Category: Hindi

MUMBAI: Nicolas Cage is on board the Vidhu Vinod Chopra produced and directed film Broken Horses. The film has Barrie Osborne as the executive producer. 

While cage will play one of the leading roles, Mickey Rourkey will play an impotant role in the gangster film.

Chopra‘s latest film has been inspired by his own film Parinda that starred Anil Kapoor, Jackie Shroff and Madhuri Dixit.

Broken Legs, being produced by Chopra in association with Reliance Big Pictues, will start shooting early next year.
 

MUMBAI: Slumdog Millionaire actress Freida Pinto has been cast opposite Anthony Hopkins in Woody Allen’s You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger that is set to release in the coming months.

The film has Pinto essaying the role of Dia. A gorgeously exotic musicologist, Dia leaves her fiancé for another man. 

Also in the cast are Roger Ashton-Griffiths, Antonio Banderas, Ewen Bremner, Josh Brolin, Anupam Kher and Naomi Watts among others.

Another film that Pinto features in is Julian Schnbel’s Miral that is based on Rula Jebreal’s novel. The story follows an orphan, portrayed by Pinto, as she falls in love with a Palestinian activist.

MUMBAI: Popular comic character Chacha Chaudhary is set to make his debut in a 3D film.

Diamond Comics, owners of the rights to the comic book hero with a red turban, has decided to to co-produce the movie with a US-based company for $6 million.

Said Diamond Comics Chairman Gulshan Rai, “We have recently signed up with an American company to make a film on Chacha Chaudhary. This will be a one-and-half to two-hour-long film in the three-dimensional (3D) format.”

Rai confirmed the budget of the film would be around $6 million. He, however, did not specify when the film would be ready for release.

The company, which has other popular comic characters such as Billoo, Captain Vyom, Chotu Lambu, Pinki and Mahabali Shaka, is also planning to promote and sell them on other digital platforms like internet, television, direct-to-home (DTH) and mobiles.

As part of the plan, the firm is converting all the physical copies of the old comics into digital ones to be sold online as well as through telecom service providers. Telecom service providers such as Tata Docomo, BSNL and Vodafone have been tapped to sell e-comics to their subscribers through mobile phones.

The company is currently working on converting a stock of between 3,000 to 4,000 comics that have been published since 1974 into digital format. These will be sold at a universal price of half a dollar on various websites, including Google and Rediff.
 

(Winner: National Award For Best Film) Producer: Romen Jha Story-Direction: Sushil Rajpal Screenplay-Dialogue-Lyric: Amitabh Varma Music: Bapi-Tutul

MUMBAI: Antardwand (Inner Conflict) is a story which is more unbelievable than fiction. It is about a practice prevalent in Bihar of abducting eligible grooms by a girl’s family and marrying them off forcibly, locally called Pakrauah Shaddi.

Raj Singh Chaudhary, a Bihar lad in Delhi, has a live-in girlfriend. When he learns she is pregnant, he takes off to a small village in the interiors of Bihar to inform his parents and seek their blessings for their marriage.

Failing to convince his father, he is on his way out of the village when he is kidnapped and locked up in isolation for days on end. Eventually, he is fed on hooch till he becomes unconscious and led through the process of a marriage ritual with Swati Sen, the daughter of the feudal lord, Akhilendra Mishra.

The newlyweds are locked till the inevitable happens – the boy accepts the girl. Some examples of such marriages are cited to prove they work. Here, to make it ‘official’ the boy is finally provoked and manipulated to consummate the marriage, almost as a rape. The conclusion is on a wishful note.

The mainstay of the film is its realistic locations and performances which, to the actors’ and the director’s credit, are uniformly good. Among them Akhilendra Mishra, Raj Singh Chaudhary and Swati Sen are a notch above the rest. Music is purely regional in flavour.

While Antardwand may leave a trail of plaudits on the festival circuit and be of academic interest to many, it has no box office potential.

Tough commercial prospects for Madholal Keep Walking

Banner: Dreamcuts Producer: Apurva Tank Direcor: Jai Tank Cast: Subrat Dutta, Neela Gokhale, Pranay Narayan, Swara Bhaskar, Varnita Aglawe.

