DUSHANBE (Asia-Plus) — Tajik prominent filmmaker Davlat Khudonazarov (دولت خدانظروف) has been listed among the 100 best Asian filmmakers. A new list of the best Asian films of all time was published in early October, as the region’s increasingly vibrant cinema scene celebrated another bonanza in Busan, South Korea.

Davlat Khudonazarov

The 20^th anniversary of the Busan International Film Festival reportedly marked its milestone with a poll of noted Asian filmmakers and international critics of Asian film, who were all asked for their top ten. According to AFP, Oscar front-runner Hou Hsiao-Hsien said the release of the Asian Cinema 100 was a reminder to fellow filmmakers of their obligation to “seek the truth.”

For the project, 73 prominent film professionals at home and abroad included film critics such as Jonathan Rosenbaum, Tony Rayns, Hasumi Shigehiko, and renowned festival executives, programmers, and directors Mohsen Makhmalbaf, Bong Joon-ho, and Apichatpong Weerasethakul. They recommended their top 10 films, resulting in 113 selections.

The first top five movies include:

1. Tokyo Story by Yasujiro Ozu (Japan);
2. Rashomon by Akira Kurosawa (Japan);
3. In the Mood for Love by Wong Kar-Wai (Hong Kong);
4. The Apu Trilogy by master filmmaker Satyajit Ray (India);
5. A City of Sadness by Hou Hsiao-hsien (Taiwan).

Nine filmmakers from Central Asia, including Davlat Khudonazarov, were listed among the 100 best Asian filmmakers.

Davlat Khudonazarov is a Tajik filmmaker, public figure and human rights activist. He was born in Khorog, the capital of the Gorno Badakhshan Autonomous Region (GBAO), Tajikistan on March 13, 1944.

Khudonazarov was a prominent filmmaker when he was elected People’s Deputy from Tajikistan to the Supreme Soviet of the USSR in 1988. He was elected as chairman of the USSR Union of Cinematographers in 1989. He was the chief peace-negotiator between the army and the demonstrators in the February 1990 Dushanbe riots. He ran against Rahmon Nabiyev in the presidential elections in November 1991. Khudonazarov received 35% of the popular vote. He worked as a peacemaker during the Tajik civil war (1992-1996). In 1994-95 he was Peace Fellow at the United States Institute of Peace, and Galina Starovoitova Fellow in Human Rights and Conflict Resolution at Kennan Institute of the Woodrow Wilson Center in 2005.