KAUFMAN - "Or cramming in sex, or car chases, or guns. Or characters learning profound life lessons. Or characters growing or characters changing or characters learning to like each other or characters overcoming obstacles to succeed in the end. Y'know ? Movie shit."
Kaufman is sweating like crazy now. Valerie is quiet for a moment - from "Adaptation".
We are all about CINEMA. That movie shit.
NOTHING is sacred.
NOBODY is spared.
Because we talk about films, dammit.
Not your sex life.
Films, fests, unsung, indies, undiscovered - all that and some fun. If you have dope on anything related to cinema or you would like to share something, do write to us at moifightclub@gmail.com.
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Or how else do you explain this poster of Endhiran starring Rajnikanth and Aishwarya Rai. Have a look and comment if you can. We are speechless!
BTW, the Twitter team of Khelein Hum Jee Jaan Sey have been desperately doing some countdown to release one more still from the film. Yes, we are blessed with one more still! If you are interested take a look at this drab pic. Abhishek Bachchan, Deepika Padukone, Sikandar Kher and others! So, it seems both are in Time Machine. One goes futuristic and the other rewind! Badhiya hai!
PS – Thnx to Chintan Shah for the Robot pic alert.
Aha, this seems like the perfect pitch for its theatrical release in India. We love it, except the title font and its colour, which looks little bland in the middle of all that chaos. For us, its “days of being wild & pains of growing up” and the poster seems to have captured that.
The lead actor is Rajat Barmecha, who looks a lot like Imran Khan and acts million times better than him. For our review of Udaan click here, for Vikramaditya Motwane & Anurag Kashyap’s video interviews here, for earlier poster/pics/synopsis of the film here and for all the Cannes jazz here.
Yes, she is very much alive! In Hollywood, as she claims! And in just few months has even managed to put a fake accent. We will come to that later. BTW, first look of Mallika Sherawat’s s0-called Hollywood film is out. Have a look. Its called Love, Barack.
The film is directed by William Dear. Mallika Sherawat plays Aretha Gupta, a devoted local Obama volunteer coordinator. And a month before the election day, Democrat Aretha unexpectedly falls for her Republican counterpart (Alonso),a handsome, dynamic African-American working for the local McCain office.
And coming back to her accent, click on the play button and enjoy! She was at Cannes for her film Hisss’ promotion. Interview by NDTV’s Anupama Chopra.
Yes! F-I-N-A-L-L-Y! Aur mere aankhon me khushi ke aanson aa gaye! Great for him and good for us becuase we cant take any more flooded timelines with his Paani tweets!
It was offcially announced at the ongoing Cannes Film Festival where Shekhar Kapur is on jury. Click here to read the full report by The Hollywood Reporter or scroll down if you are interested in knowing only the key points that matter. Plus pic and a video attached.
– Shekhar Kapur will direct “Paani” (Water) and the script is by David Farr.
– The budget of the film is $30 million and is produced by Swarovski Entertainment and Adlabs founder-turned-producer Manmohan Shetty.
– Kapur plans to shoot in November with additional backing from Walk Water in Singapore, Dubai and on large purpose-built sets being designed by John Myrhe.
– The project also marks the first full-length feature backed by Swarovski’s start-up entertainment arm.
– A R Rahman is on board as the music director and has already composed two songs for the project.
– Its a love story set in a mega city in a future where precious H2O has all but run out and corporations go to war over its control. The city is divided into two conflicting halves, in which the upper city hoards all the water and drip feeds the slums of the lower city. A girl from the upper tier meets a water rat boy and falls in love against this backdrop.
– “Blue Covenant” author Maude Barlowe is aboard and hopes Kapur’s film will play a part in taking awareness to a whole new level. Danny Boyle will also get producer’s credit.
The first look of Milan Luthria’s film Once Upon A Time In Mumbai is out. Its produced by Ektaa Kapoor and stars Ajay Devgan, Emraan Hashmi, Kangna Ranaut and Prachi Desai. Its based on Mumbai’s underworld of 70′s. Ajay’s character is based on Haji Mastan and Emraan will play Dawood Ibrahim. With benchmarks like Satya & Company, not sure if we need any more 70′s gangster story! But the posters do look impressive!
Yes, we were missing in action. The excuses are many and they are all so silly. Here we are back and with an exclusive! The first look of Vikramaditya Motwane’s debut film Udaan! Plus some more! The film is in the official selection list of Cannes Film Festival (Un Certain Regard Section) 2010. Have a look.
Also, here is the official synopsis of the film….
After being abandoned for eight straight years in boarding school, Rohan returns to the small industrial town of Jamshedpur and finds himself closeted with an authoritarian father and a younger half brother who he didn’t even know existed. Forced to work in his father’s steel factory and study engineering against his wishes, he tries to forge his own life out of his given circumstances and pursue his dream of being a writer.
