The film ‘Boli (The Wrestler)’ has won the New Currents Award at the 28th 2023 Busan International Film Festival (BIFF), in South Korea.
Directed by Iqbal H Chowdhury and produced by Piplu R Khan, the film emerges as the first Bangladeshi entry to clinch this coveted title, sharing the limelight with Japan's "Mori Tatsuya." Both films, hailed for their narrative prowess, were awarded a substantial prize of $30,000 each.
In "Boli," the protagonist Nasir Uddin takes on the role of a rugged fisherman living in a remote coastal village of Banshkhali in Chattogram, who later challenges a Boli (wrestler) to a fight.
The judges in the New Currents section of the festival declared of Iqbal Hossain Chowdhury's directorial creation, “His film 'The Wrestler' is akin to a gripping single-round wrestling match, where the story is magically told."
The 92-minute long film was funded by a grant from the Bangladesh government in the fiscal year 2020-21. The film was continuously shot in the coastal area of Chittagong in April-May of 2022. Nasir Uddin Khan played the lead role in the movie.
The film 'Boli' premiered on October 7, 8 and 9 at three local multiplexes in Busan.
