Anurag Thakur, Union Minister for Information and Broadcasting, on Friday, announced that Hungarian film director Istvan Szabo and American film director Martin Scorsese will be awarded the Satyajit Ray Lifetime Achievement Award at the 52nd International Film Festival of India (IFFI) in Goa, confirmed news agency ANI.

The IFFI was founded in 1952 and is considered one of the most prominent film festivals in Asia. The film festival seeks to provide a platform for the cinemas across the world to project their contribution to the understanding and appreciation of “film cultures of different nations in the context of their social and cultural ethos; and promoting friendship and cooperation among people of the world,” the official website of the iffigoa reads.

Who is Istvan Szabo?

Istvan Szabo is one of the most prominent Hungarian film directors of the past few decades. He directed auteur films in Hungary in the 1960s and ’70s that explored his generation’s experiences and recent Hungarian history (Apa (1966); Szerelmesfilm (1970); Tuzoltó utca 25. (1973)).

One of his most celebrated works, a trilogy, consists of Mephisto (1981) that is a winner of an Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film and a Cannes Award for the Best Screenplay), Colonel Redl (1984) that is a winner of a Jury Prize at the Cannes Festival) and Hanussen (1988).

With the 1991 film Meeting Venus, he switched to English-language films. He followed it up with Sunshine (1999), Taking Sides (2001) and Being Julia (2004). 2004 directorial got an Oscar nomination for actor Annette Bening.

With Austrian actor Klaus Maria Brandauer came one of his most acclaimed films. In 1996, he was given the Hungarian Pulitzer Memory Prize for his TV documentary series, “The hundred years of cinema”.

Who is Martin Scorsese?

Martin Charles Scorsese graduated with a BS degree in film communications in 1964 and followed it up with an MA in the same field in 1966 at New York University’s School of Film.

During that time he made several prize-winning short films including The Big Shave (1967), and directed his first feature film, Who’s That Knocking at My Door (1967). Courtesy of his acclaimed work for Mean Streets (1973) he got paired with actor and frequent collaborator Robert De Niro.

In 1976, Scorsese’s Taxi Driver (1976) was given the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival. He followed that up with New York, New York (1977) and The Last Waltz (1978).

Scorsese’s 1980 film Raging Bull saw De Niro put up an Oscar-winning performance. The film earned eight Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture and Best Director, and is hailed as one of the masterpieces of modern cinema. Scorsese went on to direct The Color of Money (1986), The Last Temptation of Christ (1988), Goodfellas (1990), Cape Fear (1991), The Age of Innocence (1993), Casino (1995) and Kundun (1997), among other films.