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Category: Hindi

  • ‘Katti Batti:’ Dead loss!

    ‘Katti Batti:’ Dead loss!

    Katti Batti is an attempt to make a contemporary film about love at first sight and the couple deciding to get in to a live-in relationship. If a movie on a live-in relationship is new generation, the germ of the story and the treatment meted out to the film are so old-fashioned, it desensitises your mind and feelings.

    Imran Khan is a student of architecture in Ahmedabad. He is supposed to be a scholar type and to that end the makers add thick-rimmed black spectacles to his look. While walking through the college common passages, he spots some colourful paper birds landing around him. He looks around to see Kangana Ranaut as the maker of the flight of birds. She gestures to say that she is doing it out of boredom in her classroom. While Imran has his name inscribed on his school kit, Kangana has a tattoo printed near her ankle pointing to the anklets she wears to convey that her name is Payal! That establishes she is a trendy girl of today, while he is old school.

    However, Imran is not all that old school for he readily opts for a live-in relationship with Kangana. Imran becomes instantly possessive of her and has a fight with Vivaan Bhatena, a college toughie because he teased his girlfriend aka Kangana. To his chagrin, Kangana informs that the fight was because he happened to be her ex-boyfriend whom she dropped like a hot potato two days after meeting Imran. Imran has a friend who seems to have been pasted on him with Fevicol! At home, at college, at work, so much so that their sexual preferences are questioned. Well, this is the trivia that dominates the contents of this film. 

    Imran and his friends are the star architects of their office with a boss who is a caricature of a South Indian loudmouth, with decibel levels that breaks the sound barrier. In this office, you never see anybody working, let alone looking like architects. Either they are flirting, sleeping around or fighting around office fixtures.

    After spending five years as partners, Imran and Kangana part ways, which Imran celebrates by guzzling down four bottles of phenyl. Constant fights were the reason for them parting. The couple decides to smoke a peace pipe with a break in Goa but end up having a fight just before boarding the flight. Imran turns back leaving Kangana alone and that is the last he sees of her. She has vanished, is incommunicado and none of her friends are willing to help Imran find her. So you spend an hour-long yawn trip with Imran trying to find her, sobbing all the way in regret of losing her. 

    That is about two hours into the film when the filmmakers decide to tell you what this film was all about! Which, in today’s media and social network era, just about everybody seems to know already. 

    The scripting, direction, music – songs as well as background score and editing are not worth discussing. While Kangana is burdened with an ill-conceived characterisation that can’t salvage an inch of the film, Imran proves to be a liability. Rest are inconsequential. 

    Katti Batti has disaster written all over it. The period from Ganesh festival to Diwali was never considered the right period to release a film, except for those which carried no hope.

    Producer: Siddharth Roy Kapur

    Director: Nikhil Advani

    Cast: Imran Khan, Kangana Ranaut, Vivaan Bhatena

    ‘Meeruthiya Gangsters:’ What a waste!

    The movies on UP and Bihar gangs are forced down the audiences’ throat despite regular rejections. The problem is that the audience does not care for a local small-town loser who unwittingly tastes success in a crime and becomes a regular gangster when the real-life one comes from the metros of India!

    Some people may even need to Google where Meeruth (now Meerut) is! One of the best films ever made on these local gangs wasSaher (2005) starring Arshad Warsi but that also failed. What we have here is a film with an utterly senseless story to tell.

    There are six college buddies of irrelevant pedigree as far as Hindi cinema is concerned. They look anything but college-going youth. However, anything goes when you are spinning a story about such a state as UP. The boys seek a job in a big private company for which they are needed to pay Rs 75,000 per head. There is some company in Meerut, which agrees to hire them en masse and promises all of them big posts along with big pay packages! But, they have no means of raising such a huge sum so they take to looting. The first victim is the very bar where this broke gang keeps guzzling beer. 

    Besides the bribe per head, they are also expected to entertain the boss of the company with a party, which means imported booze and a girl to go with it. After meeting the demands of the boss to be, the guys soon realise that the boss and the middleman have both conned them. They take the middleman as a hostage and demand ransom from his family. When they succeed, they decide to make this their regular business.

