The New Generation of Movie Posters

This is what it eventually comes to. When Om Shanti Om was released, some of the posters looked like they had been painted in the old style. But the producers were taking no chances with the likenesses of Shah Rukh Khan and Deepika Padukone. The posters were generated by a computer programme. This meant that the stars looked like stars but the poster was made to look like they had been painted by hand.

When we went looking for the men who had painted cinema hoardings and posters, the watchman at one of the housing societies was slightly puzzled.

Balkrishna L Vaidya however still paints posters from his shop in Dadar. There isn’t much demand now but the 74-year-old remembers the glory days when there were nearly 30 studios working in Mumbai.

“Up to 1993, the hoardings on the roads were the most important way to advertise films,” he says. “Today, everything comes out of a machine somewhere.” But Vaidya has found an international niche for himself.

“Hans, a young man from Switzerland, saw one of my posters at Opera House and loved the work. He tracked me down and although he spoke no Hindi or Marathi, he insisted on coming to learn the art of painting with me. He studied for three days and at the end of it, I gave him a poster to take back with him.

“I did not expect anything more from him but then he wrote me a letter asking me if I would come to Switzerland and give a demonstration of my work there. I went, not because I wanted the stipend, but only because I wanted to travel and I felt this would be a great way to see the world. I must have done something right because they enjoyed my presentation and every two years, I get to go abroad to Italy, to Austria, to Germany, to London, to show them how we used to do our hoardings,” he says.

A reflective pause and then, “We don’t seem to care as much about our culture as they do. There’s not much demand for our work in India but abroad, it’s different. They hang my posters in offices, in museums. My work is in the Victoria & Albert Museum, in a museum in Germany. But as for the streets of Mumbai? We live now on our memories.”

Courtesy of Hindustani Times

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Irrfan Wants to Cut SRK’s Hair

Director Priyadarshan has adapted the story from Lord Krishna’s friendship with Sudama. Billoo Barber is the story of two friends, one rich and the other a poor villager. While SRK plays the rich superstar, Irrfan is the village barber. The two are friends from school who grow up and drift apart until they meet again. Says Irrfan, “It’ll be a pleasure to work with Shah Rukh Khan. We haven’t shot together yet. But I must admit, I want to cut Shah Rukh’s hair in the film! I hope Priyadarshan adds a scene where I get to do so.”

If SRK will be seen romancing three hotties like Kareena Kapoor, Priyanka Chopra and Deepika Padukone, Irrfan has the lovely and sexy Lara Dutta as his wife. Tabu and Ameesha were earlier approached for the role, but Lara proved to be the lucky one. “I always fancied working with Lara. I knew she has great potential and needed a good director to bring it to the fore. She is very intelligent, pretty and has strong views,” he says.

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SRK In First Indian Musical

ShahRukh Khan, Deepika Padukone, Kareena Kapoor, Saif Ali Khan, Priyanka Chopra, Bipasha Basu, Karan Johar, Urmila Matonkar, Arjun Rampal and Rakhi Sawant will be a part of the Morani Brothers’ and Ashish Gidwani Productions’ first Bollywood musical, City of Dreams. It will premiere on June 13 at Mumbai’s St. Andrews Auditorium.

Based on the story of a small-town girl who comes to Mumbai with stars in her eyes to become an actress, the musical drama stars Nasreen Morani in the central role. The two-hour extravaganza boasts of larger-than-life sets and props and is jointly directed by Gautam Joglekar and Mohammed Morani.

All the stars will be seen as narrators in an audio-visual playing intermittently. Five more shows are lined up in Mumbai. “Such shows are very popular abroad and we wanted to introduce them in India too,” said Mohammed Morani.

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Deepika & SRK Together Again??

Deepika Padukone is now a contender to play romantic lead opposite Shah Rukh Khan in Aditya Chopra’s Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi, a romance between a 40-old-man and a 16-year-old girl that has an interesting twist in its climax.

Already in the fray for the lead role is Sonam Kapoor.

When Yash Raj Films announced their new project they indicated that the female protagonist would be a 16-year-old newcomer.

Following the announcement, the banner launched a massive talent hunt for the right combination of Punjabi looks and histrionic abilities, interviewing hundreds of girls in the process.

