Category: Movies

MUMBAI: After almost three weeks of striking work, writers are back to the negotiating table. As today‘s talks showed no concrete results, the warring parties are scheduled to meet again.

MUMBAI: The Supreme Court has granted bail to Bollywood actor Sanjay Dutt in the Mumbai serial blasts case.

Dutt will have to furnish a bond and his passport would remain deposited with the Court.

The court did not grant bail to those sentenced to life imprisonment in the serial blasts case.

In addition the appeals and the bail pleas of those convicts who had not surrendered were not considered.

Some of the important petitions that came up for hearing were that of Samir Hingora, Rubina Memon and Yusuf Khan.

Dutt is currently lodged in Yerawada Jail, Pune. He was earlier granted interim bail on 20 August 2007.

MUMBAI: Shringar Films Ltd, a 100 per cent subsidiary and distribution arm of Shringar Cinemas, has tied up with Pyramid Saimara Theatre Ltd (PSTL) to distribute ‘Halla Bol‘ in the Delhi and UP territory.

Pyramid Saimira Production Ltd (PSPL), a part of the Pyrmaid Group, had acquired the worldwide rights of Halla Bol.

‘Halla Bol‘ which has been directed by Rajkumar Santoshi, is scheduled to be released on 21 December and has a star cast that comprises Ajay Devgan, Vidya Balan among others.

Halla Bol is a Viacom 18 and Sunrise Picture venture. Produced by Abdol Samee Siddiqui, the film is slated for a 21 December release along with another Viacom 18 offering, Welcome.

Speaking on the announcement, Shringar Films MD Shravan Shroff said, “We are extremely proud to be associated with PSTL for ‘Halla Bol.‘ We are confident that it would be the start of an extremely fruitful working relationship with PSTL. We look forward to greater alliances with them in future.”

NEW DELHI: Global Climate Campaign, a lobby group facilitated by Kriti Film Club, is organising a special evening of films on climate change in New Delhi on 8 December.

The micro-fest, which will be held at the Gulmohar Hall, Indian Habitat Centre, will screen eight shorts, and will be open to anyone interested in the issue of climate change.

The festival will start at 6.30 pm and will be followed by a chat session with the film makers – Madhab Panda, Pallava Bagla – Science Editor, NDTV and some others.

The films will include those by Nitin Das (Global Warming – a fable from the Himalayas), a tiny, eight minute film shot near Tibet, a magical tale about a young boy who finds the solution to Global Warming from a monk in the mountains.

The entire cast of the film is from Kaaza, a small town in Spiti Valley. The film was made possible by spitiecosphere, an NGO based out of Spiti. The main intention of this film is to spread the message of how fast Global warming is impacting the fragile ecosystems.

Then there is a science film, “Changing Climates: The Science“, by Television Trust For The Environment, which lasts 27 minutes.

It deals with the widespead burning of fossil fuels starting with the steam engine and industrial revolution.

In the first of films on climate change, Earth Report takes a look back over 200 years of evolving scientific thought – sometimes confusing and contradictory – that has shaped the global warming debate.

This is followed by Climate Change – an Untold Story, a series of four films, winners of the UK Environment Fellowships, 2005

Nila Madhav Panda‘s film, “Climate‘s First Orphans“, tells the story of 20,000 homeless villagers in the coastal districts of Orissa, whose existence has been wiped out by the rising sea level.

“The Weeping Apple Tree” is a film by Vijay S. Jodha, and illustrates the complex issue of climate change by focusing on the shifting apple-growing belt in Himachal Pradesh.

Syed Fayaz will then be presenting his film, “A Degree of Concern“, which looks at the implications of climate change on glaciers, and how artificial glaciers are improving the water supply of Ladakh for now.

MUMBAI: The screening of the film �Emotional Arithmetic’ directed by Paolo Barzman was cancelled due to non-receipt of prints from Paris in the wake of transporters’ strike in France.

MUMBAI: Eros International and Carving Dreams Motion Pictures have signed a co-production Bollywood movie deal, with Hrithik Roshan playing the lead role.