    The guys may all look unkempt and thug-like but the girls they court would give the South Delhi disco crowd a complex! The gang now looks for bigger targets for ransom. They choose a company’s CA where the girlfriend of one of the gangsters works. Here starts the old belief that when a woman enters a scene, a bunch of friends will soon be divided. 

    The next big heist is planned. The target this time is the crorepati boss of the girl in the gang. His kidnap is too big for the UP cops to ignore. Enter Rahul Dev, a Dirty Harry kind of cop who believes neither in wearing a uniform nor discipline. The rest is utter bull, which one wonders if even UPites would identify with!

    The film is poor in all respects. It has no script worth its name, poor direction with jerks and unexplained scenes aplenty. Musical score sounds like a picnic medley. Performances are stagy. Editing is non-existent. Production values are poor and a lot of liberty is taken with location as you don’t know whether the action is taking place in Meerut, Noida, Dehradun or Mumbai.

    Meeruthiya Gangster is a total waste of time. 

    Producers: Prashant Tiwari, Prateek Tiwari, Shoeb Ahmed

    Director: Zeishan Quadri

    Cast: Sanjay Mishra, Rahul Dev, Brijendra Kala and others

    ‘MSG2: The Messenger:’ A selfie

    Late last evening while returning from PVR Juhu, I met three lads and two girls sporting the Gurmet Ram Rahim Singh Ji Insaan (GRRSJI) T-shirts. They wanted to know how to get to CST (VT) to be able to catch a train to Kaylan, which is another town on the outskirts of Mumbai! I told them to take some transport to Sion, which is closer to Kalyan by miles and more approachable than the CST.  But, while they waited for a bus or something, they discussed fare comparison between a bus and a rickshaw. 

    This group was ‘imported’ from Karnal in Punjab and carried the smell of sarson ka tel (mustard oil), applied to body after bath as a routine where they came from. I got used to the smell after a while. They had come to PVR, Juhu all the way from Kalyan to find out if their net booking tickets could be collected a day before. Well, all they had to do was just show the reference of the booking on their cell phone and they could get in. 

    This lot was the typical GRRSJI devotees, who volunteered to ‘throng’ the 75 screens booked by the Guru in Mumbai (though the thronging crowd had to be transported to Mumbai from Karnal, in fact a village nearby Karnal.)

    There you have the story of GRRJI’s foray into filmmaking.

    This time, in the sequel, GRRSJI plays the Superman once again. This time, he recounts his year spent with an Adivasi lot (tribal) who used to roam naked and had no touch with the modern world. GRRJI has a job on his hand. He needs to bring them in touch with the realities. He teaches them to dress, build schools for them, also hospitals and other amnesties albeit, after destroying the traditional evil adivasi leaders who control their lives.

    GRRSJI has superpowers, he overcomes all villains; changes the lot of tribals and comes back happily to his base preparing for his next sequel.

    As I was enlightened by his five followers, MSG1 was completed in 67 days while this one took just 47 days! In the first instalment GRRSJI handled 17 technical departments like story, action and music. His followers are waiting to count how many more he has mastered this time. 

    GRRSJI has his own funds, own marketing (last time PVR did it for him; this time he stayed back in Mumbai at a suburban seven star to find some ‘reputed’ corporate house to do the needful). But, one thing is sure, he also transports in his own audience with a Mumbai sightseeing as a bonus for another 10 days, which he promises, Mumbai like nobody else ever seen before!

    Producer and everything else: GRRSJI.

  • ‘Piku’ & ‘Dum Laga Ke Haisha’ win at Indian Film Fest in Russia

    ‘Piku’ & ‘Dum Laga Ke Haisha’ win at Indian Film Fest in Russia

    MUMBAI: Yash Raj Films’ production Dum Laga Ke Haisha as well the Amitabh Bachchan and Deepika Padukone starrerPiku, which was distributed by YRF, won accolades at the recently concluded Indian Film Festival in Russia (IFFR).

     

    The festival saw Dum Laga Ke Haisha’s lead actor Ayushmann Khurrana, with industry personalities Ronnie Lahiri and Sheel Kumar in attendance along with IFFR president and festival director Sarfaraz Alam and Indian Council For Cultural Relations director, Indian Embassy Ashish Sharma.

     

    Khurrana won the best actor award for Dum Laga Ke Haisha, whereas Piku was awarded the best film (Ronnie Lahiri) and best director (Shoojit Sircar) at the festival, which took place at Formula Kino Horizont.