Madholal Keep Walking tackles  the issue of the the after effects of a tragedy on the psyche of an individual. In this case, Madholal, the survivor of the Mumbai train blasts who losses an arm and a whole lot of his friends cum co-commuters.

The first half is about the life of a security guard, his juggling of meagre finances and the camaraderie with his fellow travellers on the Mumbai local. Then a bomb explodes and while all his friends die, Madholal survives with a lost arm. But his whole world is shattered; he has not only lost his job but also his confidence.

The rest of the film is all about his coming to terms with the situation.

The film has a decent first half sprinkled with some humour though it has more of the Mumbai flavour. The details of commuting life and surroundings are well incorporated.

It is in the post bomb blast story that things become drab and tedious. As it were, films made on real life events and news headlines don’t go down well with our audience and a story of one bomb blast survivor hardly makes for interesting viewing.

Subrat Dutta, the main protagonist gives a natural performance, aptly supported by Neela Gokhale and others. Direction is bogged down by the choice of subject. Dialogue is good and witty. Music, as is the wont nowadays, stays within the cinema hall.

Commercial prospects of Madholal Keep Walking are about as much as the worth of yesterday’s newspaper.

MUMBAI: he twelfth Mumbai Film Festival to be held between 21 and 28 October has added a new competition section titled Celebrate Age open to ad-films, short fiction films, documentaries and feature length films made on the theme of growing old with dignity.

Mumbai Academy of Moving Image (MAMI), the organiser of the festival, has launched this competition in collaboration with Harmony for Silver Foundation run by Tina Ambani.

Commenting on the new section, 12th Mumbai Film Festival festival director Srinivasan Narayanan says, “MAMI is committed to creating as many opportunities as possible for budding filmmakers to discover and showcase their talent. Harmony for Silver Foundation is committed to the safety, welfare and joie de vivre of senior citizens. This new initiative by the Harmony for Silver Foundation through the Mumbai Film Festival platform is to make filmmakers train their attention, camera and lights to address the issue of ageing with dignity.”

The competition offers cash prizes of Rs 50,000 and Rs 25,000 to two selected films.

MUMBAI: The Venice Film Festival has decided to honour Mani Ratnam with the Jaeger-LeCoultre Glory to the Filmmaker Award this year.

Announcing this development, Venice Film Festival director Marco Muller said, “Mani Ratnam is one of the greatest innovators in contemporary Indian Cinema. He helped introduce the auteur concept to contemporary Bollywood. We are very proud to honour the work of the great Indian director Mani Ratnam.” 

In addition to Ratnam, Suhasini Mani Ratnam and actor Vikram will be attending the 67th Venice International Film Festival in September.

The award ceremony and the screening of Raavanan (Tamil) and Raavan (Hindi) will take place on 6 September.

Both the versions of the film will also take part in the Pusan International Film Festival in Korea in October 2010.
 

MUMBAI: India’s leading production designer Nitin Chandrakant Desai, known for his sets in films like Jodhaa Akbar and Lagaan, will be honoured by The Art Directors Guild (ADG) Film Society and American Cinematheque on 29 August at the Egyptian Theatre, Hollywood. Desai, thus, becomes the first Indian art director and production designer to get this honour.

This felicitation is one of the highest recognition for Desai for his outstanding contribution in the field of art direction and production design. On the occasion, Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s Devdas that showcases the brilliance of Desai’s art work would be screened.

“This is an honour to me and my country. History has been made today. It is indeed a pleasure for me to get global recognition. This is an also a proud moment for Maharashtra. I’m extremely happy that my work has been recognised in this way,” avered Desai.

The event will witness a panel discussion moderated by production designer John Muto and the participants would include Sangita Shresthova, dancer, choreographer and media scholar, Nakul Dev Mahajan, an Indian-American dancer and choreographer known for his pioneering work in Bollywood dancing style on top TV show named So You Think You Can Dance and Jack Rajsekar Fusion Edge Media CEO and executive producer of Enthiran and Robot.

With over 25 years of experience in the industry, Desai has been associated with blockbuster Indian movies such 1942: A Love Story (1994), Josh (2000) and the very recent Once Upon a Time In Mumbai (2010) to name a few.

