ITV

Category: Movies

  • HKIFF to pay tribute to Bruce Lee on 70th anniversary

    MUMBAI: The 2010 Hong Kong International Film Festival (HKIFF), beginning 30 March, will celebrate the 70th anniversary of Bruce Lee. The festival will go up to 6 April.


    The Bruce Lee tribute will include nine of his films like The Kid (1950), The Orphan (1960).


    The program also will include a few Cantonese films, such as The Thunderstorm (1957) and the kung fu classic Enter The Dragon (1973).


    “Bruce Lee‘s legacy continues to inspire filmmakers and audiences around the world,” said Hong Kong International Film Festival Society executive director Shaw Soo-wei.
    “The HKIFF is proudly committed to supporting Hong Kong film talent of the past and present who pave the way for new filmmakers to establish themselves globally,” Shaw said in a statement.


    Lee‘s work continues to drive worldwide interest in Hong Kong action cinema, his films having influenced all areas of popular culture including fitness, music, sport, dance and video games. Not only that, his films drove the martial arts film industry into the mainstream, putting Hong Kong cinema on the world map.


    The Bruce Lee exhibition and tribute will be officially opened at the Hong Kong Cultural Centre on 30 March by Lee‘s daughter, Shannon Lee Keasler and Linda Lee Cadwell, wife of the late Bruce Lee.
     

  • Sri Lanka to host 2010 IIFA awards

    MUMBAI: This year the International Indian Film Academy (IIFA) awards will be held in Colombo from 2 to 4 July.


    Announcing the awards iterinary, the country‘s Minister for Tourism, Achala Jagoda said that out of the several countries that had evinced interest to host the event, Sri Lanka finally got the nod.


    The minister hailed it as an international achievement, and added that several events such as an Indian business meeting would be held on the sidelines of IIFA.
    The IIFA Awards, are presented annually by the International Indian Film Academy to honour both artistic and technical excellence of professionals in Bollywood, the Hindi language film industry. 


    Instituted in 2000, the ceremony is held in different countries around the world every year. The first ceremony was held in London at The Millennium Dome. From then on the awards were held at locations around the world signifying the international purpose of Hindi cinema.


    It has been held in South Africa (twice), Malaysia, Singapore, The Netherlands, the United Arab Emirates, England, Thailand and Macau.


    While Sri Lanka will host the event in 2010, the 2011 event will be held in Toronto.
     

  • Orson Welles comes back to screen as narrator

    MUMBAI: Orson Welles is set to appear posthumously in a film. A rare recording, recently discovered has the filmmaker narrating a children‘s Christmas novel, is being used as the basis of a film.


    The film is being produced by Drac Studios, known as a special effects and makeup studio for movies like The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. It has now moved into full-fledged production.


    Drac is developing Christmas Tails, a 3D live-action/CG hybrid film to be directed by Todd Tucker and narrated by Welles who expired in 1985.


    Said Drac president Harvey Lowry, “It‘s a movie about how Santa‘s dog saves Christmas, but on one level, this a story about the discovery of Orson‘s lost tapes. This is a substantial find. It‘s something that a filmmaker dreams of.”


    More than 25 years ago, author Robert X. Leed self-published a book titled Christmas Tails and in 1985 got his friend, the legendary Welles, to narrate it making five reel-to-reel recordings.


    The filmmaker passed away a few months later, and apart from Leed making the occasional copy of a reel to pass along with his book, the recordings stayed on a shelf in a closet of his Las Vegas home.

  • Robin Hood to open at Cannes on 12 May

    MUMBAI: Ridley Scott‘s Robin Hood that stars Russell Crowe and Cate Blanchett will be the opening-night film of the Festival de Cannes on 12 May.


    The film, which also stars Max Von Sydow, Lea Seydoux and William Hurt, will be released in France on the day it screens at the festival while in the rest of the world, it will release on 14 May.


    The film written by Brian Helgeland portrays the beginnings of the Robin Hood legend.


    Scott is a familiar face at the festival, having been to the Riviera in 1977 with prize winner The Duellists and in 1991 with Thelma and Louise.


    The festival will end on 23 May.

  • UTV to start theatrical release of world cinema next month

    MUMBAI: UTV World Movies will start the theatrical releases of films from the first week of April. The channel, which had announced the plan of venturing into the theatrical release and home video segments at the time of launch, had deferred the plans due to exhibition hassles.


    The channel has lined up a slew of movies to release in theatres across Mumbai, Delhi and Mangalore over a span of two months.


    The movies to be screened in theatres are The Song of Sparrows (4 April), The Counterfeiters, La Zona, Murderers, I Always Wanted To Be A Gangster, Wrap Up and A Ton Of Luck. 


    Says UTV World Movies business head Sameer Ganapathy, “When we started the UTV World Cinema channel, we had decided to tap the other two verticals. Though the Home Video section was launched last year, we had to defer theatrical release due to the exhibition problems in the wake of the multiplex strike.”


    Meanwhile, UTV World Movies will also hold Arties festival in association with NCPA on 26 and 27 March, wherein an international band is scheduled to perform.