The only girl that came up to the mark was Simran, who was brought to Bombay, along with her family.

According to Hindustan Times, while training Simran to face the camera, Aditya had doubts about her ability to do justice to the role, prompting him to look for alternatives.

One young and talented Punjabi girl that the whole country already knew about was Sonam Kapoor.

Sonam’s father Anil Kapoor, himself a talented actor, was receptive to the idea, and several meetings later Sonam was on board.

It is not clear what prompted Aditya to bring Deepika, who already has her hands full with projects, into the fray. Sonam on the other hand has just finished filming for Dilli 6 and as no other projects on hand.

Pre-production work on the film, which will be shot in Greece, Australia and Dubai, has already started. Production is scheduled to begin in May for a release on December 12.

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Deepika Snubs Gauri

They say that sometimes fame can go to one’s head.

And one star who seems to have acquired some rather starry ways is Deepika Padukone. Flushed with the success of her film, Om Shanti Om, opposite Shah Rukh Khan, the young actress has been giving others associated with the film, the cold shoulder.

It started with the film’s director Farah Khan. Deepika simply forgot to wish Farah on her birthday.

Now, the latest to get the ‘treatment’ is Shah Rukh’s wife, Gauri Khan. The story goes that Deepika ignored Gauri, who produced OSO, at the recently concluded Lakme Fashion Week because she was too busy with her boyfriend Ranbir Kapoor’s mother, Neetu Singh. The two were cheering for Ranbir, who walked the ramp for designer Arjun Khanna.

“She did not even say hello to Gauri and completely ignored her,” a source, who was present at the event, told Gullu.

While Farah said she is used to this type of behaviour as she knows how the industry works, we do not know what Gauri thinks about it. Time will tell.

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Kareena and Deepika Dance With SRK

Kareena Kapoor and Deepika Padukone will be seen getting jiggy for a hot item number in Red Chillies Entertainment’s Billoo Barber with Shah Rukh Khan. Irrfan Khan plays the title role in the film directed by Priyadarshan.

Billoo Barber is an adaptation of the story of the Krishna-Sudama friendship and is said to be a remake of the superhit Malayalam film Kadha Parayaumbol.

Says a source close to Kareena, “Though Kareena and Shah Rukh haven’t done any films together; after Asoka and Don, their chemistry has been sizzling . Bebo is also very fond of SRK.

When Shah Rukh, who plays a superstar in Billoo Barber, asked her to perform to a song with him, she agreed. Kareena is keeping dates aside and will soon be shooting for the song by next week.

Deepika Padukone is also being pencilled in for the song with SRK.

Kareena and Deepika will be the two actresses playing themselves vying for Shah Rukh’s attention in the song.”

Billoo Barber is a story based on the friendship between two friends — one, a rich city slicker and the other, a poor villager. SRK plays a big star while Irrfan Khan plays a village barber.

The two are friends since their schooldays; who drifted apart only to meet years later. Tabu was initially considered for the lead opposite Irrfan but now Ameesha Patel has been signed on.

While Gulzar has penned the lyrics, the screenplay is by Mushtaq Sheikh and Manisha Korde.

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Shah Rukh to do Billoo Barber

SRK will soon start shooting for Priyadarshan’s film Billoo Barber. A Red Chillies Entertainment venture, the film also stars Irrfan Khan in the title role.

Billoo Barber is an adaptation of the story of friendship between Krishna and Sudama.

Our well-placed source from Red Chillies Entertainment says, “Billoo Barber is a story based on the relationship between Krishna and his childhood friend Sudama. Priyadarshan is adapting this story of friendship between two friends – one rich and the other a poor villager – in a completely new avatar. Here SRK represents Krishna, he plays an actor. On the other hand Irrfan Khan represents Sudama and plays a village barber. The two are friends from school who grow up and drift until they meet again.”

SRK will be seen romancing three different ladies including Kareena Kapoor, Priyanka Chopra and Deepika Padukone. He has already begun shooting with Kareena but is in talks with Deepika and Priyanka.

