An actor dies and often his family tries to keep the alive in the memories of his loved ones, well at least they try to, though I know of many stars who warned their families to never celebrate their birthdays after they were gone. Late Raaj Kumar warned his family to cremate him without a funeral. So did Dev Anand and he was fortunate to breathe his last in a hospital in London. On the other hand, Rinki Bhattacharya (daughter of legendary filmmaker Bimal Roy) has been hosting a film festival in honour of her father for decades now and Nandita Om Puri, widow of actor Om Puri is keen that people remember Om Puri so in collaboration with her son Ishaan has launched a foundation that will inspire activities all through the year.  

For Om Puri’s 70^th birthday Nandita has launched her own channel on YouTube channel aptly titled ‘Puri Baatein’ dedicated to the actor, his films and beyond.  “The idea is to celebrate him globally and host retrospectives of his films in India, Cannes, London and more”. It is a terrific idea but not as easy to keep it going but then knowing Nandita everything is possible.

Shootings have resumed full time and actors are facing the spotlight again. Most of them are shooting all over India and some have left for foreign locations too. Pooja Entertainment was the first to set the ball rolling, the first to and dissolve fear among the actors. It all started when producer Jacky Bhagnani came up with the idea of shooting Bellbottom in Scotland. Bhagnani hired a chartered flight to carry his crew to location. Everyone was given a COVID test followed by a two-week quarantine and since most of them were traveling with a companion (Akshay Kumar, Deepshikha and Lara Dutta were with their families), everyone was comfortable with the break.

When shooting resumed Akshay Kumar suggested longer hours at work and everyone agreed as a result, the unit packed up before time, now this is what I call a smart producer.

For years, filmmaker Subhash Ghai celebrated his banner Mukta Arts anniversary with a lavish party and a new film announcement.  That is how Viddhaata, Hero, Meri Jung, Ram Lakhan, Khalnayak and more were launched.  As decades went by and as Mukta Arts expanded to include Whistling Woods Film School, distribution and exhibition of films, his focus on directing movies reduced but after a long break, Ghai kept up to his promise of announcing three new films with Zee Studio on his banner anniversary which they promise to release in 2021. Now that is a big leap for a banner that has been relatively out of action for a while.

Diwali is round the corner and considering the difficult times we are going through; it is amazing that three important films are gearing up for a festive opening. The most important and controversial of course is Akshay Kumar’s Laxmi (censor board has asked the producer to drop ‘bomb’ from the title), the second is T Series produced and Anurag Basu directed Ludo featuring Abhishek Bachchan and Aditya Roy Kapoor.  

The third, on a more modest budget is Zee Studios Suraj Pe Mangal Bhari helmed by director Abhishek Sharma starring super talented Manoj Bajpayee, Diljit Dosanjh and Fatima Sana Shaikh tells the story of a wedding detective agency which runs background checks on prospective groom.

The trailer reveals Bajpayee playing multiple roles from a beggar, a dabbawala to a Maharashtrian woman in a nauvari saree. The producer has released a behind – the – scenes video sharing the prosthetic process.

It is amazing how much cinema how much cinema has changed over the decades. Once upon a time, the old guards said that a film is made on two tables – the writing table and the editing table, today, a third table has been added to the making of a blockbuster- the marketing table that can build and break a film or a star!!

Sometimes, the simplest decisions taken out of instinct get blown out of proportion as it happened with Akshay Kumar’s trailer of forthcoming film Laxmmi Bomb. The actor and the director were viciously attacked by detractors on twitter. To clear out all the negative clutter Tamil director Raghava Lawrence sheds light on the back story of his film,
“People are raising objection to my changing the original title ‘Kanchana’ to ‘Laxmi Bomb’. I mean shouldn’t it be my choice? The Tamil film was named after the lead character Kanchana which means ‘gold’ but we felt that Laxmmi will be more appropriate for the Hindi speaking audience and because the film was releasing during Diwali time, we added Bomb to it… “
“Anyone who has seen the original, will tell you that the film has a strong social message. It is inspired from a true story. I have been running a Trust that aids underprivileged and one day, a group of transgenders approached us for aid.
“They told me their story, it was so moving and I was inspired to make a film. When Kanchana released down South, the transgender community came home to bless me. So, my request to all is that please don’t speculate before watching the film.”

Boman Irani is not just a terrific actor, motivation speaker but also a terrific singer as well. The 3 Idiots actor sang ‘Over the Rainbow’, originally sung by Judy Garland from the film, The Wizard of Oz and joined by a choir of talented girls.

Boman says, “I discovered the choir on social media and was bowled over by their talent. I desperately wanted to sing with them and connected with them. In the meantime, I requested budding artists of my Akansha Foundation to send me pictures of their paintings so that we have images to depict the classic song that has filled many with hope and the result was magic. Sometimes, the best things that happen are unplanned”.
To be continued…

All the superstars love to work with director Rohit Shetty who has a reputation of churning out blockbusters and there has never been a time in all these years (except pandemic) when Shetty has been on a break. Good news is that Shetty is back to his office, planning his next with who else but Ranveer Singh. After the massive success of Simmba and yet to release Sooryavanshi, Cirkus will mark the third outing of Shetty and Singh together. Cirkus is set to go on floors next month and will be shot in Mumbai, Ooty, and Goa.

It is nice to see artistes coming out of their shell and getting into serious work mode. Composer, singer and lyricist, Amaal Mallik, man behind chartbusters like Kabir Singh, M S Dhoni The Untold Story, Airlift and Kapoor & Sons, is all set to make his pop debut and his fans are waiting.
To be continued…

For too long now, everyone has been under a pall of gloom but now it seems the mood is changing. Actors have begun shooting and are planning promotions of new films. The first good news came when Yash Raj Films released their golden jubilee logo followed by the news that the latest statue to join Leicester Square’s ‘Scenes in the Square’ will be of Shah Rukh Khan and Kajol thus marking the 25th anniversary of Indian cinema’s most loved film, DDLJ, coinciding with 50 years of Yash Raj Films.

DDLJ is the longest running film in all of India, made on a modest budget of 4 crore in 1995, collected 89 crores in India, 13.50 crore in overseas markets. Thus, total collections stood at 102.50 crore worldwide in 1995! In today’s inflation adjusted value, DDLJ’s collection stands at a staggering 455 crore in India and 69 crores in overseas territories, taking the total worldwide collections to a phenomenal 524 crores!
To be continued…

For an actor identified all time with anger, Raudra Rassa does not need any elaboration, but what made these roles special is that Bachchan expressed anger differently every single time. He mixed emotion with anger in Zanjeer, in Namak Haram the rage came out of his ego and in Agneepath it was disdain disguised as detachment.

A prime example of Bhayanak Rassa/ Fear is when a timid Kallu transforms into the forbidding Kaalia to fight his oppressors. In Benaam, Bachchan is being threatened by the system but fights it to the finish.

And finally, Vibhasta Rassa, Vijay of Deewar nurses disgust for his father and society at large and that’s the reason he is drawn to crime. In Do Anjaane it is disgust that compels him to torture his wife and her friend. So many more roles need to be mentioned but there are no rasas to qualify them for instance where do you slot a Trishul where he battles with his illegitimate father, a Jurmana where he is consumed with guilt for his doing and Shakti where he cannot stop loving a father who he feels did not stand by him? The list is endless…
Concluded