ITV

Category: Movies

  • Raavan gets CCI nod for screening in Karnataka

    MUMBAI: The Competition Commission of India (CCI) has restrained the Karnataka Film Chamber of Commerce (KFCC) from taking any action directly or indirectly to prevent any exhibitor from showing the Hindi film Raavan and its Tamil version Raavanan in Karnataka.


    Comments film producer and KFCC member Madhusudhan Reddy, “Expecting trouble from KFCC, Reliance Big Pictures had approached the court. The court, in turn, referred the matter to the CCI which passed a judgment in favour of Reliance Big Pictures. We will adhere to the CCI judgement.”


    Both the Hindi and the Tamil version would now be playing in 24 theatres in Mysore circuit, in all multiplexes.


    It may be recalled that the releases of Raavan and Raavanan had run into rough weather with the KFCC restricting the release of the movie in both the versions to only 24 screens in the old Mysore distribution area of Karantaka.


    Reliance Big Pictures had contended that since the project was in two languages and with a different star cast, it should not be considered as a single but as two movies. And, hence, it should be permitted to release the films in 24 screens each.


    “Raavan is a hugely mounted film and we would like the KFCC to liberalise its policy of restricting the release in a fixed number of theatres in Karnataka,” a letter from Big Pictures to KFCC had said.


    But the KFCC turned down its contention and ordered it to keep it down to 12 for each language.

  • Akshay Kumar plays Marathi manoos in Khatta Meetha

    MUMBAI: After playing a Sikh character to perfection in Studio18‘s Singh Is King, Akshay Kumar will play a Marathi manoos in Cape of Good Films and Shree Ashtavinayak Cine Vision‘s Khatta Meetha.


    Kumar plays Sachin Tichkule in the film that is largely a political satire on the deals between the construction lobby and municipal corporations in the country related through the life of Tichkule.


    This slice of the film, much inspired by cartoonist RK Laxman, will get one thinking and have them laughing off their seat at the same time, believe the producers.


    The film will see the debut of South‘s most sought-after actresses Trisha
     

  • Randy Jackson in hospital after heart attack

    MUMBAI: Randy Jackson, younger brother of the deceased pop star Michael Jackson has suffered a heart attack.


    The 48-year-old musician was immediately rushed to the Huntington Memorial, California. 


    Recently, the Jackson family has been going through a spate of bad news.


    The news of Randy‘s ill health comes days before the Jacko‘s first death anniversary.


    Meanwhile, Dr Conrad Murray, Jackson‘s physician who was charged with ‘involuntary manslaughter‘ after the pop stars death last year was given permission to continue practicing medicine.
     

  • H’wood Walk of Fame announces plaque winners

    MUMBAI: The Hollywood Chamber of Commerce has announced a list of celebrities who would be given a plaque on the famous Los Angeles sidewalk.


    The stars include a rare family dedication, when three stars will take part in the same ceremony. They are actors Bruce Dern and Diane Ladd and their daughter Laura Dern.


    From the motion picture fraternity, Penelope Cruz, Ed Harris, the Muppets, Kenny Ortega, Gwyneth Paltrow, Ridley Scott, Sissy Spacek, Donald Sutherland and Reese Witherspoon will also receive honours.


    On the TV front, the stars will go to Danny DeVito, Tina Fey, Simon Fuller, John Langley, Ed O‘Neill and John Wells besides Winfrey and Harris,.


    Among recording artistes, Melissa Etheridge, Los Tigres Del Norte, Rascal Flatts, Go-Go‘s, Slash, Will i. Am and Bebe and Cece Winans will get the stars.
     

  • BigFlix Movie Rentals eyes 150 stores by March 2011

    MUMBAI: BigFlix Movie Rentals, the online and offline movie rental service under Reliance Big Entertainment, plans to have a total of 150 stores by March 2011.


    The plan will have BigFlix.com deliver films at home to the people residing in Tier II cities like Jaipur, Vadodara, Surat, Lucknow, Nasik, Jamshedpur, Kochi, Patna, Nagpur and Kanpur.


    In its endeavour, the company will engage local logistic partners to deliver movies at home to the masses in the respective cities.


    It has 10 franchise stores in Mumbai, Pune, Delhi, Chandigarh, Faridabad and Panipat. The stores will start functioning once they have their respective logistics partners finalised for these cities.


    The rental company has a total retail presence of 60 stores and an access to about 21,000 titles in 13 Indian languages.


    The company‘s franchise business will have two models, namely, ‘store‘ franchise and ‘master‘ franchise. While the store franchise will be where an interested party can become the franchise of a single store in any specific city, the master franchise will be where interested party can opt for the franchise of a set number of stores for a specific geographic location.


