Category: Movies

MUMBAI: BigFlix.com, Reliance Big Entertainment’s movie rental service, has partnered with Future Group for movie rentals wherein the alliance will entail marketing promotions and schemes to all customers of Big Bazaar, Food Bazaar, Central, Depot, HomeTown and e-Zone.

BIGFlix.com head – marketing Raviraj Jayram said, “Kishore Biyani’s Future Group has a massive retail presence with a large loyal customer base in the country. Thus, we are confident that this alliance will help reach a much wider base of customers. Also, alliances and tie-up with leading companies across sectors is on the anvil which will help us meet with our objective of bringing in entertainment at home in the common man’s daily life anytime anywhere, thus revolutionizing and taking home video industry in this country to the next dimension.”

This association will see support across nine cities – Mumbai, Delhi, Chennai, Kolkata, Pune, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad, Bangalore and Indore.

Big Bazaar CEO Rajan Malhotra said, “We are a purely retail based format group. Our partnership with BigFlix.com will help us provide our customers a great value proposition with movies at home, another entertainment avenue catching up at a fast pace with such players in the industry.”

MUMBAI: Anand Kumar’s next directorial venture Juggad will witness a nationwide release on 6 February.

Produced by Sandeep Kapoor, the film casts Manoj Bajpai and Hrishita Bhatt as the lead protagonists. The other actors in the film include Vijay Raaz, Sanjay Mishra and Akshat Kumar.

While Sachin Gupta is the music director of the film, the lyrics have been penned by Sameer.

Juggad is based on the real lives and incidents of people who faced the MCD ceiling destruction done by the New Delhi government.

MUMBAI: The seventh Pune International Film Festival (PIFF) is set to kick off on 8 January with the screening of approximately 150 films from 42 countries.

PIFF will also give away lifetime achievement awards to actors Sulochana, Shashi Kapoor and Hema Malini.

The festival, which ends on 15 January, will screen films under categories like World Cinema, Student Films- Live Action and Animation, World Showcase, Country Focus, Retrospective, Tribute, Indian Showcase, Focus on Director, Gems from NFAI and Marathi Cinema Today.

PIFF will showcase 109 films under the World Competition section from 30 countries while in Marathi section 30 entries have been received.

Starting this year, the festival has also introduced a new segment on Football wherein three films based on the game will be shown.

PIFF will be inaugurated by Minister of State for External Affairs and Information and Broadcasting Anand Sharma.

MUMBAI: Hyderabad-based DQ Entertainment (DQE) will co-produce with international studios two Bollywood films – an animation feature and a high-end live action movie.

The budget for the animation feature, based on futuristic Indian mythology, is Rs 180 million. DQE will own 50 per cent of the commercial exploitation rights worldwide.

“The two movies, to be co-produced with international studios, are currently under development. The Bollywood animation is a 100-minute feature that has a budget of approximately Rs 180 million,” DQE Group chairman and CEO Tapaas Chakravarti tells Indiantelevision.com.

The live-action feature is a high-end movie which will be released in the third quarter of 2010, Chakravarti adds. He, however, did not disclose the cost of the movie project.

 

NEW DELHI: Shyam Mathur will receive the first prize in the “Journalism and Mass Communication” category for his manuscript “Film Patrakarita Ke Vividh Aayam” in the Bhartendu Harishchandra awards for 2006.

Harshdev has bagged the second prize for his book “Samayik Media Shabdkosh” and the third prize has gone to Sita Ram Khodawal for his manuscript “Hindi Jansanchar Aur Premchand Ka Jaagran Manch”.

Twelve books/manuscripts have been selected by the Jury for the awards which will be given away by Minister of State for Information and Broadcasting Anand Sharma on 6 January in the capital.

Murli Manohar Manjul for his book “Akashvani ki Antarkatha”, Narendra Singh Yadav for “Graphic Design”, Dr Smita Mishra and Dr Amar Nath ‘Amar‘ for their jointly written book “Electronic Media: Badalte Aayam”, Prabhu Jhingran “Sachitra Media Shabdawali” and Dhananjai Chopra for his book “Sirf Samachar” have been chosen for consolation prizes.

The first prize is of Rs 35000, second prize is Rs 25000, third prize is Rs. 20000 and consolation prizes are of Rs 5000 each in this category.

In the ‘Women Issues‘ category, the first prize has been given to Anamika for her book “Man Manjhne Ki Zaroorat” and the second prize goes to Lata Sharma for her book “Aurat Apne Liye”.

In ‘Children‘s Literature‘, the first prize goes to Rama Shankar for his book “Antariksh Ka Swapnil Lok” and the second prize to Harish Kumar ‘Amit‘ for his manuscript “Imandari Ka Swad”. For these two categories, the first prize consists of Rs 15000 and the second prize is of Rs 10000 each.

Interestingly, no book or manuscript has been recommended by the jury in the ‘National Integration‘ category.

Bhartendu Harishchandra Awards were instituted in 1983. Since then, these Awards are given by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting every year to promote original writings in Hindi in the field of Journalism and Mass Communication. Awards for National Integration, Women Issues & Children‘s Literature were introduced in 1992.

MUMBAI: Vistaar Religare Film Fund (VRFF), India‘s first film fund to be approved by Sebi (Securities and Exchange Board of India), has started the ball rolling. Its maiden film financing project: Manmohan Shetty‘s Victory.

The nature of the funding is unique in the sense that VRFF has agreed to invest only in the cost required for print and advertising (P&A) promotion. Shetty‘s Walk Water Media will receive a funding of approximately $1 million from VRFF for the movie Victory.