Desai has worked on more than 85 films and has won a National Award for best film direction four times . In 1999, he won a Genie Award for best achievement in art direction/production design for Such a Long Journey (1998).

MUMBAI: In his zeal to promote his upcoming film Agent Vinod, producer Saif Ali Khan has tied up with Trine Animation and Gaming Studio, one of the few Indian companies that create Xbox and PlayStation games, to create a PlayStation game and a comic book.

The pre-release promotions for the actor-producer’s home production will kick off in April 2011. And around the same time, a PlayStaion game along the lines of an action shooter game and the comic book will be released.

For all ages, the game and the comic book will also include characters that are not part of the film with the idea to come up with a different medium of expression that will appeal to kids and adults. Khan will do the voiceover himself along with the other actors.

His new partner, 24-year old Sangam Gupta of Trine Animation and Gaming Studio, has eight-nine games to his credit, including Gothic 3, Wii Yoga, and Sony’s soon to-release Street Cricket.

Agent Vinod is Gupta’s stepping-stone to Bollywood which he believes is an untapped market.

MUMBAI: Seems like the art of animation is set to unite people across seven seas by letting know each other of the other’s religion and culture. Otherwise why would The Mahabharata be made in a studio in California.

The great Indian epic is all set to be made into a Hollywood animation film titled 18 Days: The Mahabharata.

Says 50-year old maker and a Scottish comic books writer Grant Morrison, “This new version of the Mahabharata is like a psychedelic ‘The Lord of the Rings’ with made with ‘Star Wars’ technology. This film is not a strictly accurate historical portrayal of events but a poetic, fantastic interpretation of the original text. Krishna stops time to deliver the terrible wisdom of the Gita… with super real battle scenes, ‘Saving Private Ryan’ style. I think this type of ‘holographic‘ structure allows us to plug new stories into the ongoing 18 Days War. I‘m setting the date for this version somewhere around 10, 000 BC. Elephants in this proposed film wear gas masks.”

18 Days would be available in full Hi-Definition and in a variety of formats: 2 x 90 minute TV movies, 6 x 30 episodes, extended 200 minute DVD release and as 18 x 10 minute web episodes. It will be supported by on-line and console gaming products, mobile content and other L&M licenses.

A joint venture of Perspective Studios and Liquid Comics, Perspective Studios, with Steven Lehrhoff as CEO claims to be a leading performance capture and character animation studio based in Santa Monica (California, USA).

Liquid Comics, with Sharad Devarajan as the CEO, claims to be an entertainment company focused on creating original stories and modern myths for worldwide audiences.

Banner: Percept Picture Company Director: Nagesh Kukunoor Cast: John Abraham, Sonal Sehgal, Anaitha Nair, Girish Karnad, Farida Jalal, Master Ashwin Chitale

MUMBAI: Aashayein is a poor example of filmmaking from start to end. There is a huge set right out of a C grade film where people bet on cricket in lakhs and crores. Most extras don‘t look like they can afford a cup of tea, let alone bet in lakhs. Is this how betting on cricket is conducted? Quite a revelation!

John Abraham bets his girlfriend Sonal Sehgal‘s savings to come back with a win of millions to discover that he has lung cancer and about three months to live. Like all film heroes he is brave about his cancer, even laughs at it!

And, while sprinting on a street in the dead of the night, in true filmy style, an old newspaper comes and hits him in the face. This leads him to Xanadu a hospice where terminal patients spend their last days. John Abraham buys his way in to the hospice which claims funds to be scarce but has five star amenities like two cooks serving delicacies from six nations!! After this, the film tries to be many films, Hrishikesh Mukherjee‘s Anand included, but ends up being a fantasy with poor imagination. To put it mildly, viewing it becomes intolerable!

With a poor script and poorer direction, the few good moments in the film are provided by Anaitha Nair, a 17-year inmate at the hospice whose dialogue is pungently witty and her last wish is to bed John Abraham who complements her well. Rest of the performances are good, too. Rest of the aspects are mediocre.

As mentioned on the onset, a poor specimen of film making.