Dadasaheb Phalke Award winner Adoor Gopalakrishnan is understandably one of the most sought after people at the 36th International Film Festival of India (IFFI).

When pen pushers or impromptu seminar organisers let him alone, which of course isn't very often, he does manage to sneak into a movie hall to watch a new Indian film.

On Thursday night, he had to head straight to a Goa Malayali Samajam - a special dinner event organised to felicitate Kerala's solitary Phalke Award winner.

This has been a great year for Malayalam cinema at IFFI. As many as seven films from the state are in the Indian Panorama. Several people associated with these entries, including popular actor Ravindran, were also seated on the dais during the felicitation function.

Adoor was at his candid best. "Malayalis are extremely good at organising such functions but they have stopped seeing our films," he said.

He appealed to the congregation to rediscover the film-watching habit, which was so effectively inculcated in Malayalis 40 years ago by the film society movement that Adoor himself spearheaded.