NEW DELHI: The Jury of the Cimema XXI section of the Rome Film Festival that commences tomorrow and will be on till 17 November also has an Indian filmmaker, Ashim Ahluwalia on board.

Ashim Ahluwalia came to the limelight with his debut film John & Jane that had its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival and later screened at the Berlin Film Festival. It was the first Indian film to be distributed by HBO Films. His first feature-length film — Miss Lovely premiered at the 2012 Cannes Film Festival, in the Un Certain Regard section.

An outsider with respect to the Bollywood cinema system, Ashim Ahluwalia is part of the new generation of Indian directors who avoid working with the stars of Hindi films.

The Jury is chaired by American director and artist Larry Clark and other members include Yuri Ancarani (Italy), Laila Pakalnina (Latvia) and Michael Wahrmann (Uruguay).

On the occasion of the 100 Years of Indian Cinema, a restored version of Kamal Swaroop’s 1988 cult classic Om Dar Ba Dar will be screened out of competition in CinemaXXI.

The two Indian films competing in the CinemaXXI section are Prantik Basu’s Makara and Kamal Swaroop’s Rangbhoomi. The Seventh Walk (Saatvin Sair) by Amit Dutta will be the closing film section.

CinemaXXI is a competitive section devoted to new trends in world cinema and focuses on works that reflect the continuous reinvention of cinema in the contemporary audiovisual landscape. CinemaXXI hosts feature-length, medium-length, and short films.