È morto Sushant Singh Rajput

È di queste ore la notizia del decesso di Sushant Singh Rajput, 34 anni, il cui corpo senza vita è stato rinvenuto nel suo appartamento di Mumbai. La polizia ritiene si sia trattato di suicidio. Sembra che il giovane attore soffrisse di depressione. 

Zoya Akhtar: Everybody in my family has a National Award except me

Vi segnalo l'intervista concessa da Zoya Akhtar a Mayank Shekhar, pubblicata ieri da Mid-Day. Zoya Akhtar: Everybody in my family has a National Award except me:

'Little is known about her life up until her rather belated directorial debut at 36-plus, with Luck By Chance (2009), although she'd been working as a film professional for around 18 years before that. Very little worth knowing, Zoya casually reckons, jogging back to age 19, when she started interning for a copy-writer's job at a creative agency - simultaneously reading sociology at Bombay's St. Xavier's College. "I remember watching Salaam Bombay! (1988), being madly in love, and going: I want to direct. And I don't know what I'm going to make. Because Hindi films were not my scene then. Out of the blue, when I was about 21, I got a job with Mira Nair on [the sets of] Kamasutra (1996)." You can find her in a cameo appearance as one of the Kamasutra girls, "an extra part," as she puts it, because ADs are frequently expected to fill-in or add to the human backdrop on shoots. Of all her past associates, Mira as director appears to have left a strong impression on Zoya: "Mira is just special, you can see that. When she is talking to you, you are the only person in the world. She makes people feel special. She knows everybody on a crew by name. I love that about her. And I love her aesthetics."

Post Kamasutra, Zoya recalls, "I started working mainly on American projects that came to India. Went to NYU [New York University] for a diploma [in filmmaking]. Stayed back in New York. Got a job, thanks to Ismail Merchant, in a small, cool, indie film called Side Streets, directed by Tony Gerber." She returned to Bombay as a freelance, professional AD, of which there were only four in all of Bollywood, who did a lot of foreign films and Indian work: "Reema [Kagti], [director] Apoorva Lakhia, and me. Then Kiran Rao came in." Zoya's credits during this phase include Mahesh Mathai's Bhopal Express (1999) and Dev Benegal's Split Wide Open (1999). She chose to specialise in the casting department, because there, "you get to direct actors, with a script," and that's what she ever wanted to learn/master anyway. She was the casting director on Farhan [Akhtar]'s first film Dil Chahta Hai (DCH, 2001), and thereafter Armaan (2003), her mother Honey's directorial debut. Okay did she personally pick/cast that balloon-lover boyfriend in Dil Chahta Hai? "Oh that's actually Hassan, a childhood friend of Farhan. But we handpicked everyone, so to speak. There are very interesting cameos. Kiran Rao is one of the girlfriends in Goa. She'd come to do all the extras' casting for the film's Goa leg!"

Between freelance AD-ing, Zoya had been ideating all along for her debut feature. It's mildly ironic that while so cued into casting, she was unable to kick off her first film for want of a lead actor, for almost a decade that she'd been ready to direct. And the one she eventually cast for the lead role, in her directorial debut (Luck By Chance, 2009) was her brother, Farhan, who'd been around all along! "You cannot cast someone, unless they are ready. And feel that they want to do this. It took Farhan a while to get there - that he wants to act, and that he is a really good actor." While practically the entire Bollywood A-list came down for cameos in Luck By Chance, including both Shah Rukh Khan and Aamir Khan (guessing, for the first time in the same film, although not in the same frame), Farhan was the seventh star to read/consider/hear the script. Hrithik Roshan played the second lead. "Luck By Chance is a book that I am going to write one day, about how that film got made," Zoya sighs. Can't wait. It'd be quite a telling tinsel-town tale, given that nobody in Bombay does it. And Zoya is perfectly positioned to - not just as the quintessential insider, but as someone who can surprise you with her adorably random zaniness, on occasion. Recently at an interview she called herself the love-child of directors Karan Johar and Anurag Kashyap. What does that mean? "That I am halfway between Indie and commercial, you know." (...)