  • Mukesh Bhatt re-elected as Guild president

    Mukesh Bhatt re-elected as Guild president

    NEW DELHI: Eminent filmmaker Mukesh Bhatt has been unanimously re-elected as president of the Film and Television Producers Guild of India., while Dheeraj Kumar, Siddharth Roy Kapur, Manish Goswami and Vijay Singh have been named vice presidents.

     

    At the first meeting of its newly constituted Guild Council of Management, which was held immediately after the 61st Annual General Meeting in Mumbai, the other office bearers re-elected as part of the Guild Management Team are Ashim Samanta and Srishti Arya as treasurers.

     

    Kulmeet Makkar will continue to manage the affairs of the Guild as its CEO.

     

    In his opening speech, Bhatt said, “Throughout the past three years, our management team has embarked on the path of my illustrious predecessors and worked with dedication, determination and intensity on embellishing and brightening the image and reputation of the Guild.”

     

    He said Makkar had reinvigorated and revitalised the approach and modus operandi of the Guild. “We continue to engage with State and Central Governments over several issues concerning the film and television industry. There have been many fresh initiatives undertaken by Guild such as waiver of all the charges pertaining to Publicity clearance and Titles registration to make the system more transparent and provide enhanced value to the members, release of first edition of the Film incentive Guide which provides processes and incentives in detail to benefit Indian producers for shooting in 12 countries apart from other reports such as Make in Maharashtra, Film tourism, GST way forward,” Bhatt added.

     

    The other members of the newly elected Council of Management of Guild are Ramesh Sippy, Manmohan Shetty, Ashutosh Gowariker, Rakesh Roshan, Karan Johar, Farhan Akhtar, Ekta Kapoor, Vishal Bhardwaj, Sushilkumar Agrawal, Ratan Jain, N P Singh, Madhu Mantena, Hiren Gada, Sabbas Joseph, Kiran Shantaram, Randhir Kapoor, Amit Khanna, Kamalkumar Barjatya (member emeritus) and Rajkumar Kohli (co-opted member).

     

    In addition to these, Subhash Ghai, Ritesh Sidhwani and Guneet Monga along with eight more Guild members and representatives namely Prem Sagar, Asitkumarr Modi, Sneha Rajani, Ajit Andhare, Sameer Nair, Apoorva Mehta, Aashish Singh and Vipul D. Shah were nominated as special invitees.

     

  • Prakash Jha’s ‘Jai Gangaajal’ to release on 4 March, 2016

    Prakash Jha’s ‘Jai Gangaajal’ to release on 4 March, 2016

    MUMBAI: Prakash Jha’s next film Jai Gangaajal, starring Priyanka Chopra in the lead is all set to release worldwide on 4 March, 2016.

     

    Jai Gangaajal is the sequel to Gangaajal, which featured Ajay Devgn as the police officer with a conscience. The movie told the story of how a society gets the police it deserves.

     

    Thirteen years later, with Jai Gangaajal, Jha revisits the dusty heartland of North India, and examines again the society-police relationship to tell us a new story.

     

    This time, Chopra will be playing Abha Mathur, the new SP in town, who will raise wrestle with her conscience. Mathur is posted in the district, because as a woman she will perhaps be pliable, easily manipulated and thus not disturb the entrenched nexus of the town.

     

    “Much has changed in the last 13 years. When I made Gangaajal 13 years ago, the dictum was that every society gets police that it deserves. But the scenario has changed since then. Today the cops follow the dictum of inaction is virtue and efficiency is crime,” said Jha.

     

    The movie also stars Manav Kaul, Rahul Bhat, Murli Sharma and Ninand Kamath.

     

    Written and directed by Jha, Jai Gangaajal has been produced by Prakash Jha Productions and Play Entertainment.

  • YRF to release Kanu Behl’s directorial debut ‘Titli’ on 30 October

    YRF to release Kanu Behl’s directorial debut ‘Titli’ on 30 October

    MUMBAI: Yash Raj Films and Dibakar Banerjee Productions’ co-production titled Titli, which is the debut directorial vehicle of Kanu Behl, will release across India on 30 October, 2015.

     

    The film’s tagline ‘har family, family nahi hoti’ (every family is not a family) has been given by YRF head honcho Aditya Chopra.