The film is written by Vikramaditya Motwane & Anurag Kashyap. Its produced by Anurag Kashyap & Sanjay Singh. Strangely, UTV rejected the script twice earlier but came on board as soon as the film got the Cannes stamp! Not surprising that they produced “Chance Pe Dance”! It has music by Amit Trivedi and lyricist is Amitabh Bhattacharya. The main cast includes Rajat Barmecha, Ronit Roy, Aayan Boradia and Ram Kapoor.
First look of two new films are out. Priyadarshan’s Bumm Bumm Bole and Mahesh Manjrekar’s City Of Gold. Have a look.
Bumm Bumm Bole is an official adaptation of Majid Majidi’s acclaimed film Children Of Heaven. Its produced by Percept Picture Company and stars Darsheel safary. The Remake Master continues remaking.
Mahesh Manjrekar’s City Of Gold is set in Mumbai’s mills era. Here is the official synopsis of the film…
Today, there is hardly anyone who hasn’t visited the swanky shopping malls, nightclubs, lounge bars, clubs and other such lifestyle destinations that sprung up across the centre of Mumbai. However, very few know that buried deep below these glittering edifices to consumerism lies the dark, dirty and painful reality of many thousands of mill workers who once worked the cotton mills in this very same area. Rising and toiling to the wail of the mill sirens each and every day, seven days a week, these workers embodied the true unbridled zeal and unflagging spirit of the city and played a pivotal role in the evolution of Mumbai as the modern day business capital of India.
And then it suddenly was as if they never existed. Following the mill workers strike in the mid-80s, these mills began closing down rapidly and the mill-workers mysteriously disappeared. What happened to them, and where they went is one of the most shameful secrets that the city of Mumbai will have to bear for generations, one that until now has always been spoken about in hushed whispers.
City of Gold – the story of these long-forgotten masses – not only explores the apathy of these mill workers narrated through the story of one such family, but is also a take-no-prisoners account of the birth of the true underbelly of organized crime in Mumbai.
The film traces the birth of the politics of greed in Mumbai and exposes the unholy collusion between the triumvirate of big business, the political establishment and the trade union leaders who ostensibly were charged with protecting the rights of the mill workers. In the two decades that followed, the entire landscape of Central Mumbai was changed forever. Land became the currency of growth, and this began the systematic extinction of mills in Mumbai. In a matter of just a few years, hundreds of thousands of workers lost their means of livelihood. Having worked in these mills from generation to generation, this was the only vocation that they knew.
Many left Mumbai and went back to their ancestral homes, some others chose to stay back and fight what they soon realised was a losing battle, some took the extreme step of ending their miserable lives, and still some others took to a world of crime.
Truth… as is said, is stranger than fiction. But the truth that the film uncovers is not just stranger but darker and dirtier than any mind has ever imagined. Produced by DAR Motion Pictures and from the Director of dark and realistic films like Vaastav – Mr Mahesh Manjrekar, ‘City of Gold’ takes another trip down memory lane…. just that this time around the result is a much more heart wrenching, soul stirring and shocking film about human avarice and apathy.
The film doesn’t provide any direct solutions. Yet it shatters many a myth and raises many a question which only the passage of time will provide answers to.
To know more about the film, click here for the official website.
First it was Madhuri Dixit and now its Kartik Krishnan. Rarely do people manage to get a film title based on their name. No, we dont want to count Ramu here. Thats for another day.
The 70 min film has been directed by Srinivas Sunderrajan. The cast includes Kartik Krishnan, Vishwesh K, Swara Bhaskar and D Santosh. Its shot by Hashim Badani and is written by Srinivas Sunderrajan & Vijesh Rajan. While trying to pitch his feature, Srini has been told by few that tu toh bachcha dikhta hai (which he does. 26 ka hai bus!), abhi film kya direct karega. Well, now he can throw the dvd on their face.
So while we wrote blogs, spread goss, struggled with writing and did tweet-twat, the bachchas got together and shot this film in less than 70k. Its been shot on Sony HDV Z1 in 30 days over a period of one year. And there are more twists in its making than in the film. Read on.
Many of you must have already seen the trailer. If not, click on the play button.
Over to KK.
Flashback
The 1st draft of the script was ready and emailed to me on Feb 20th 2009 by the director and my friend Srinivas Sunderrajan with a instruction in CAPS saying ‘BANIYAN KHAREED” (helpful in attaching the lapel mike to the actor). We begin the actor rehearsals. The screenplay is in place but no dialogues. “Why?” I asked. “Because I want to improvise it”
Preparations
When the Locations would be available for say a Saturday, the actors would meet on a Wednesday for a reading and rehearse under Srinivas’ instructions. If some interesting lines came about in the reading, they would be kept. A framework would be developed with the actors being given a free hand to fill in the meat. No sticking to lines, but simply improvising, but being in the scene, being in character.
Shoot begins
All wide shots, long takes. Minimal cut-aways. Not necessarily adhering to traditional style shooting of covering a scene from all angles. Also this was done because we used to get the location for not more than 2 hours (read: Location). And there used to be at least 4 scenes (average) per location. The lapel mike works sometimes, and sometimes you have to keep the battery cover pressed down for it to work. So someone off-screen would do that (Mostly the director himself)!
