screening of “Raman Raghav 2.0”.

The film has generated a huge buzz here. It will be watched keenly in particular by Kashyap’s fans who were left cold by his last film, the big-budget “Bombay Velvet”.

One of the two Indian films in the Cannes official selection, Shirley Abraham and Amit Madheshiya’s “The Cinema Travellers”, a documentary on Maharashtra’s struggling travelling tent cinemas, premiered in the Cannes Classics on Sunday.

Screened in the Bunuel theatre, the film received a standing ovation.

Introducing “The Cinema Travellers”, Abraham said, “The film showcases the keepers and custodians of an old tradition of film watching as a community exercise. It is, therefore, great to premiere in a festival like Cannes.”