Eros International chairman and CEO Kishore Lulla said, “I am delighted that Hrithik Roshan will be playing the lead role. That has elevated our first project together to an entirely different level. We are looking forward to a wonderful relationship and many more such ventures and specifically giving this particular film a great global distribution and marketing platform pulling our entire group‘s resources together.”

Carving Dreams Motion Pictures director Bunty Bahl said, “Having worked closely with Hrithik Roshan as his business managers for over two years now, we hope to be sensitive to his creative needs and expect him to be involved in our film beyond the boundaries of an actor. As we foray into film production, Hrithik was the most natural choice for us to fortify our relationship further.”

MUMBAI: The Chennai based BMD group made a foray into media and entertainment with Air Media.

The diverse & comprehensive offerings to be provided by AIR MEDIA across animation, cinema trading and both feature film and television concept production, will make it among the first few fully integrated media and entertainment companies in South India. At a press conference held in the city, the company formally launched its operations in the presence of Karti P Chidambaram, member of All India Congress Committee (AICC).

AIR MEDIA also unveiled its exclusive IP and India’s first non-mythological animation character that will appeal to a global audience, called �Tusker’, at the conference. The integrated media venture will focus on live 2D & 3D animation, feature film production, multi-lingual cinema trading, production of innovative TV concepts & serials and distribution of national and overseas titles among other offerings.

AIR MEDIA has already acquired the dubbing rights of more than 400 titles that will be sold in India over the next 3-4 years. Apart from this, the first Tamil movie produced by AIR MEDIA is slated for release in January 2008 and final negotiations are under way to sign another South Indian feature film.

�As a group when we looked at opportunities to diversify and grow, we saw huge potential in the media and entertainment segment and this has been validated by the immense growth in the last 2 years and the entry of large companies into the segment. India has a natural advantage, being the world’s largest producer and consumer of films and Chennai is emerging to be a hub for entertainment technology & innovation. In this context, we expect AIR MEDIA to become a key business and revenue contributor to the group. We have invested over 80 million initially, sourced from internal accruals and are targeting an estimated revenue of Rs 1 billion by 2010. We are also building a highly professional core team with complementing skill sets�, said AIR Media CEO and BMD Group chairman S Baskar.

Noted Tamil cinema director and Creative head of AIR MEDIA, Thakali Srinivasan added, �AIR MEDIA is committed to developing its own intellectual properties for the international market. We will focus on a niche & are not looking at mature or cluttered spaces. We are working closely on innovative concepts in co-production and independent production of Feature Films, Short Films & TV Serials and trading of multi-lingual content. AIR MEDIA has a well equipped animation studio that will provide international quality digital media content to its customers.�

MUMBAI: Indian Panorama at Iffi – 2007 was inaugurated by Information & broadcasting minister Priyaranjan Dasmunsi today in the presence of the Goa chief minister Digambar Kamat.

The members of the two juries were felicitated on the occasion. The juries are headed by renowned filmmakers KS Sethumadhavan (feature films) and Arun Khopkar (non-feature films). Shyama Prasad, director of the opening Feature Film ‘Ore Kadal‘ (Malayalam), Bisnu Deb Halder, director of the Non-Feature Section opening film, ‘Bagher Bachcha‘ (Bengali) and main cast of the two films were also felicitated.

In all, 36 films will be screened in Indian panorama. Of these, 21 are feature and 15 non-feature films. The selections were made from 119 feature films and 149 non-feature film entries.

DIGITAL ENTERTAINMENT TOOLS FOR CHILDREN SHOULD PROMOTE INDIAN ETHOS:

The digital entertainment tools for children should create Indian brands and be aimed at giving some message for the younger generation, said Dasmunsi at the seminar on “Digital Entertainment: Animation, Gaming and Visual Effects”, organized by Ficci alongside Iffi-2007 in Goa today.

The Minister said, new advancements in technology help in producing better quality at cheaper rates but still the costs remain considerably high from the viewpoint of the mass of Indian people. The endeavour has to be to develop affordable technology.

MUMBAI: London based media analyst firm Screen Digest has launched Global Media Intelligence (GMI), a new division dedicated to delivering high quality research and analysis to institutional investors in the US.