Slowly it is falling into place.
Crew
Barring the actors, there used to be max. 3 people on the set – Srinivas (director), Hashim (Camera), and sometimes a friend to just help us out. But most of the time, it used to be just the two of them. Some locations, had one guy for lights.
We are our own costume designers, makeup men, location in-charge, food & catering. We lose our cool most of the times due to the high level of multi-tasking, but Srinivas’ level headedness kept us going. All actors/crew (except Srinivas) having day jobs and other assignments, postponing a day of shoot meant waiting at least for a week for the same location & all our dates to match.
Locations
There were 4 main locations in the film – KK’s flat, KK’s Office, Drinks Bar, Coffee shop. Coffee shop turned out to be an expensive affair so we had to settle in for a “sweet mart” which also had seating space for customers. With the help of Srinivas’ friend, we barged into one and finished two huge scenes in a span of 2 hours and before the owners could even realize what was happening – we vacated the premise.
For the drinks bar location, we had to visit the bar a couple of times, befriend the waiters, and then bribe them into letting us into the place to shoot early in the morning. So basically, 5am shifts wherein we used to enter the location via the backdoor, and then complete shoot before 9am because that’s when the main owner opens the front door shutter! We again had 3 long scenes at this venue and so we had to re-visit the location twice till Srinivas got everything he wanted.
KK’s flat was the cinematographer Hashim’s grandmother’s flat in Mohd.Ali road. Hashim had to basically trick the building people into saying that it was a student film and Srinivas’ ‘I’m still in college/school’ look came in handy! It was the most difficult location because the house was very near to the JJ Flyover and the sound pollution levels were maximum. To top it all, the house was on a slant so we had to basically balance ourselves while delivering our lines.
Intermission point
60% of the scenes are shot at this location in Mohd. Ali Road. The location is crucial because that’s the house of the protagonist, Kartik Krishnan.
Due to some major ‘postponements’ and ‘date issues’, we could not finish the 40% as pre-decided. Srinivas, by now, has spent half his year trying to get us all under one roof for a very crucial scene of the film – the ‘film shoot sequence’. Just when things try to brighten up, a call from Srinivas – “One section of the 3rd floor (our shooting floor) falls onto the 2nd floor. The building has been cordoned off by BMC and will be broken down in the next 6 days”.
We’re in a fix – Whether to risk our lives and finish the 40% in those 6 days or just figure out another location. Risking life seems stupid but the only “indie solution” here! Srinivas is in two minds about the whole film now since any other location would break the whole flow-chart.
Time lapse clouds
I don’t hear from Srinivas for quite sometime. I guess no one from the crew has any news about him or the film. What to do when you have completed close to 60% of the film and a location in continuity is unavailable and you have a completely absconding director? Drink booze? We do. Luckily our director is a tee-teetotaler (edit: And still is!)
Few months later
I’ve moved on to a new job. Also to a newer house. I get a call from Srinivas saying “I’ve cut a scene from the film – do you want to take a look?” Hell yeah!
Srinivas comes home and shows me the first interaction scene between Kartik Krishnan and Srinivas Sunderrajan. I like it. He seems positive of finishing the film – we talk about my dates etc. Things look bright.
A few days later, another phone call from him. “Dates clashing”, “Crew unavailable”, “Life moves on!”
Welcome 2010, bye 2009
Fresh look. Use the existing footage. Shoot something else. Build a new story around it. See if it works. It does. So it seems. But not all actors are available. REWRITE according to the available resources. Film becomes something else.
“I’ve got an idea to finish the film without involving everyone. I’ve already edited the film and written a rough script for the new version. You game?” – Srinivas
Shoot begins – again
Early morning 4am in local trains. 10 am versova beach. 11.30 local train to panvel. My house. Montage shots. Stock shots. B-rolls. Painful edit process.
Shoot complete
Post production which was simultaneously happening, now needs to be addressed single mindedly. Does it all fit? Does it hold attention? Does the new story work? Is the VFX looking tacky? Inhibitions and doubts.
Screening for the cast
I saw it twice the same night. Seemed to hold. Long Takes kind of work. Don’t know what the audience will say.
CUT TO – PRESENT Some talk about the festivals. Undecided. We are trying to spread the word. FB, twitter, mails. We’re hoping the film finds its own course.
This is the first look of Badmaash Company. Its produced by Yashraj Films, written and directed by Parmeet Sethi. The film stars Shahid Kapoor and Anushka Sharma. The other actors on the poster are Meiyang Chang and Vir Das.
According to official release, Badmaas Company is an extraordinary story set in the 90’s in middle class Mumbai of four young friends who get together to start a company. Their business is an instant hit because they find a way to beat the system. Rocket Singh Redux ? Will keep you posted as soon as you get to know.
F.i.g.h.t C.l.u.b 