And while her films primarily deal with real, human, often raw emotions, there is this carefree cattiness that inevitably slips in too. It's only fair that we dig into a couple of stories behind some stellar, surprising choices she's made so far. For example, why/how/when did a ladies' bag, called Bagwati, bag a proper part in the breezy masterpiece Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara? "That comes from Reema and a close friend of ours, Shai Heredia, who's an academic, award-winning documentary filmmaker, and hysterically funny. She and Reema were on a road trip, and they kept talking to Shai's bag. Think they were just tripping! We just put it into Zindagi." It was Zoya's second film, with Farhan and Hrithik back on her frame, but in a much wider canvas, although the script started out in her head as a small, cathartic, road movie, about three boys in a car - for all the road trips she's taken in her life. Over time, of course, the script "developed a life of its own".

The film she co-wrote after was Reema's Talaash. It's a supernatural thriller that, by the way, was based on a true story, that happened to her! "You have to stop. I am going to be the crazy lady that goes on interviews and says all this shit. I know it sounds really crazy, and I don't want to be propagating this nonsense. But, I had a strange experience on Haji Ali, while a bunch of us were driving back from a nightclub. We thought we had hit a naked woman in the middle of the road. Everybody was freaking out. This is something I told Reema about, and where Talaash came from. I am not going to repeat this story, ever again!"

Okay how about the dog called Pluto, who's the narrator/POV of Dil Dhadakne Do; where does he come from? "From my super-smart, intelligent beagle Zen, who passed away last year. You can find him on my Insta page, Zen Akhtar. Zen would look at us as though he is watching National Geographic - that we are the animals, and he is like, 'What are they doing?' That's Pluto. Even the way the film is shot [as a result] is observational - there are no close ups, only 'wides'." After a preview screening for Aamir Khan and his wife, Kiran Rao, both of whom Zoya makes it a point to get a feedback from before her film's final cut, she asked Aamir if he'd like to voice the dog: "He was, like, after these many years, you have offered me the voice of a dog? I said, please do it. He was, like, yeah, totally! And he just came [on-board], like a sweetheart. It was great!"

Is there anything she'd like to change about Dil Dhadakne Do? "I think the title. Would have been nicer [if it had] a little more gravitas." How about the climax (that was rather OTT, compared to the rest of the film's tone)? "I actually liked the climax (of the mom, dad, sister jumping off the ship, with lifeboats to chase down brother/Ranveer Singh's character). The whole metaphor of the trip is that you can't get rid of anyone. Family is what you are stuck with. You can't just walk out the door. Eventually, when shit hits the fan, they are the only ones who will pull you up too. So when everyone tells me, I don't like the climax; I am like, cool, so what would you do? Till now nobody has given me a better ending. If there is one, I'd be like, damn!"

What did upset Zoya even before the release of Dil Dhadakne Do though was people taking the piss out of the picture for it being centred on lives of the super-privileged - intended also as a barb against movies that Zoya had directed thus far. "Firstly I don't think it was criticism. There is nothing for me to take home from it. It is like somebody seeing a trailer of Gully Boy and saying, oh, this is about poor people. And I made Made in Heaven, along with Gully Boy. And that is about very rich people! I was being interviewed by this woman wearing diamonds and solitaires, and she was telling me, it [the film] is about rich people. I was, like: Would it bother you, if your husband has an affair? Why? But you have solitaires on, it shouldn't bother you! What does it even mean?"

Before Gully Boy - set in a Mumbai slum and the city's underground rap scene - released, it got roundly compared to the American ghetto, hip-hop biopic, 8 Miles. Did that bother her? "The two people I spoke to [to base the film on their lives] are living here. You can talk to them. So, no, I didn't get into it. It bothered me, when they compared Zindagi to Hangover [producer Ritesh Sidhwani had to respond to Warner Bros]. Now, I think that's what they do."

Inspirations from dogs and spirits apart, what makes Zoya's filmmaking process special - given what we've managed to gauge so far - is she is capable of working backwards. Where she must know end, before she locks her script. Which isn't true for many filmmakers, who often arrive at the conclusion, as they navigate the story or characters' journeys: "I have to set a goal. That goal may change. But I when I set off, I have to know where I am taking the film. Otherwise I meander. I need a direction I am shooting at, you know!" The other thing is her complete clarity on the point she's trying to make - so much so that she can distill each film into a single line, which is different from a log-line that describes a plot: "Of course Gully Boy is about a Muslim kid from Dharavi, who expresses himself through rap. It is a rags-to-riches, coming-of-age story. You can pin it down in any log line. But at the core of it, the film is about class. Luck By Chance is really about self-esteem. Zindagi is about living, seizing the day. Dil Dhadakne Do is a film about projection - who we actually are, and what we tend to project. It is what lenses the film, creates the base".'