    Adds Ganapathy, “It is a matter of privilege for UTV World Movies to be associated with this unique endeavour. Music lovers are in for a delight with the celebrated band Quatuor Eben of France belting out their finest numbers.”

  • Reliance Mediaworks ties up with UFO Moviez for digital distribution of films

    MUMBAI: Reliance MediaWorks (RMW) has entered into a strategic partnership with UFO Moviez to create a wider platform for film releases on digital screens.


    UFO Moviez will set up an additional encoding and encryption facility in the premises of RMW, the largest multiplex chain operator with 250 screens across the country.


    RMW CEO Anil Arjun said, “The alliance will accelerate the creation of a secure digital ecosystem that facilitates a wider reach for digital distribution of movies, delivering to movie consumers a superior experience, more content, with greater reliability and lower costs. That’s where we can make a real difference.”


    UFO Moviez India joint MD Kapil Agarwal added, “The alliance would help us focus on our core business of technology development and greater proliferation of digital systems across cinemas, while creating a significant platform for producers and distributors to optimise their print costs and spend more on marketing and publicity within the overall release cost, resulting into accelerating of the recovery process.”
     

  • I Spy actor Robert Culp dies after fall

    MUMBAI: Robert Culp, best known for playing a secret agent alongside Bill Cosby in the 1960s cloak-and-dagger hit I Spy died on Wednesday after having a fall when he was on his routine morning walk. He was 79.


    Culp, who also starred with Natalie Wood, Elliott Gould and Dyan Cannon in Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice was pronounced dead at a Los Angeles hospital where he was rushed after the fall.


    Culp, born in Oakland, California earned his first major television role in the late 1950s Western Trackdown in which he played a Texas Ranger.


    But his most famous TV role was that of Kelly Robinson, a secret agent with a double life traveling the world as a top-seeded professional tennis player in I Spy. Culp was also nominated for a Golden Globe for the film which was shot on location in Hong Kong, Acapulco and Tokyo.

  • Change to 3D will hit films shot on 3D: Cameron

    MUMBAI: First it was Avatar then Alice In Wonderland. The success of these two 3D animated films has resulted in a craze among Hollywood studios to convert big films from 2D to 3D.


    Director James Cameron believes that the studios are rushing to take advantage of the public‘s appetite for 3D films, but using computers to convert standard 2D films to 3D, instead of filming in 3D “gives audiences a cheaper-looking film and could do more harm than good if audiences get turned off.”


    “The problem is these decisions should be made by filmmakers, they shouldn‘t be made by studios, because if it was up to studios they‘re going to sacrifice quality for lower cost,” Cameron has reportedly said.


    Shot in 3D, Avatar has gone on to become the top-grossing movie of all-time with a gross of $2.7 billion at the box-office.


    Cameron is not the only filmmaker questioning studios‘ headlong rush to convert films to 3D,Transformers maker Michael Bay has questioned the move too.


    Studios are rapidly converting now that Walt Disney Co has seen its 3-D conversion “Alice in Wonderland” sell more than $570 million in tickets since its March 5 debut.


    On April 2, Warner Bros, a division of Time Warner Inc, will release its action movie Clash of the Titans as another 2D to 3D conversion.

  • Eros-Ashtavinayak to co-produce Ranbir starrer Rockstar

    MUMBAI: Eros International Media Ltd. has struck a deal with Shri Ashtavinayak Cine Vision to co-produce Rockstar directed by Imtiaz Ali and starring Ranbir Kapoor.


    The film will go on the floors in May this year and is scheduled for a December release. 


    Commenting on the announcement, Executive Vice Chairman & Managing Director, India – Eros International Sunil Lulla said “Eros and Imtiaz Ali have had a fabulous and successful working relationship in the past and we are proud to take our association to the next level with Rockstar in this association with Shri Ashtavinayak. The very talented Ranbir Kapoor had worked for us earlier during our first film Anjana Anjanee releasing this July.”
     

  • Anti-piracy drive yields goods worth Rs 2.19 million

    MUMBAI: Within days of the launch of an anti-piracy coalition by the Hindi film industry and the Motion Picture Distributors Association (India) that represents Hollywood studios, several raids were conducted by the Mumbai police along with AA Khan & Associates resulting in the seizure of 25,292 pirated CDs and DVDs worth Rs. 2.19 million.


    The raids were conducted at Andheri (East and West), Mumbai Central, and Fort areas.


    The pirated CDs and DVDs included those of Lahore, Road-The Movie, Right Yaa Wrong, Atithi Tum Kab Jaoge, My Name Is Khan and English films like Alice in Wonderland, Gamer, Young Victoria, Beauty And The Beast, The Toothed Fairy, The legion, and Edge for Darkness among others.


    Former IPS officer and former ATS chief A A Khan said “Piracy is a serious offence and is rampant in major parts of the city. The recent announcement of the anti-piracy coalition between Hollywood studios and Hindi studios will help us push this initiative further.”


    “People need to remember that besides denying the creators of the content their fair share, earnings from such sales fund are put into several illegal activities including terrorism in India and abroad.”


    In the last few months, goods over Rs 5 million have been seized and over 50 arrests made.