     

    Banerjee said, “We were all struggling to find a befitting tagline for the poster but nothing good was coming out. I was feeling a bit stuck when Adi very casually came up with this line and I realised that he just gave me the tagline. It came out very naturally from him.”

     

    “This came from a man who has a deep, gut level understanding of the Indian audience. Moreover, I felt that this tag line translated in any language anywhere in the world would be as kickass. Any person who has a family and has understood the pain and the pleasure of the complex dynamics of a family will get this,” he added.

     

    Director Kanu Behl’s father – Lalit Behl plays Titli’s father, whereas Shivani Raghuvanshi plays Titli’s wife, Neelu in the movie.

     

    Titli is a tale of a dysfunctional family and a young boy’s struggle to escape his oppressive family. It also stars Shashank Arora, Ranvir Shorey and Amit Sial.

  • Box Office: ‘Hero’ collects Rs 20 crore in its opening weekend

    Box Office: ‘Hero’ collects Rs 20 crore in its opening weekend

    MUMBAI: The Sooraj Pancholi – Athiya Shetty starrer Hero does not work despite high promotion and solo release status. A botched up job, the film suffers from poor scripting followed by equally poor direction and lacking support from its musical score.

     

    The film opened with below average response and managed low collections on day one. While the collections failed to improve on Saturday, it managed to marginally pick up on Sunday. The film collected Rs 20.15 crore in its opening weekend and will find it tough to sustain through the week.

     

    Welcome Back does well in its first week thanks to its good opening weekend. The weekdays thereafter showed a marked decline. However, the film collects Rs 73.1 crore in its first week. The film stands to gain from poor opposition in its second week but may still have to struggle to make it to the Rs 100 crore mark.

     

    Phantom drops to about 10 per cent of its first week collection and adds just Rs 4.1 crore in its second week, which takes its two week tally to Rs 49.9 crore.

     

    Manji: The Mountain Man collects Rs 45 lakh in its third week taking its three week total to Rs 12.7 crore. The film’s box office run has practically come to an end.

     

    Bajrangi Bhaijaan collected Rs 25 lakh in its eighth week taking its total box office collections to Rs 318.1 crore. 

     

    Bahubali: The Beginning (Hindi-Dubbed) collected Rs 30 lakh in its ninth week taking its nine week total to Rs 109.6 crore.

  • Status Check: Indian cinema in FY-2015

    Status Check: Indian cinema in FY-2015

    BENGALURU: Calendar year 2014 can be considered to some extent the start of an inflection point for Indian cinema vis-?-vis the discerning and rapidly maturing movie audiences in India. 2015 and 2016, will tell if the change will be tectonic or not. As compared to 2013, there were fewer movies with ‘good content’ in 2014. The revenues generated by the top ten grossing films in 2014 grew just 2.4 per cent over 2013 and 11.3 per cent over 2012. Movie consumption patterns in India have been changing over time.

     

    The Indian film industry is heavily dependent on theatrical releases, which contribute the lion’s share of revenue to the film industry, which was 74 per cent in 2014 and 73.3 per cent projected for 2015 by the FICCI-KPMG Media and Entertainment Industry Report 2015 (FICCI 2015 Report). In 2019, theatrical releases are projected to contribute 71.1 per cent to the revenue as per the report.

     

    Even small budget movies are now being released across more screens than ever before, more prints are distributed digitally, which enable simultaneous release in 3000 to 4500 screens at one go in a blitzkrieg of sorts. This in turn has resulted in shortening of the box office window. The once rare phenomenon of movies grossing Rs 200 crore within the first week of release is now being witnessed.

     

    Also, 2014 could well be termed as the year of introspection and reality check for the Indian film industry. During the year, the gap between box office collection of the top ten films and the contributions from the rest of industry widened further according to the FICCI-2015 Report. While the category ‘A’ films with top league actors continued to perform well at the box office, the same was not true for films, which lacked both strong content and a big actor to attract audiences to the theatres. With rising average ticket prices (ATP) and availability of alternate entertainment platforms, the audience today seems to have become more discerning when it comes to watching films in theatres.

