ITV

Category: Movies

  • Brooke Shields back to the big screen

    MUMBAI: After a 10-year hiatus from mainstream films, Brooke Shields is returning to the big screen. She is going to star in a live-action family comedy Furry Vengeance.
    Dick Van Dyke, Ken Jeong and Samantha Bee are the others who have been signed for the film.

    Brendan Fraser is playing the lead in Roger Kumble‘s film, which centers on a real estate developer who gets more than he bargained for from a band of raccoons when he pushes too hard into more pristine territory. Shields will play Tami Sanders, the wife of Fraser‘s character.


    Shields returns to a mainstream big-screen role — she did have some turns in animated and DVD fare — for the first time since 1999, when she starred in James Toback‘s hip-hop drama Black and White.


    The actress, who is known for her roles in The Blue Lagoon and Endless Love earlier in her career, has been concentrating on TV and Broadway.


    She also has been in the news this week for her intimate eulogy of Michael Jackson.

  • Gary Ross tapped to write ‘Spider-Man 4‘

    MUMBAI: Gary Ross has been signed to write Columbia‘s Spider-Man 4 the directors of which would be Sam Raimi and Tobey Maguire will play the protagonist.

    Ross joins James Vanderbilt (Zodiac) and Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright David Lindsay-Abaire on the list of high-profile writers who have been working on the project.


    The move also puts Ross back to work with Maguire, with whom he worked on his directorial vehicles Pleasantville and Seabiscuit. The two were also working on Tokyo Suckerpunch, a drama set up at Columbia; that project is now on hold as Ross tackles another writing project, Columbia‘s Lance Armstrong biopic.

  • ’99’ grosses Rs 200 million in six weeks

    MUMBAI: People Pictures‘ maiden release 99, made on a budget of less than Rs 80 million, has crossed the Rs 200 million mark in its six-week run at the box-office so far. The film continues to play in select theatres into the 7th week.

    A strong word-of-mouth and sustained marketing campaign have resulted it a most-unlikely hit at a time when most moviegoers had stopped visiting theatres due to the strike at the time of its release and in subsequent weeks too.


    Commenting on the success of the film, People Pictures founder Anupam Mittal said,
    “I am glad that our business model is validated. We set out to make highly content- driven cinema on international standards through Creative Film Studio.”


    “The cult status that the film achieved globally as well as the 4 star reviews from publications like the New York Times, underscore my belief that people want ‘good cinema‘. Now, the numbers have proven that there is also a potentially strong business around this belief,” he added.


    99 is an unpredictable and hilarious ride spread over two cities with colourful characters, unbelievable circumstances, small-time crooks, big-time conspiracies, fateful car crashes, loads of coffee, a briefcase full of money, a budding romance and a historical controversy brewing in the background.

  • Tearful sendoff to Jackson

    MUMBAI

    : All praise was showered on Michael Jackson by an all-star list of musicians, athletes and other celebrities during a spiritual ceremony.

    The golden casket containing Jackson‘s body was placed in front of the stage at his memorial as a choir sang.


    Several of Jackson‘s brothers, each wearing one sequined glove, served as pallbearers, carrying the coffin to the stage as the Andrae Crouch choir sang Soon and Very Soon.


    But the most poignant moment was delivered by his sobbing 11-year-old daughter Paris Katherine who addressed mourners at the Staples Center last night, tearfully telling them her father was “the best father you could ever imagine.”


    The girl spoke after Jackson‘s brothers Jermaine and Marlon bid tearful goodbyes to the King of Pop. “Michael, when you left us, a part of me went with you,” Marlon Jackson said. “And a part of you will live forever within me, but also a part of you will live forever within all of us.”


    Jackson‘s band members, family, children and celebrities followed to sing Jackson‘s Heal the World.

  • ‘Harry Potter’ tickets sales getting bigger

    MUMBAI: Advance sales of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince are showing more than those of Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen or the fifth Potter movie, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix at a similar point in their sales cycles.

    Eight days before its July 15 opening, Prince accounted for 65 per cent of daily ticket sales, said an online ticketer.


    In a related promo, the online ticketer said that a poll of more than 3,000 visitors to its website found that 85 per cent of respondents had read all seven Potter books.


