Category: Movies

MUMBAI: The ninth Third Eye Asian Film Festival, to be held in Mumbai from 29 October to 4 November, will felicitate renowned filmmaker Shyam Benegal with the Asian Film Culture award.

The award honours the achievements of Asian directors and is given each year to the master of Asian cinema.

Iraqi film Son of Babylon, which won the Best Movie Award at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival in July this year, will open the festival.

Said Festival director Sudhir Nandgaonkar, “In the last twenty years, Asian cinema has gained immense popularity by winning top awards at world‘s important film festivals. And to recognise the talent and films made by Asian directors, the festival has organised a ‘director‘s first or second film‘ section.”
The competition would be adjudged by an international jury. 

Six films by Mrinal Sen would also be screened this year under the Asian Masters section.

The festival that will showcase 80 films and 50 short films from Asian countries will be held in Plaza in Dadar (central Mumbai), Y.B. Chavan Centre (Nariman Point in south Mumbai) and Fame Adlabs (Andheri).

The festival will close with the screening of Marathi film Mee Sindhutai Sapkal, based on a true story of a village woman‘s journey to overcome the adversities of life through her good deeds.

MUMBAI: Veteran actress Aruna Irani is retuning to Marathi films after 16 years in Bol Baby Bol. The movie is produced by her brother Balraj Irani and directed by Vinay Laad.

A family comedy that revolves around a toddler, Ladd shot the film 22 days.

Asked whether she faced any language problem, the actress said: “I always used to enquire about the scene to be shot next day and came prepared by listening to the recorded dialogues. There was no problem.”

The film‘s cast includes Makrand Anaspure, Anikesh Vishwarao and Neha Pendse.

The last time Aruna Irani acted in Marathi movies was in Changu Mangu that also starred Ashok Saraf

MUMBAI: In line with Raghav Bahl‘s strategy to consolidate Network18‘s entertainment businesses under Viacom18, the joint venture company between media conglomerate Viacom Inc and IBN18 Broadcast has come out with an offer to acquire the Indian Film Company (TIFC).

The board of Roptonal, Cyprus, a subsidiary of Viacom18 Media, is making the open offer to acquire AIM-listed TIFC shares at a price of 115.56 pence apiece. The offer is recommended by the independent directors of the TIFC board.

Earlier, in July, Viacom18 had announced that it will come up with an open offer to acquire TIFC, which produces and distributes movies.

At present, Network18 holds 80.4 per cent stake in TIFC. Viacom18 intends to purchase shares from the other shareholders as well and delist the company from AIM.

Network18 Media & Investments is considering this offer from Viacom18 beneficial to its shareholders and has already given an irrevocable undertaking to accept the offer.

Interestingly, Network18 had made an open offer at 40 pence per share to up its stake to 80.4 per cent in TIFC.

“This sale will mark the culmination of a very successful investment in the film business for Network18 shareholders with a gain of over Rs 1.4 billion. In turn, IBN18 shareholders will get asset to their entertainment business in Viacom18,” Network18 said.

Viacom18 plans to be one of the leading entertainment companies in India across TV (GEC/Youth/Kids) and films. The film business will be further strengthened with the involvement of Viacom, a global leader in the motion picture business.

Earlier, IBN18 and Viacom, the two shareholders, had shown willingness to provide the necessary funding to Viacom18 for making the purchase.

MUMBAI: Kareena Kapoor is likely to play Indira Gandhi in the much-awaited international biopic Mother: The Indira Gandhi Story.
The international producers had earlier thought of approaching Priyanka Chopra for the role but the film’s Oscar-winning make-up artistes Jenny Shircore and Greg Connam were divided in their opinion.

They are certain that Kapoor can look closer to Indira than Chopra. While Shircore, who won an Academy award for her work in Elizabeth felt that Chopra is the only actress, Connam, who worked on The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, thinks that Kapoor is more suited. As of now, the two are seriously looking over Kareena‘s features for a near match before they approach her. 

The film’s director Krishna Shah, who has made films like Shalimar, says, “Can you imagine Gandhi without Ben Kingsley or Nixon without Anthony Hopkins or Patton without George C. Scott? Indira‘s film provides incredible scope for the make-up artistes. Kareena has a strong jaw and deep eyes and the time for make-up will not be taxing.”