     

    Domestic theatrical revenue was stagnant in 2014 as compared to 2013. In 2014, domestic theatrical revenue grew 9.9 per cent as compared to two years ago in 2012. Cable and Satellite (C&S) rights contributed about 11.7 per cent to the overall revenues mentioned in the FICCI 2015 Report, in 2013, C&S rights contribution was 12.1 per cent. The FICCI 2015 report projects C&S rights revenue will contribute 11.4 per cent in 2015, and 15.5 per cent by 2019 to overall revenue generated by the Indian film industry.

     

    The revenue generated by C&S rights fell 3.3 per cent in 2014 as compared to 2013, as compared to the growth of 20.6 per cent that 2013 witnessed as compared to 2012. C&S revenue in 2014 grew 16.7 per cent when compared to 2012.

     

    Movie content consumption including music (in a theatre and any kind of screen) will probably change for ever, and, probably for the betterment of the ecosystem. The lacklustre performance of two revenue generating segments in 2014 – theatrical and television or cable and satellite rights says it all.

     

    Another barometer would be the performance of the some major exhibitors. Exhibitors have been expanding their footprint across the country either via mergers and acquisitions (M&A) or opening new properties. Entities such as Carnival Cinemas expanded with acquisitions of Reliance’s Big Cinemas, HDIL’s Kulraj Broadway and Star Gaze’s Glitz Cinemas. PVR has opened nine new properties with 50 screens in FY-2015 (year starting 1 April, 2014 and ending 31 March, 2015) and currently operates a network of 467 screens spread over 105 properties in 43 cities across the country. What’s more, PVR plans to continue its aggressive expansion plans and intends to add approximately 60-70 screens in FY-2016. On the other hand, Inox added 38 screens to its existing kitty with the acquisition of Satyam Cinemas.

     

    PVR touts itself as being amongst the top 10 cinema companies in the world with respect to admissions per screen. During the year ended 31 March, 2015, the multiplex chain entertained 5.92 crore patrons in its cinemas, down by one per cent as compared to the previous year owing to disappointing box office performance of the movie content released during the year.

     

    In PVR’s case, the adverse impact of poor content quality to an extent was mitigated by improvement in non-box office revenues.

     

    In the case of Inox Leisure, footfalls in FY-2015 increased 6.5 per cent to 4.11 crore from 3.86 crore in FY-2014. Footfalls increased by 2.4 per cent to 0.84 crore in Q4-2015 from 0.82 crore in Q4-2014, but declined 15.2 per cent as compared to the 0.99 crore in the previous quarter. Occupancy in FY-2015 declined to 25 per cent from 28 per cent in the previous year and declined from 23 per cent in Q4-2014 to 20 per cent in Q4-2015. In FY-2015, Inox gross box office (GBO) increased 12.4 per cent to Rs 670.38 crore (66.1 per cent of TR) as compared to the Rs 596.56 crore (68 per cent of TR) in FY-2014.

     

    However, the first and second quarters of 2016 have seen tremendous results from some movies, with blockbusters that have had box office collections of Rs 300 crore plus. Multiplex houses such as PVR and Inox saw a manifold increase in their profit after tax (PAT) in Q1-2016 as compared to the corresponding year ago quarter or the loss reported by some in the Q4-2015.

     

    So are Indians movie mad?

     

    Considering the 1000+ movies that the Hindi film industry along with its regional counterparts like Telugu, Tamil, Bengali etc churn out, and the way many deify film stars, most people seem to think so. It is also fair to assume that this would be construed as a fact if one were to consider the super successes of movies in the recent past that have grossed between Rs 100 – 300 crore plus at the box office in India.

     

    In addition, also vital to consider are revenues from other streams like international box office, music, television, digital etc. What’s more, companies like Eros International and Yash Raj Films have also begun to explore and exploit the long revenue generating tail.

     

    One must also consider India’s population numbers along with its cultural and language diversity. While many Indians do consume cinema on the big screen, but considering the long revenue tail that smart Indian production houses have begun to exploit, it should come as no surprise that more cinema is consumed on the small screens like the idiot box, mobile or other digital devices rather than theatrically.

     

    A digression – two languages namely Tamil and Telugu movies, along with Bollywood, churn out about two thirds of the movies produced every year. How the splitting of Andhra Pradesh into two separate states affects the fortunes of the Telugu M&E industry remains to be seen.