    Speaking on the franchise plan, BigFlix.com chief lead- franchise operations Puneet Sachdeva said, “We are all geared up with the launch of our new expansion plans with the franchise route. While we will focus on the brand building and content acquisition aspects meeting with the specific requirements of the denizens residing in these cities, our franchisees will handle all the logistics and operations of the business.”


    “Considering that even today we see 75 to 80 per cent of our registrations coming in from the offline route, and a constant response in terms of enquiries/ registrations on our website from these cities for our film service, we are confident that the franchise model will be the most feasible path at this stage,” added Sachdeva.


    Currently, BigFlix.com has a customer base of 80,000 customers and with the franchise foray, it aims to reach a target of 1, 50, 000 customers by March 2011.
     

  • Reliance Big Entertainment, Brad Pitt to distribute The Imperfectionists

    MUMBAI: As part of a creative partnership, Reliance Big Entertainment, the entertainment arm of Indian conglomerate Reliance Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group (ADAG), and Brad Pitt‘s production company Plan B Entertainment have acquired the distribution rights of Tom Rachman‘s novel adaptation The Imperfectionists. 


    The film centers on the quirky, maddening, endearing people who write and read an international newspaper based in Rome: from the obituary reporter who will do anything to avoid work, to the young freelancer who is manipulated by an egocentric war correspondent, to the dog-obsessed publisher who seems less interested in his struggling newspaper than in his magnificent basset hound.


    Commenting on the acquisition, Reliance Big Entertainment chairman Amit Khanna said, ‘”The Imperfectionists is a compliment to our slate with Plan B Entertainment. It will make a commercial and extremely relevant film which will play well to an international audience.”


    Reliance Big Entertainment first introduced its development/ production financing deal termed as Creative Partnership with Plan B Entertainment at the Cannes Film Festival 2008.

  • Last Airbender release moved up one day

    MUMBAI: Paramount has preceded the theatrical release date of family adventure The Last Airbender by one day to 1 July.


    Midweek releases are generally designed to arouse word-of-mouth publicity in advance of an opening weekend. The distributor will effectively reap a five-day bow for the M. Night Shyamalan- directed film as Independence Day falls on 4 July and the following Monday is a federal holiday in the US.


    Summit‘s Twilight third part Eclipse is the holiday-stretched session‘s only other opener that opens on 30 June.

  • Internet service provider in Japan to show The Cove for free

    MUMBAI: To invite public comment on Japan‘s nationalist opposition to The Cove that resulted in theatres cancelling the screening of the film in Japan, Niwango Inc., an Internet service company has decided to show The Cove free of charge this Friday.


    The service provider that shows streaming video on the internet said that it‘s inviting people to write opinions via Twitter and e-mail for an open exchange of views on the Oscar-winning documentary.


    About 20 theatres in Japan had planned to show the film but canceled after protesters made threatening phone calls and screamed slogans outside the distributor‘s offices.


    Nationalists oppose the film as a denigration of Japanese culture. It has been shown at the Tokyo International Film Festival and other more private screenings but has not been seen by the Japanese public.

  • Raajneeti collects Rs 945 mn at box-office

    MUMBAI: Walkwater Media and UTV Motion Pictures‘ Raajneeti is among the few films that have been able to boast of their vigour at the box-office this year.


    The film‘s 10 day gross box office collections in India are Rs 945 million. Overseas too, Raajneeti has had a good run at the box office with its 10 day collections at Rs 160 million across close to 300 screens.


    In the USA, the movie has done business of $1,287,416 while in the UK, the collections stand at $588,305 and in the Gulf it is $726,081.

  • Natarang at Munich International Film Festival 2010

    MUMBAI: Zee Talkies‘ Natarang will be the opening film at the 28th Munich International Film Festival, to be held from 25 June to 3 July.


    The film had earlier won several prestigious awards like the best film award at the Pune International Film Festival.


    Says Zee Entertainment Enterprises Ltd. COO Nitin Vaidya, “Natarang has done an awesome business and achieved great appreciation from nationwide critics. Now Zee Talkies is really proud for getting international recognition through this festival and augurs well for us as our film will get a great applause from the worldwide audiences. We are happy that our faith in this project has been justified.”


    This year the Munich film festival will be holding the premieres of more than 200 German films besides screening films from 48 countries.


    The festival is Germany‘s leading film festival that attracts over 65,000 film lovers every year and as many as 600 members of the international press and over 1000 film-related professionals.