Pakistani film secured 8th position in Asia’s first ever 'Smartphone Film Festival,' which was held yesterday evening here at the Pak American Cultural Centre (PACC) in Karachi.

Organized in Pakistan by the iSmart Films, the Festival was the world’s 9th pocket cinema film festival, which featured only those films and movies which were produced by young filmmakers from all over the world using their mobile phone devices only.

A total of 1058 films were submitted from over 110 countries, wherein Hassan Zaidi from Lahore, got 8th position for his documentary film titled Colors of death, which is about ‘coloured chickens’ sold after dying in the pet market in Lahore.

Among the top five winning films of the Festival were ‘Oven Glove’ from Ireland, ‘CHASM’ and ‘How to rob the house’ from the United States, ‘Sector Zero 4’ from Spain, and ‘Gloomy boy’ from France.

Launched in June this year, the last date of film submission was December 5, while the entries were judged by a panel of filming experts, including Shahzad Nawaz, Jami Mehmood, Furqan T. Siddiqui, Adil Murad, Yousuf Bashir Qureshi, and others. Awards were conferred to the top 10 films selected. Among the media partners of the Smartphone Film Festival were the Jang Media Group, GEO TV, FM91, FM107, and www.Tune.pk.

The submitted films were screened at nine different venues, including the Karachi Youth Support Network (KYSN), DotZero, DCTO Academy, Nazeer Hussain University (NHU), the Pak American Cultural Centre (PACC), and the Arena Multimedia, Karachi. Smart phone Film Festival is a madjoint creative production, brought up front by Abid Beli.

The Smartphone Film Festival was hosted by the iSmart Films in collaboration with seven international festivals from the United States, Spain, New Zealand, France, Macedonia, etc. In the festival, the ‘School of Smartphone Film Production’ was also inaugurated, followed by the launching of a ‘Web TV.’ The iSmart Films unveiled its ‘Video Resume Portal’ in the event, including the launching of different portals for videos, news, and online shopping.

The iSmart Films has recently introduced ‘Mobile Journalism’ in Pakistan, an emerging form of film-making and new media storytelling where pocket-sized communication devices with network connectivity are used to capture, gather, edit and distribute shots and visuals.