     

    It is a fact that celebrities from the celluloid screen as well as the cricket field make a huge impact on the average Indian. One has to just look at the mega deals that many actors sign for brand endorsements. For example, Bollywood A lister Aamir Khan charges an eye-popping Rs 5 crore a day as per a report in the Economic Times. He, however, doesn’t sign up for every brand that knocks on his door.

     

    At the same time, there are regions in the country where actors are worshipped, especially in the south Deccan and coastal areas. Many actors have been raised to the level of gods, with temples that deify them. Actors such as the late Dr Rajkumar in Karnataka have iconic status, and even a perceived slight to them or their memory can result in violence, chaos and mayhem. No one has the kind of pull that a person like him or an NTR or an MGR had. Maybe Rajnikanth is the only exception to the rule today, but that superstar is so down to earth and humble that most Indians would love to have many more like him.

     

    MG Ramchandran, NT Rama Rao, Nara Chandra Babu Naidu and Jayalalitha Jayaram have been elected as Chief Ministers of their states on the back of fame earned on the celluloid screen. Bengali filmdom’s young superstar Dev is a member of the Indian Parliament, while Tamil leading actor Vijaykanth has formed his own political party.

     

    However, it must be noted that elevating the actor to the level of ultimate power (in terms of politics) has been limited to the four southern states, and, except for J Jayalalitha, and Chandra Babu Naidu, all the other superstars that attained the mantle of Chief Minister have demised. Yes, a lot of actors from the film and television world have been and will probably continue to get elected to various levels of power at the national, state or local level, but that trend seems to be dying with the deaths of the doyens. The only one that has bucked the trend in the recent past is Smriti Irani, who is currently the Minister of Human Resources Development in the Government of India.

     

    To some extent, a small portion of Indians can be considered more than just movie buffs, but certainly not crazy.

     

    Conclusion

     

    The Indian craze for cinema isn’t any different than that of its oriental brethren. Jackie Chan is an example. For a movie to be a hit in India, say gross Rs 300 crore (super hit) assuming that the ticket price of Rs 100 each, it has to be watched by just three crore pair of eyes, which is just 2.4 per cent of the country’s population (125.2 crore as per 2013 estimates). This hypothesis begs the questions as to how many super hits do we churn out in a year? 10, 20? How many are just ‘average’? And how many flops?

     

    Despite the 1000 or so films that are churned out every year, just about 10-20 per cent of the population watch movies in a theatre. Today, movies have to compete with other modes of entertainment such as cricket and other major sports that are slowly eroding the number of cinema theatrical eyeballs. The FICCI 2015 Report says that only two of the twenty movies that were released during the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2014 performed well at the box office. Release windows have to be tweaked to festival and long school holidays. This results in a number of releases planned for during the second and third quarter (July – December), with Q3 generally being the most prosperous one for the theatrical movie industry players.

     

    Many of the top performing movies have done well on television, as the attached TAM data for the years 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014 as week 1-27 of 2015 indicates.

     

    Maybe it is the Indian movie makers that are mad, considering the hopeless, poor or timid story lines, the sad efforts at attempting slapstick and other types of comedy, of wildly aping the west with sequels of movies that were non-starters in the first place.

     

    Even today, theatrical revenue is the largest contributor to the revenue from a movie. Many of the major chains are looking at tier I and II cities for organic expansion, besides takeover of the smaller and regional players. The FICCI 2015 Report brings out some startling differences between the US and India. India has just seven screens per ten lakh population as compared to the 125 screens per ten lakh people that the US has, with the geographical distribution of screens more skewed in favour of urban India.

     

    It now remains to be seen how the movies released in the last four months of 2015 fare at the box office. Diwali and Christmas being favourite release windows for filmmakers, some fireworks at the box office are likely to be in store. 

     

    Disclaimer: Many of the ideas and opinions expressed expressed in this report are personal views of the author with which Indiantelevision.com does not agree or disagree in part or full.

     

    Click here to see TAM analysis

  • Majid Majidi, AR Rahman face ire for working on Prophet Mohammed film

    Majid Majidi, AR Rahman face ire for working on Prophet Mohammed film

    NEW DELHI: Seeking a ban on renowned Iranian filmmaker Majid Majidi’s film Mohammed: Messenger of God, which opened the Montreal World Film Festival this month, an Indian Muslim group has also issued a fatwa against Majidi and the film’s music composer AR Rahman.