    Prince is the sixth Potter film of a planned eight; Warners is splitting the seventh book into two movies.

  • Randall Wallace tapped to rewrite ‘Leagues’

    MUMBAI: Randall Wallace has been signed to rewrite Captain Nemo: 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea for Disney being directed by Sean Bailey.

    Nemo aims to tell the origin of Captain Nemo and his submarine warship, the Nautilus. Nemo is a mysterious but noble antagonist in the book, a scientific genius with a thirst for knowledge and a desire for revenge against the forces of imperialism.


    In Verne‘s lesser-known sequel, The Mysterious Island, Nemo is revealed as Indian Prince Dakkar, a rajah‘s son who took part in a failed rebellion and lost his wife and children. It is unclear how close to that back story Disney will stick, but “Nemo‘s” tone will be decidedly action-adventure.

  • Ryan Phillippe eyes ‘MacGruber’

    MUMBAI: Ryan Phillippe is in negotiations to star in the feature, with Val Kilmer in negotiations to also join the Relativity Media production. Will Forte and Kristen Wiig are reprising their roles from the skits.

    Phillipe will star in MacGruber the recurring Saturday Night Live skit that parodies MacGyver.


    Jorma Taccone, who created the character and directed most of the skits, is helming the film which SNL producer and creator Lorne Michaels produces.


    The MacGruber sketches starred Forte as MacGyver‘s son with Wiig as an assistant who always find themselves, along with that week‘s guest star, in a control room with a ticking bomb about to go off. MacGruber gets sidelined by personal issues, and the bomb goes off.


    The film harkens back to an earlier era when comedies based on “SNL” skits were commonplace, especially in the wake of the massive success of 1992‘s “Wayne‘s World” and its sequel. The trend eventually faded, seemingly dovetailing with the relevancy of the show itself.


    The film would see Phillippe playing Piper, an Army officer forced to pair up with a reluctant MacGruber. Kilmer would be Cunth.

  • Mukta Arts launches ‘ Paschim Express’

    MUMBAI: Fresh from its success of Paying Guests, Mukta Arts has launched a romantic entertainer titled Paschim Express.

    A unique point about the film is that it features graduates from Whistling Woods Institute in the form of writer, director, lead actors, cinematographer, editor and sound engineer. The music of the film has been provided by Pritam.


    Incidentally, Whistling Woods will be celebrating its third anniversary on 18 July.

  • PPC to cast IPL Miss Bollywood winners in ’24×7 Raftaar’

    MUMBAI: Percept Picture Company has decided to rope in the winners of ‘IPL Miss Bollywood’ for their forthcoming film 24×7 Raftaar.

    Made on a budget of Rs 250 million, the movie is to be directed by Shamin Desai and stars Emraan Hashmi, Aditya Panscholi, Neha Dhupia and Sagorika Ghadge. 24×7 Raftaar deals with the life of a TV reporter at a TV news channel.
    Says Percept Picture Company CEO Navin Shah, “Bollywood has always appealed to the world. IPL has done a highly commendable job and ‘IPL Miss Bollywood’ being a huge property, we are excited to be associated with them.”

  • Filmmaker Brett Ratner ties up with Big Entertainment

    MUMBAI: Hollywood filmmaker Brett Ratner, who made films like Rush Hour and X-Men: The Last Stand, has tied up with Big Entertainment to bring cinematic material from all over the world to India.

    Ratner has now acquired a French graphic novel on behalf of the production house to be made into a film.


    To be titled Infinity, the film will be directed by Sylvain White. “I feel the boundaries between Bollywood and world cinema are evaporating. And material with a strong visual appeal will enable Bollywood to go global,” Ratner told the media..


    According to Ratner, this tie-up with Reliance has given him more creative and financial freedom. “For example, I’ve this deal with Paramount. I can go to them now with Reliance’s financial proposal and get more room for quick and effective negotiation,” he said.


    Ratner wants to use his partnership with Reliance to distribute films of Jackie Chan in the Indian market. “Having done those Rush Hour kind of films with Chan, I share an incredible relationship with him. And he has told me that his cinema has an amazing market in Bollywood. Hence, I thought that if I cut a deal with Reliance, I could bring the Jackie Chan movies into India,” he said.