ITV

Category: Movies

  • Vampire drama ‘Twilight’ picks up nine Teen Choice awards

    MUMBAI: At the recently held Teen Choice Awards, The vampire story filmTwilightwon as many as nine awards.

    The film won for choice drama, romance, lipl-lock, rumble, drama actress for Kristen Stewart, drama actor for Robert Pattinson, villain for Cam Gigandet, fresh face female for Ashley Greene and fresh face male for Taylor Lautner who will also appear in the upcoming sequel, New Moon.


    Miley Cyrus also rode a high at the Teen Choice Awards. The teen queen sailed away with six surfboard-shaped trophies at Sunday‘s ceremony. She won for comedy TV actress and comedy TV show for Hannah Montana, music/dance movie actress and hissy fit for the Hannah Montana movie, music single for The Climb and summer song for Before the Storm. She also presented Britney Spears with the ultimate choice award.


    Other big winners were Gossip Girl and Zac Efron. Chace Crawford, Leighton Meester and Ed Westwick picked up drama actor, actress, villain and TV series awards for the sudsy CW series while Efron won for music/dance movie actor in High School Musical 3 and comedy movie actor and rock star moment in 17 Again.

  • Shawn Ryan to make pilot for ‘Ridealong’ for Fox

    MUMBAI: 20th TV has assigned director Shawn Ryan to make a pilot for Ridealong a new cop drama. Set in Chicago, Ridealong will move the inner law-enforcement workings away from the police stations.

    It is known that Ryan‘s return to the cop genre so soon after the end of FX‘s Shield was planned earlier. Said Ryan, “I always knew I wanted to go back to the cop arena but with a markedly different approach, not just do a network version of ‘The Shield,‘ ” he said. “I think I‘ve found a way to do a unique cop show with Ridealong.”


    When he first got the idea for the show, Ryan approached director-producer Peter Berg who liked it and wanted to be involved, but previous commitments prevented him from coming on board. Ryan plans to pit the colorful history of Chicago, including the exploits of gangster Al Capone and Richard Daley‘s political machine. He will also explore the inter-twined worlds of police and politics in present-day Chicago.


    Ryan is writing the script for the project and will be executive producing the film.

  • China protests fail to stop screening of Kadeer film

    MUMBAI: All kinds of attempts to stop screening of the controversial documentary on the exiled Uyghur leader Rebiya Kadeer went awry when the film was screened at the Melbourne Film Festival.

    Scores of people attended the world premiere of the film The 10 Conditions of Love after which director Jeff Daniels thanked the organisers of the festival and the audience who attended it braving the Chinese threats, saying “I congratulate you for standing up for the basic freedom of being heard.”


    China has accused Kadeer, who was also in attendance for orchestrating recent bloody clashes in China‘s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region between ethnic minority Uyghurs and members of China‘s ethnic Han majority.

  • AFTRA president re-elected for two-year term

    MUMBAI: Roberta Reardon was unanimously re-elected for a second two-year term as national president of the American Federation of Television & Radio Artists (AFTRA) at the union‘s biennial national convention in Chicago last Saturday.

    All revenue raised as a result of the fee increase has been exclusively designated for organising efforts to increase employment opportunities for union performers and broadcasters.


    The three-day 62nd National Convention, held at the Hyatt Regency, also saw the re-election of national first vp Bob Edwards, a satellite radio host from Washington; second national vp Ron Morgan, an actor from Los Angeles; national treasurer Matt Kimbrough, a Los Angeles actor; and national recording secretary Lainie Cooke, a New York actor.


    All officers serve two-year terms. AFTRA‘s next national convention will be held in 2011 in Seattle, followed by Washington in 2013.

  • G.I. Joe romps in $100.5 million in opening weekend

    MUMBAI: Paramount‘s G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra, based on the comic book series and the television series by the same name, took the box office by storm when it grossed $100.5 million in its opening weekend.

    In America, the movie fetched $56.2 million, according to studio estimates. The film also roped in $44.3 million overseas.


    Though critics came out with a harsh review of G.I. Joe, the film had a stupendous opening and is likely to be among the handful of films that grossed $400 million in America alone.


    The overall box office collections of the film showed a rise of 22 per cent from the same weekend a year ago, when the batman sequel The Dark Knight still stood at the No. 1 film even after four weeks in release.


    G.I. Joe, featuring Dennis Quaid, Channing Tatum, Sienna Miller, Marlon Wayans and Joseph Gordon-Levitt in a globe-trotting adventure about an elite military unit taking on a corrupt arms dealer, follows Paramount‘s Transformers as the latest toy story to make it big at the box office.


    It may be noted that critical reviews of Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen earlier this year had Paramount skipping screenings for critics and releasing G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra in theatres that went unnoticed by reviewers.

  • PVR swings into Q1 net loss of Rs 128.6 mn

    MUMBAI: The multiplex industry has been hit hard and how. PVR has slumped into losses for the first quarter ended 30 June as revenue plunged by 45.82 per cent.