Talking about the probable makeup time on Kareena will take, Shah explains, “Indira at 20 will take about an hour, she at 50 about two hours while she at 67 will take three hours because of the advancement in the art of make-up.”
The movie will be released in two parts. The first part will come up at the end of 2011 and part two about seven or eight months later. Shah mentioned that the film would be multilingual.

MUMBAI: Aamir Khan‘s much-awaited film Dhobi Ghat, directed by his wife Kiran Rao, will release on 25 February next year.

The film is about Mumbai‘s multicultural aspect and the life of a painter who has a temporary fling with an American women. The connecting link between the two is a dhobi. Besides Khan, the film also stars Pratiek Babbar along with Monica Dogra and Kriti Malhotra. While Khan plays a painter in the film, Babbar plays a dhobi.

The film has been in the news lately due to a legal case over the title when the Hindustan Kanojia Organisation of Dhobis chairman Vinod Kumar Kanojia tapped the Delhi High Court, demanding a change of title before its release in theatres.

The film was expected to release on Christmas this year but has been postponed till February next year.

The film premiered at the Toronto international film festival recently.
 

MUMBAI: After tying up with Alliance Films to distribute his Canadian co-production Break Away globally, producer Akshay Kumar has decided to release his first international project in India himself.
Kumar says, “Break Away will be released globally next winter. I have a unique vision on how to bring it out, but it’s too early to discuss that now.” 

A cross-cultural hockey drama set in the Indo-Canadian community in Toronto and helmed by Robert Lieberman, the movie stars Vinay Virmani, Camila Belle, Anupam Kher, Russel Peters and Rob Lowe.

Avers Kumar, “I’m a huge sports enthusiast, but I also need to look at who is best suited for the role.”
 

MUMBAI: Army officer-turned-filmmaker Major Ravi‘s forthcoming film Kandahar will release on 9 December.

Max Labs is planning to release the film in over 100 screens in Kerala.

Kandahar is Amitabh Bachchan‘s first Malayalam movie. It also marks the coming together of the Bollywood star and Mohanlal after Ram Gopal Varma ki Aag. 

A trilingual made in Malayalam, Tamil and Telugu, the film revolves around the hijack of the IC-814 flight that happened a few years ago.

The film has completed its entire shoot in Ooty, Dehradun, Mumbai and Pune in a record 28 days.

The story of the film centers on Ganesh Venkataraman who plays Bachhan‘s son and an angry young commando whose life undergoes a change when he meets Major Mahadevan, played by Mohanlal. The film also marks the debut of Kannada actress Ragini Dwivedi.
 

MUMBAI: For the first time in four years, Whistling Woods founder Subhash Ghai took a master class with 400 students post the screening of his evergreen film Taal.

Ghai shared the stories behind the making of the film through scene-by scene narration and enlightened the students on how to make a great film with given resources, budget, talent and technology.

Specifically speaking on the topic “How to handle a crisis” and how to come up with better results, Ghai also shared his experience of rewriting the character‘s traits when it came to casting. In this case, Anil Kapoor was to play a role which was originally written for Govinda as a dancer than a musician.

“Every technician and actor must know his limitation of excellence if they want to be on top… even if you decide to be the 1st assistant director or chief assistant forever. Our generation is the victim of misguided motivation to become a complete film personality. Script writing and directing are two different forms of talent and we should not live in dreams to become a Raj Kapoor, Manoj Kumar, Aditya Chopra, Karan Johar and so on, unless we are multi-talented and have full command over each department. Great directors never wrote a script but shared their vision with specialised writers and translated it on the screen,” averred Ghai. 

Ghai said that he thoroughly enjoyed making Taal because it was a huge challenge for him to create a pure musical film with a thin storyline and work with actors who were not big stars at that time.

“I knew that A. R. Rahman would justify the journey of music and its sound from chapter one to chapter six of the script along with the growth of characters and each of my stars including Aishwarya and Akshay put their level best to get of the final result while playing such complex roles,” Ghai said.

Talking about proven good writers, he expressed strongly that they must be paid a percentage of the film’s budget like in Hollywood, so they are encouraged to have a respectable position. However, writers must stop dreaming to be directors since direction is surely a different art and craft.

“I am proud of my students and faculty, most of whom are moving ahead in the right direction and discovering themselves as experts in their art and I am sure that they will learn more from the industry once they join it. This will be their new beginning,” he concluded.