     

    The Mumbai-based Raza Academy – a Sunni Muslim group, demanded that Muslims reject the film, which is the first of the trilogy on the life of Prophet Mohammad.

     

    Last week, the group had written to Home Minister Rajnath Singh and Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, seeking a ban on Majidi’s film. They have also sought a meeting with the Home Minister and External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj.

     

    “We are against the title. People may use it in a bad manner if they don’t like the film, which will mean an insult to the Prophet. The actors have charged money to act in the film and they may have dubious character in real life. How can we Muslims allow such things to happen?” asked Raza Academy chief Saeed Noorie. The fatwa was issued by Muhammad Akhtar – the chief mufti of Mumbai.

     

    In the fatwa, the reason cited is the Prophet’s word that no visual or picture of him be created or kept. The fatwa claims the film makes a mockery of Islam, and professional actors, including some non-Muslims, have been cast in the key roles.

     

    The fatwa adds that the Muslims working on the film have committed sacrilege and will have to read the kalma again and also solemnise their marriage again. “They have erred and they must apologise,” he said.

     

    Noting that most members of the film’s crew were Muslim, Noorie said that it was more important to make them realise their mistake. “We would have been criticised if we had condemned American or Danish filmmakers. If it’s an insult, then it is an insult and the person’s religion doesn’t matter,” he said.

     

    Majidi along with another Iranian filmmaker Mohsen Makhmalbaf  has directed films like Children of Heaven, which was nominated for Best Foreign Film at the 1998 Academy Awards, The Color of Paradise, and Baran. He is also currently working on a film on Kashmir. 

  • ‘Hero:’ A poor clone

    ‘Hero:’ A poor clone

    MUMBAI: The myth that stars can make a film work makes producers resort to gimmicks like sequels or a remake of an old hit. While a sequel may work at times, though not as well as the original, remakes are a big risk because not only is it near impossible to recreate a classic but even the audience, the ambience and other aspects change every few years. And, to think that the original Hero is over three decades old.

    Hero brings together two star kids, Sooraj Pancholi (son of Aditya Pancholi) and Athiya Shetty (daughter of Suniel Shetty). It has been produced by Salman Khan, the reigning superstar, along with Subhash Ghai, the maker of the original Hero (1983). 

    The film starts on the same lines as the original: Sooraj is a goon, generally referred to by all as goonda and not hero. He has been assigned the job of kidnaping Athiya, the daughter of IGP Tigmanshu Dhulia. Dhulia is an honest cop who has arrested Aditya Pancholi for the murder of a journalist. Aditya is behind bars and sure to be convicted since Dhulia has all the evidence needed. Aditya, having tried all possible means to influence Dhulia, including bribery, decides that kidnapping Dhulia’s daughter is the only way left to arm-twist him. 

    Sooraj owes much to Aditya, his foster father, who he treats like his own father. He complies with Aditya’s wishes and kidnaps Athiya and moves to a shack in a snowy valley along with his buddies. He poses as a cop assigned by her father to protect her and take her far away because of a threat to her life from Aditya. Athiya and Sooraj are no strangers to each other. Earlier in the film, mighty Sooraj has saved Athiya from her ex-boyfriend by felling him a few punches at a nightclub when he was harassing her. 

    Now that she thinks he is a cop employed by her father especially to protect her, she falls in love with him before you can say ASAP! While some romancing, singing, and revelry happen, it is time for Dhulia and his cops to catch up with the couple. However, Sooraj being the hero, outperforms numerous automatic-gun-wielding cops and Athiya’s brother, Sharad Kelkar, chasing them in a chopper. He jumps a broken bridge across a gorge on his bike. They don’t make it to the other side but fall into the gorge and are presumed dead! 

    Aditya is being taken to court and, for some reason, Sooraj and Athiya are also around when a police constable triggers a bomb. The audience doesn’t know why. This is the point where the film goes haywire beyond salvation. With a lot of cross firing, a lot of junior artistes die while all relevant characters always come out unscathed! The cops survive this bomb blast, as do Dhulia, Kelkar, Aditya, Sooraj and Athiya. While Aditya escapes, Sooraj is arrested and sentenced to two years imprisonment. On the other hand, Athiya is dispatched off to Paris to learn dancing!