For the second female lead opposite Irrfan, Priyadarshan is scouting for a powerhouse performer, someone like Smita Patil. According to our source Ameesha Patel and Tabu are being considered for the second lead. Adds the source, “Shah Rukh will take the final decision about the cast.”

The lyrics are written by Gulzar and the screenplay is by Mushtaq Sheikh and Manisha Korde.

Billoo Barbar is Priyadarshan’s 75th film and is rather reluctant to let us in with more on the film He says, “It’s too early to give out details about Billoo Barber. Red Chillies will make an official announcement at the right time.”

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Katrina & Shah Rukh: King & Queen of Mobile Content

 

Bollywood stars Shah Rukh Khan (SRK) and Katrina Kaif are officially the king and queen of mobile content, according to findings of a new research undertaken by IMI Mobile, a value-added services provider for the telecom industry. Budget 2008-09

The study notes that Bollywood’s popularity is at an all-time high, and that actors Salman Khan, Hrithik Roshan, Akshay Kumar and Sanjay Dutt make it to the top five along with SRK, to become the five most downloaded movie stars in terms of mobile content. Deepika Padukone, Priyanka Chopra, Lara Dutta and Aishwarya Rai all feature along with Katrina in the top five female Bollywood actors.

The mobile content ranges from ringtones of a film’s big hits to graphics and wallpapers of the stars. The study was based on blockbuster movies of last year.

The Chief Executive Officer and Founder of IMI Mobile, Vishwanath Alluri, in a statement said India has the fastest growing mobile population in the world, which is projected to reach 400 million by 2010.

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OSO Sweeps Central European Bollywood Awards

 

Farah Khan’s second directorial venture ‘Om Shanti Om’ has swept the fifth Annual Central European Bollywood Awards (ACEB).

Voting for the awards began in January and continued till March 7. Votes outside central Europe were not counted, BNA-Germany said in a release Monday.

On March 8, the winners were announced in Munich at the second International Bollywood-Blogger meeting.

The awards are hosted by a leading Swiss website, molodezhnaja.ch, and central Europe’s discussion panel bollywoodforum.ch.

While ‘Om Shanti Om’ won the best film award, it got Khan the best director trophy as well. The film also won prizes for the best special effects, best art direction and best costumes.

Music director duo Vishal-Shekhar won the award for best music for the commercially acclaimed project, ‘Dastaan-e-Om Shanti Om…’.

Sonu Nigam was voted the best singer and newcomer Deepika Padukone walked away with the award for breakthrough role (female) category.

Shah Rukh Khan bagged the best actor award for his performance in ‘Chak De! India’. The blockbuster also won the awards for best cinematography and best editing.

Mani Ratnam’s ‘Guru’ won the best script trophy. The movie also got Shreya Ghoshal the best singer (female) award for the song ‘Barso re…’. For the same movie, Vidya Balan and Mithun Chakraborty bagged the ‘Best Actor in Supporting Roles’ awards in the female and male categories respectively.

Shahid Kapur and Kareena Kapoor who paired up in ‘Jab We Met’ were declared the Best Couple. Vikram Chatwal was conferred the award for breakthrough role (male) for ‘Honeymoon Travels Pvt. Ltd.’.

In the most disappointing film category director ‘Ram Gopal Varma Ki Aag’ left all other nominees behind.

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Pepsi SRK-less

 

Pepsi has come up with the sequel to its earlier Shah Rukh Khan, Ranbir Kapoor and Deepika starrer commercial. Apparently the sequel will have Ranbir and Deepika except King Khan.

The sequel has recently been shot in Mumbai’s Filmistan studio by Jab We Met fame filmmaker Imatiaz Ali. A unit hand informs us that the sequel will be a continuation of their first commercial. Though it’s a sequel, its concept is not going to be same. Imtiaz has shot with Ranbir and Deepika without SRK.”

It can be recalled that earlier John Abraham and Shah Rukh Khan played the role reversal in one of Pepsi’s commercial. The duo was seen in its sequel too. Coming back to Pepsi’s Youngistan …commercial, it stars this young and much talked about couple Ranbir and Deepika for the first time. Apparently SRK’s presence had created a star value to the earlier commercial. Will his absence able to attract youngsters? Let’s wait and watch!

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