A brief history of Bella Ciao

Vi segnalo l'articolo A brief history of Bella Ciao (the song Shah Rukh Khan is so sick of) di Sankhayan Ghosh, pubblicato oggi da Film Companion:

'I heard it [Bella Ciao] (...) in the various Indian iterations, during the CAA/NRC protests [proteste contro il Citizenship Amendment Act]. In the #OccupyGateway gathering, one of the protestors stood and sang the new lyrics, written to fit the issue at hand, (...) and the others, seated, sang after him. (...)

Unsurprisingly, I am hearing Bella Ciao more and more without the context. Baba Sehgal has done one, called Kela Khao, so silly that you can't be offended by it. Ayushmann (...) Khurrana plays the tune on his piano. (...) Actress Kriti Kharbanda also attempted a piano cover and uploaded a video. (...) 

Then you had Shah Rukh Khan. (...) In his segment shot from home for a fundraising concert for the COVID-19 outbreak, Khan sang that he is sick of hearing Bella Ciao. (...) He meant it as one of the typically Quarantine things, equating it to activities such as working out and watching TV shows on streaming. Given the significance of the song - a symbol of common people speaking up against an oppressive regime - this appeared insensitive to some. (...) The lyrics for Khan were written by Badshah. (...)

Bollywood has been guilty of bastardising Bella Ciao even before it had become so popular in this part of the world. Lalit Pandit (of Jatin-Lalit) plagiarised the tune in "Love ki Ghanti" from the movie Besharam, starring Ranbir Kapoor. There is also a Telugu song called "Pilla Chao" from the Mahesh Babu film Businessman. They are cringeworthy'.

Video Wapas Jao (Bella Ciao Hindi Version), Poojan Sahil featuring CAA-NRC Protests, 23 dicembre 2019

Video Bella Ciao Hindi at #OccupyGateway #MumbaiWithJNU, 6 gennaio 2020

Video Bella Ciao piano cover by Ayushmann Khurrana & Kriti Kharbanda, 2 maggio 2020

(Non riesco a scovare in rete il video della versione interpretata da Shah Rukh Khan).

Aggiornamento del 26 agosto 2021: Netflix India propone Jaldi Aao!, versione di Bella Ciao rivisitata dal produttore musicale Nucleya e interpretata, fra gli altri, da Shruti Haasan, Anil Kapoor, Rana Daggubati, Radhika Apte e Vikrant Massey. Il video è stato realizzato per promuovere la quinta stagione della serie La casa di carta. Oggi The Hindu pubblica un'intervista concessa da Nucleya:

 

'Nucleya is all smiles as he gushes over Jaldi Aao: The Money Heist Fan Anthem, which he composed ahead of the new season of Spanish-language crime series La Casa De Papel or Money Heist dropping. The track and video (...) has picked up more than 5 million views since its August 23 upload on YouTube. (...) The anti-fascist protest song is from the early 20th Century, and is sung by Italians every year on April 25 to observe Liberation Day, the anniversary of the end of the Nazi occupation in 1945. Over the years through history, there have been many iterations. During the 2020 lockdowns, Italians took to the empty streets and their balconies, belting out the song as a collective and comforting experience, building upon its status as a revolutionary anthem. (...) It was important to Nucleya that Jaldi Aao retained that recognisable melody while adding various elements to it to make it more Indian audience-friendly. “That composition has that [revolutionary] feel to it because of the original song’s lyrics, but we wanted it to sound fresh. I think we did a pretty good job,” he laughs. (...) The rebooted song has a mix of Tamil, Hindi and Telugu lyrics and singing styles to suit the different Indian regional fanbases. As a composer, the core melody had to work with these new elements to make the song feel less forced. Nucleya explains, “The core structure and melody stay the same throughout but what changes is the voice, which gives Jaldi Aao the flavour it needs. For example, at the Tamil part, everything goes deeper with full South Indian drums, and towards the end of the video, there’s a scene where drums are played in the streets of Mumbai and it feels very Maharashtrian. The melody, though, stitches everything tight together”.'

Phaim Bhuiyan vince il David di Donatello

Phaim Bhuiyan vince il David di Donatello come miglior regista esordiente per il film Bangla. Alla pellicola era già stato conferito il Nastro d'Argento per la miglior commedia.

