Film festival played a major role in introducing foreign films to American audiences. Films in the first year included Akira Kurosawa's "Throne of Blood" and Satyajit Ray's "Pather Panchali". Today, thousands of film festivals take place around the world—from high-profile festivals such as Sundance Film Festival and Slamdance Film Festival (Park City, Utah), to horror festivals such as Terror Film Festival (Philadelphia), and the Park City Film Music Festival, the first U.S. film festival dedicated to honoring music in film. Film Funding competitions such as Writers and Filmmakers were introduced when the cost of production could be lowered significantly and internet technology
Pather Panchali (novel) and published. It was translated to Sinhalese under the name "Mawathe Geethaya" (Sinhala) by Chintha Lakshmi Sinhaarachchi and published in 1986. This was immensely popular in Sri Lanka and was followed by the translations of the other two books of the Apu trilogy by the same translator. 'Pather Panchali' was translated into Malayalam under the name, 'Pather Panchali - Paathayuday Sangeetham' by Mr. M. K. N. Potty, which was first published in April 2009 by Green Books Pvt Ltd., Trichur, Kerala. An English translation by T.W. Clark and Tarapada Mukherji was published in 1968 by Indiana University Press as part