    The company suffered a consolidated net loss of Rs 128.6 million (after share of minority interest), as against a net profit of Rs 4.6 million a year ago.


    PVR clarified, “The quarter under review was an abnormal quarter for exhibition industry due to the ongoing tussle between producers/distributors and multiplex owners over revenue sharing. Due to the above tussle no films were released across theatres during the period April to mid June. Accordingly the Company incurred losses mainly on account of decline in revenues. Hence the financial results for the current quarter cannot be effectively compared to the quarter ended 30 June, 2008.”



    Total income came down to Rs 445.6 million, from Rs 822.5 million, mainly due to unavailability of movies.


    “We entertained over 2.3 million patrons during the quarter under review, less by 34 per cent from FY 2008, courtesy the tiff between multiplex operators and producers. Occupancies witnessed a fall from 32 per cent to 20 per cent against similar period last year,” the company said.



    Around 35 screens of PVR were shut down during the period of strike. Thus, occupancy for the quarter after factoring closed screens would be approximately 17 per cent.



    Meanwhile, total expenditure of the company came down to Rs 602.5 million, as against Rs 806.2 million in the previous fiscal.



    The company disclosed that 5.27 per cent (or 500,000 shares) of promoter’s stake is pledged, amounting to 2.17 per cent of the total paid up equity, as on 30 June.



    The movie exhibition segment suffered an operating loss of Rs 152.6 million in the quarter as compared to an operating profit of Rs 50.6 million. The revenue from the segment was Rs 399.3 million (from Rs 627.8 million), while capital employed till 30 June was Rs 3.09 billion.



    In movie production and distribution business, operating loss narrowed to Rs 17.1 million, from prior year’s Rs 34 million. The capital employed till 30 June was Rs 402.6 million.



    PVR has 108 screens in India, including 13 operated by its subsidiaries. Its 46 screens are enjoying entertainment tax exemption, the company said.

  • Adlabs plans to invest Rs 2 bn in FY’10

    MUMBAI: Reliance ADAG-owned Adlabs Films Ltd, the largest multiplex operator by number of screens, plans to invest Rs 2 billion this fiscal for expanding its lines of businesses.

    Adlabs is also considering raising long term resources by issue of equity shares or other securities by way of rights offer to existing members. The board will meet to this effect on 12 August.


    The company is setting up a studio at Film City in Mumbai which will take away Rs 800 million. Adlabs, which already has 457 screens, plans to add 80 screens during the year.


    “We will be investing Rs 2 billion this fiscal and are adding 80 screens in the year,” Adlabs chief executive officer Anil Arjun tells Indiantelevision.com.


    For the 12-month period ended March 2009, Adlabs swung into a net loss of Rs 513.75 million as it ramped up its multiplex business. Revenue, however, more than doubled to Rs 6.62 billion. While income from theatrical exhibition was at Rs 3.4 billion, the film production and distribution segment kicked in Rs 2.1 billion. The film facilities business posted a revenue of Rs 1.3 billion.


     

  • Ultra releases ‘Sanam Teri Kasam’ on home video

    MUMBAI: Ultra has released the home video of Sanam Teri Kasam. The film directed by Lawrence D‘souza stars Saif Ali Khan, Pooja Bhatt, Atul Agnihotri and Sheeba among others.

    Said to be a triangle with a twist where Atul Agnihotri completes the third angle,
    the film includes songs like ‘Ek Baar Ek Baar Pyaar Se Tu Bol‘ and ‘Sanam Yeh Pyar Hi To Hai‘.


    While the VCDs cost Rs 99, the DVDs cost Rs 199 each.

  • Love Aaj Kal crosses Rs 1 billion in first week

    MUMBAI: Eros International‘s Love Aaj Kal has raked in Rs 1.08 billion in its first week, making it the biggest grosser of the year.

    The movie, made in association with Illuminati Films Production, has collected Rs 750 million from India alone.


    Says Eros International senior VP – Distribution-India Nandu Ahuja, “We are thrilled that our first venture with Illuminati Films has proven to be such a huge success. The superb run of the film in the first week has superceded all expectations. The Raksha Bandhan holiday greatly helped boost up admissions mid week”.


    Love Aaj Kal was released with approximately 1200 prints in over 1800 screens worldwide.


    “Love Aaj Kal has performed incredibly well in all the overseas markets. We were expecting a commercial success but this kind of response has been overwhelming with all major markets indicating remarkable box-office results,” says Eros International president (Distribution) Europe and Africa Pranab Kapadia.

  • TIFF announces 18 intl titles for fest schedule

    MUMBAI: The Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) to be held in September has announced the names of 18 international films to screen at the festival.

    Of them, eleven will be part of the fest‘s ‘Contemporary World Cinema‘ programme that will represent “an annual snapshot of trends in world cinema” while several of them contain stories of children and adolescents like Blessed, Heiran and Down For Life.

    Seven other films included in TIFF‘s “challenging, boundary-pushing” vision programme include I Am Love, Hiroshima and Trash Humpers.