Film Topics

A Minute With: Farhan Akhtar

No wonder, it's all anyone seems to ask him these days, especially after the success of "Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara".Akhtar is back to where he started out in Bollywood -- as a director -- and his latest film, a sequel to his 2006 "Don" is one of the most anticipated releases of the year.Starring Shah Rukh Khan and Priyanka Chopra, the film opens in cinemas on December 23.Akhtar spoke to Reuters about "Don 2", action films in India and why he decided to make a sequel to a remake.Q: What are the ingredients to make a slick, good-looking Bollywood action thriller?A: "Well, there are two things -- the look is one thing -- and storywise, what is happening, is another. And I feel with ‘Don 2' I got an opportunity to do a very good action with the...

'Bigg Boss' winner Juhi Parmar says honesty key to win

Parmar, 31, was declared the winner of the popular show over the weekend, trumping actors Amar Upadhyay, Akashdeep Saigal, Siddharth Bhardwaj and dancer Mahek Chahal to bag 10 million rupees in prize money."I won because I was very honest," Parmar told Reuters in an interview. "People think you have to play politics to win Bigg Boss but I did exactly the opposite.""If I had a problem with someone, I would go up to them and tell them.""Bigg Boss", India's take on the reality TV show "Big Brother", follows the international format and features celebrity contestants closeted in a house near Mumbai for three months with no access to the outside world.The inmates of the house are subjected to a life of constant scrutiny, with dozens of cameras and...

Big Brother (and Sister) is watching you

Last week a video clip of a morning show hosted by one Maya Khan on a local TV channel began doing the rounds. The clip shows Ms. Khan with a posse of assorted thirty-something women and a cameraman raiding a famous public park of Karachi and prowling the lush vicinity looking for young unmarried couples.The idea was to confront ‘wayward’ young women and embarrass them for ‘betraying their parents’ trust’.The very next day another video clip showing the same Maya Khan bouncing off the walls on TV via a dance routine that can at best be explained as a hefty personification of a rhythmic earthquake, appeared.This thus perfectly capped the volatile moral state of Pakistan’s urban bourgeoisie that, especially in the last 15 years or so, have managed...

Anupam Kher to launch his famous play as life-coaching programme

Bollywood actor Anupam Kher will soon launch his widely-acclaimed one-man play Kuchh Bhi Ho Sakta Hai as a life-coaching programme.The play is the story of 57-year-old Kher's journey so far. He has a repertoire of over 450 films in a career spanning more than 25 years."My play Kuchh Bhi Ho Sakta Hai is my autobiography, the most creative product of my life that came along only because I needed to survive," he writes in his inspirational book The Best Thing About You is You, released recently by Hay House."Today I have completed over 225 shows of my play and it has become an extension of my philosophy. And I want to take that philosophy far and wide to reach as many people as possible, so that they too may share my life changing truths and benefit...

Does Size Matter in Pakistan?

So cynically begins the trailer of Waar, the most exp - ensive (with a controverted budget of $2 million), the most slick and the most eagerly anticipated film in the history of Pakista ni cinema. On the first day of the release of the trailer on YouTube, Waar had over 1.5 lakh hits (it has raked in some 3.5 lakh more in the fortnight since) and made it to the website’s top five videos. Today, the film is widely slated as the one that will singlehandedly revive the terminally ill Pakistani film industry. No mean feat for an incomplete film with a top-secret storyline; by a team comprising a rookie director, producer and scriptwriter; in a country that can’t even remember its glorious cinematic past. And, to top it all, more than half of the...

Movies can change the world, says German filmmaker

As we take on the ambitious task of strengthening ties with India across politics, business, science and research, we believe culture, art and especially filmmaking and cinema is a more fitting platform for exchange of ideas. We wish to bring this to India for connoisseurs, especially those in the Oxford of the East," Heldman said.Offering a bouquet of 47 films from Germany, the highlights include those by filmmakers Werner Herzog and Wim Wenders. Naber's maiden feature film, The Albanian, which is competing in Piff's world cinema category, is inspired from true events pertaining to immigrants from Albania to Germany."Today, Germany is assimilating different communities of migrants because I think the Germans have begun to feel the need for...

You can see ‘Crying Woman’ because you don’t live in China

This sounds like a pretty good idea for a movie, right?: A woman who’s down on her luck and desperate for money discovers that there’s a market for an unusual quality she has—enthusiastic crying. Yes, in China, there’s a need for serious mourners at funerals, and soon our heroine is earning her keep and paying her debts by attending funeral after funeral, weeping over people she never knew.This is the story in Crying Woman (2002), which will be presented by ArtPower! in UCSD’s Price Theater at 8 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 2, with director Liu Bingjian in attendance. It’s worth noting that although you can see Crying Woman on Thursday, one place it’s never been seen is in the country where it was made; Crying Woman has been banned in China.“Since China...

No Bollywood stars, could work with Dhanush, says Shekhar

Shekhar Kapur, among a few Indian directors with an international career, doesn't mince his words. Ask him about Bollywood films and why he doesn't direct them anymore and there's a pronounced wince. This, despite directing a clutch of successful Hindi films such as Masoom, Mr India and the critically-lauded Bandit Queen.The wince comes from the term "Bollywood". "Bollywood films are stifling. They limit creativity. To me, making films is like entering a temple. When you go with an agenda, the sanctity is lost," he says.Quickly turning it around, he says, "Ask me if I would make another Indian film and I'll say I probably will." But don't expect mighty heroes in the film. Shekhar Kapur will have none of that, still. Pretty much like his coming-of-age...

Bollywood takes to NYU

Dillagi, NYU's Bollywood-Hindi Film Dance team, was founded in the fall of 2010 by Mohit Chhatpar. Dillagi is a coed dance team that regularly performs in the city and has even traveled for competitions. The team performed at Hofstra University earlier this year.Next weekend, Dillagi will be traveling to Atlanta for a show called A-Town Showdown. This will be the first time the group travels outside the New York region for its biggest competition since the club was created."People will be competing with dance teams from all over the country," LSP freshman and Dillagi member Shaaranya Pillai said. "These types of national competitions are how you make your reputation and a name for yourself as a college Bollywood team."In preparation for the...

SRK: I feel like I'm the source of a Shakespearean farce

A day after Shah Rukh Khan is said to have roughed up the husband of his former best friend at a party thrown by actor Sanjay Dutt to celebrate the success of his film Agneepath, conflicting accounts are emerging from various eyewitnesses of what really happened at the posh Juhu lounge where many of Bollywood's A-listers were present.Both Shirish Kunder and Khan were nonchalant following the altercation. Khan made an indirect reference to it in a tweet and Kunder kept his sense of humour on Twitter despite nursing a swollen face. In a cryptic message on his Twitter page, Khan described the whole incident as a Shakespearean farce."Reading stuff and watching tv...Feel like I am the source & author of a Shakespearean farce...without the poetry...