GMI‘s latest report – ‘Do Movies Make Money‘ – published projects that after five years of exploitation across all global media, the 132 medium-to-big budget films released by the leading US studios in 2006 will produce a loss of $1.9 billion pre-tax. This compares to a profit of $2.2 billion for the new releases of 2004.

Despite a recent surge in box office returns, GMI believes that the movie business has seen costs rising faster than revenue for the past several years.

Revenues from DVD sales, which accounted for 75 per cent of growth and significant profits from 1999 to 2004, have experienced a worldwide decline over the past three years. A detailed title-by-title analysis was carried out for this report which shows the trend accelerating further in the first half of 2007 with US DVD sales down 12.5 per cent from 2006. International sales mirrored this decline.

Some executives in the Hollywood studios are looking to the new technologies of Video on Demand (VoD) and subscription based TV to fill the gap left by DVD. However, GMI estimates that while VoD will offer a superior share of the consumer dollar over traditional pay channels (60 per cent versus 40 per cent), it will not deliver at the lofty levels predicted in the early days of the industry and will not help the studios put ‘old wine in new bottles.‘

Financing films has also become a major concern. Until recently, the industry used to generate its own capital entirely from internal sources. However since 2004 when revenues started to decline, the industry has been forced to seek outside financing, mostly from hedge funds and private equity. GMI believes that this source of capital will not be available on the attractive terms that until recently prevailed. Sophisticated investors are becoming aware of just how thin, or even non-existent, movie profit margins can be.

One of the biggest sources of increasing costs is for the stars of the movies, particularly the ‘gross participations‘ paid to top actors, directors and producers. These costs totalled $3 billion in 2006 – nearly double that of five years ago. While the studios are currently in negotiations with writers, actors and directors over fees, these salaries are not the main issue; the current cost of producing, casting and advertising movies in the present environment simply exceeds the likely returns.

Roger Smith, author of the report believes the outlook is bleak. “Our analysis of the business of the Hollywood studios may come as a surprise to investors and even some people within the industry. We believe there is little chance of the negative revenue trend reversing in the coming years.

“New technology will not deliver anything like the revenue initially predicted, and as DVD sales continue to decline and the cost if making movies increases, the message is simple: the Hollywood studio‘s must begin a serious attempt to reign in costs, like News Corporation‘s Fox have done, if they are to survive.”

MUMBAI: Sports footwear company Reebok has tied up with the film Goal as it deals with soccer. The estimated deal value of this partnership is worth over Rs 200 million.

Rebbok provided the soccer team in the film with gear. Reebok sponsored the sport apparel and footwear for the entire South Hall United Team in the movie.

Reebok is present in multiple scenes because it fits in naturally with the movie. It is now making the same gear available in the form of merchandise, available in 535 Reebok stores across the country.

A 30 seconds co-branded television commercial was created. It was also aired during the India – Pakistan one day series to widen the reach of the association to the cricket crazy audience across the country.

Radio is also being used. A Radio Spot tells listeners to check out the Rbk – Goal collection of merchandise available at Reebok outlets across the country

What’s my Goal? is a live contest that invites people to define their goals; it is also being aired across Radio City and Fever FM stations in Delhi, wherein best responses are being gratified by means of Reebok gift vouchers. Fans can also visit the Reebok site to shop for Goal merchandise.

Reebok is also doing activities in the malls and multiplexes. Its shoe design stickers, leading from the lift to the Reebok kiosk, greet people once they enter the multiplex and mall area.

On display at the kiosk are the Goal Reebok apparel worn by mannequins along with Goal – Reebok standee.

GroupM worked closely with Reebok to conceptualise these activities. GroupM ESP senior director-entertainment Vinit Karnik says, “The idea was conceived by the team at GroupM ESP keeping in mind brands’ positioning and script of the film. Personality of the leading characters in the film reflects the brand’s communication ‘I Am What I Am’ which makes this association strategic to its target audience.

“The scale of this association is by far the biggest in the business of cinema as the infilm association has been amplified through various touch points, concluding with merchandising the product through 535 Reebok retail stores. Reebok’s association with Goal is not just a tie-up; it’s a partnership of two industries, Corporate and Entertainment.”