Says Walk Water Media chairman Manmohan Shetty, “This is a landmark deal as it is happening in India for the first time that a third party is putting in the money for P&A. The industry is in urgent need of entities that will recognise the depth of talent available in the country and work methodically to produce superlative cinema. We believe that this is the beginning of a long and fruitful association with Vistaar Religare Film Fund and we are confident that we will work together on future ventures as well.”

The big budget film, featuring Harman Baweja and Amrita Rao as lead protagonists, will release on 30 January.

MUMBAI: Bengali film actor-director Dilip Roy is set to direct a film on legendary music maestro Sachin Dev Burman. The film will be made by The Film Division in Tripura.

Films Division eastern regional centre director Rajiv Kumar sent a letter to the Tripura government to inform about the decision.

SD Burman composed music for 100 movies (inclusive of Bengali films). He also sang about 20 film songs (inclusive of Bengali films), for which he composed music too. He also sang for one of the songs of Amar Prem (1971), a film whose music was composed by his son, Rahul Dev Burman.

SD Burman‘s compositions have been mainly sung to a large extent by the likes of Lata Mangeshkar, Mohammad Rafi, Geeta Dutt, Manna Dey, Kishore Kumar, Asha Bhonsle and Shamshad Begum. Mukesh and Talat Mahmood have also sung songs composed by him.

MUMBAI: PVR Pictures is investing Rs 70 million in producing its latest film Mere Khwabon Mein Jo Aaye and has set 6 February as its release date.

The film will see a simultaneous opening in India and the international market. PVR will release the movie across 150-175 screens with 100-125 prints in India.

“Mere Khwabon Mein Jo Aaye has been made on a budget of Rs 70 million that excludes marketing costs. We will be distributing the film in India as well as overseas. While we are targeting approximately 150-175 screens with 100-125 prints in India. We plan to release the film across 25-30 screens in the international market,” PVR Pictures – marketing head Ranjan Singh tells Indiantelevision.com.

The film will also be released with 40-50 digital prints in India.

Mere Khwabon Mein… will mark the directorial debut of Madhureeta Anand who is also the writer of the film. The film stars Raima Sen, Randeep Hooda and Arbaaz Khan. Ekaa Films is the executive producer.

The music of the film will be released by music label T-Series. While Lalit Pandit is the music director of Mere Khwabon Mein…, the lyrics have been penned by Javed Akhtar. The playback singers include Shaan, Alka Yagnik, Anoushka Manchanda and Caralisa Monteiro.

The film‘s theme explores the journey of the characters who are pursuing their dreams.

MUMBAI: Aamir Khan

seems to be scoring over Shah Rukh Khan at the box office, if early indications of their latest films are to be believed. While the Aamir Khan-starrer Ghajini has raked in close to Rs 900 million over the four-day weekend (25 December to 28 December), SRK‘s Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi mopped up the same amount after its first week of release.

Ghajini has collected Rs 700 million from the Indian theatres while in overseas market it has pocketed close to Rs 200 million.

Distributed by The Indian Film Company in India, Ghajini was released across 1400 screens with 1200 prints.

Ghajini was released by Reliance Big Pictures, the motion pictures brand of Reliance Big Entertainment, in 22 countries internationally with 250 prints. The key markets included the UAE with 36 prints, the US and Canada with 112 prints, and the UK with 65 prints.

According to the data provided by Big Pictures, the film opened with $1.4 million in North America and with $0.92 million in the Middle East. The other countries across which Ghajini saw a simultaneous release are Ireland, Norway, Germany, Denmark, Holland, Netherlands, Belgium, South Africa, New Zealand, Fiji, Mauritius, Hong Kong, Singapore and Australia.

Big Pictures is planning to release in four additional countries – Myanmar, Uganda, Malaysia and Morocco – in the coming weeks.

“Ghajini’s performance demonstrates that the overseas audiences are equally accepting quality action films, which are still a rarity, coming out of India. We are extremely pleased with the films opening, which has created bench marks in various International markets like North America, Australia and the Middle East,” says Big Pictures COO – International Film Business Jawahar Sharma.

A Geetha Arts production, Ghajini is a remake of the critically acclaimed Tamil language film with the same title, also directed by AR Murugadoss. The film stars Aamir Khan, Asin Thottumkal, Jiah Khan, Mohit Ahlawat, Pradeep Rawat and Riyaz Khan. Ravi K Chandran is the cinematographer.

MUMBAI: Aamir Khan‘s Taare Zameen Par (TZP) has bagged the V Shantaram Gold Award for best film while Neeraj Pandey‘s A Wednesday has been honoured with the silver award.

Also, critically acclaimed Marathi film ‘Tingya‘ has won the V Shantaram bronze award.

Neeraj Pandey swept away both best director Gold and best debut director award for ‘A Wednesday‘ while Jimmy Shergill received the best artist in a supporting award for the same.

The silver award for best direction went to Aamir Khan for TZP and Ashutosh Gowariker bagged the best director bronze award for Jodhaa Akbar.

Darsheel Safary and Aishwarya Rai Bachchan won the best actor and actress award for their performances in TZP and Jodhaa Akbar respectively. Amol Gupte received the best script award for TZP.

The debut artist award went to actor-director Farhan Akhtar.

AR Rehman won the best music director award for Jodhaa Akbar and Kiran Deohans was given the best cinematographer award.

Additionally, best sound award went to late H Sridhar for Tamil film Dashavataram while Shree Narayan Singh received the best editing award for A Wednesday.