    Post-jail and Paris, the romance continues. Just when the story seems to come to a dead-end, the makers parachute in a new villain out of nowhere. His credentials are that he is a gambler of high stakes beyond his capacity, owing crores to a don (who later turns out to be Aditya himself) and can flex his muscles too, the prime requirement for film roles today. 

    There is no story now as the film proceeds on whims and fancies and manages only to get on the viewers’ nerves. While a lot in the film is unpredictable being illogical, the climax is utterly predictable. 

    To compare this film to the original Hero would be sacrilege. This is a poorly scripted and unimaginatively directed film. While the original had a talent bank in its star cast, this one has mostly unknown faces.

    Musical score is no patch on the original version, even though music was a reason in most part for its success. Editing is slack. Dialogue is mundane. Action is good but only as good as every other film nowadays. Sooraj will need time to be accepted; this is not the film promising him that. Athiya could prove a better model. Aditya is okay as usual. Dhulia who keeps calling Sooraj a goonda, in fact, looks more like one. Kelkar suffers from an undefined character. Chetan Hansraj plays what Manek Irani played in old days; his job is only to be bashed up by the hero every time he confronts him.

    Hero is a poor remake and though the opening shows had a fair number of footfalls, there are also instances of the viewers walking out halfway through. The prospects in toto look bad.

    Producers: Salman Khan, Subhash Ghai

    Director: Nikhil Advani

    Cast: Sooraj Pancholi, Athiya Shetty, Aditya Pancholi, Tigmanshu Dhulia, Sharad Kelkar

  • Zee Studios to co-produce Akshay Kumar’s ‘Rustom’ with Neeraj Pandey

    Zee Studios to co-produce Akshay Kumar’s ‘Rustom’ with Neeraj Pandey

    MUMBAI: Zee Studios will be co-producing the Akshay Kumar starred Rustom along Neeraj Pandey & Shital Bhatia’s Friday Filmworks and KriArj Entertainment, which is slated to release worldwide on 12 August, 2016.

     

    Inspired by real life incidents, the film is written by Vipul Rawal and also marks the directorial debut of Tinu Suresh Desai. 

     

    Pandey will also pen the dialogues of the film, co-write the screenplay with Rawal as well as contribute towards the film’s edit.

     

    Apart from Kumar, the film will also star two actresses. However, their names have not yet been finalised.

     

    After Special 26 and Baby, the romantic thriller Rustom will be the third project in which Akshay Kumar and Pandey’s Friday Filmworks have teamed up.

     

    Kumar said, “Having worked with Neeraj on two fabulous projects, I am excited to start work on our new film. I am happy that Zees Studios is putting its might behind this film along with KriArj Entertainment and Friday Filmworks. It gives me and the entire team confidence of this launched worldwide using the global might of Zee.”

     

    Pandey added, “When Tinu narrated Rustom to us, we immediately got hooked to the quality of the narrative and its potential and instantly decided that it was something that we would like to produce. We also really felt that given the nature of the story, Akshay would be the perfect fit and him agreeing to come on board will definitely give it the canvas it requires.”

     

    Friday Filmworks producer Shital Bhatia said, “One of the other key elements that was central to our plan while green lighting this film was that to do justice to the story it would need to be an international film traversing multiple countries and for that we would definitely require good partners. To that extent when both Zee Studios and KriArj Entertainment saw the same potential in the story as us and readily agreed to co-produce this film along with Friday Filmworks, it just further vindicated our belief in this project.”

     

    Zee Studios CEO Nittin Keni said, “We are delighted to partner with Akshay Kumar, country’s leading icon, Neeraj Pandey and KriArj Entertainment on Rustom. For us at Zee, this is another key milestone for Zee’s aggressive foray into Bollywood.”

     

    KriArj Entertainment producer Arjun N Kapoor added, “It is a momentous occasion to unveil our association with one of the most prolific entertainers of Hindi film industry, Akshay Kumar and the much recognised film-maker, Neeraj Pandey. With such a great beginning, we are sure this splendid team is headed to create some magic on the big screen.”

     

    The first shooting schedule of Rustom commences by mid-December. The film will travel to multiple locations globally in the course of its production.

     

    The music of Rustom will be released by Zee Music.