Vedi anche: Bangla - La serie, 12 aprile 2022.

Salman Rushdie: Quichotte

Quichotte, l'ultimo romanzo di Salman Rushdie, sarà distribuito nelle librerie italiane a partire dal 12 maggio 2020. Pubblica Arnoldo Mondadori Editore.

È morto Rishi Kapoor

A Mumbai questa mattina si è purtroppo spento Rishi Kapoor, figlio del leggendario attore e regista Raj Kapoor, e padre di Ranbir. 

(Nella fotografia, Rishi e la moglie Neetu Singh in vacanza in Italia nel 2019)

Red: le riprese in Italia

Lo scorso febbraio la troupe di Red era in Italia (Firenze, Viareggio, Toscana, lago di Garda, Dolomiti) per effettuare alcune riprese. Red, diretto da Kishore Tirumala e interpretato da Ram Pothineni e Malvika Sharma, è il remake in lingua telugu della pellicola tamil Thadam del 2019. Video dei brani Nuvve Nuvve e Mounanga Unna.

Firenze

Extraction: locandina e trailer

A partire dal prossimo 24 aprile Netflix proporrà il film d'azione Extraction, con Chris Hemsworth. Nel cast anche Randeep Hooda e Pankaj Tripathi. La versione italiana si intitola Tyler Rake. Trailer in italiano.

Family

Anche l'India è in lockdown. Ma non disperiamo: vi segnalo Family, un genialissimo cortometraggio interpretato - rigorosamente da casa - da un cast a dir poco stellare: Amitabh Bachchan, Rajinikanth, Mohanlal, Mammootty, Prosenjit Chatterjee, Chiranjeevi, Priyanka Chopra, Alia Bhatt, Ranbir Kapoor, Diljit Dosanjh.

Amitav Ghosh: "E adesso in India sprechiamo come qui da voi"

Vi segnalo l'intervista concessa da Amitav Ghosh a Edoardo Vigna, pubblicata dal Corriere della Sera il 30 marzo 2020. Amitav Ghosh: «E adesso in India sprechiamo come qui da voi»:

'Ora l’acqua alta non c’è più, e nessuno sembra interessato al problema per trovare una soluzione strutturale. Passata l’ansia, ci si gira dall’altra parte... Forse è umano, ed è un po’ ciò che succede con la crisi climatica. (...) Venezia, in particolare, dovrà accettare di convivere con l’acqua alta e le sue drammatiche conseguenze a lungo termine?

«Non è vero che nessuno parla dell’acqua alta, qui a Venezia. L’altra sera ero a cena in una trattoria, nel sestriere del Castello, e il proprietario mi ha portato a vedere fin dove è arrivata l’acqua a novembre. Per lui, e per tanti altri, è stata una catastrofe, anche dal punto di vista economico. Ma Venezia purtroppo, rappresenta in modo più ampio ciò che chiamo il “derangement”, lo sconvolgimento, il disordine del nostro tempo».

Cosa intende?

«Tutti sappiamo che questa città è una delle vittime potenziali del riscaldamento globale, se non riusciremo a fermarlo. Allo stesso tempo Venezia attira e vuole sempre più turisti, che rappresentano business e lavoro, e permette a gigantesche navi da crociera di arrivare fin nel cuore della città - cosa che considero terrificante per i danni che provoca alla laguna e all’intero ecosistema. Tutto ciò per me va al di là dell’immaginazione. Gli ecosistemi sono fragilissimi, e noi ormai lo sappiamo bene, eppure sembriamo non tenerne conto. Venezia cattura il “derangement” del nostro tempo anche in questo senso. Stavo poi passeggiando vicino alla basilica di Santa Maria della Salute, che è di fatto il più grande memoriale di una catastrofe che esista al mondo...».

Un ex voto alla Madonna eretto nel Seicento dai veneziani per la liberazione dalla peste che aveva decimato la popolazione nel 1630-31...

«Esatto. E pensavo: nessuno mai ha ipotizzato un ex voto contro l’acqua alta. Non siamo neppure capaci di realizzare quale tipo di disastro sta avvenendo al pianeta e a tutti noi. E una delle ragioni per cui accade è che nessuno può attribuirlo a un’entità superiore esterna a noi, a una astratta “Natura”. Siamo noi che lo stiamo causando, noi che lo stiamo facendo a noi stessi».

Lei ha scritto che gli alberi, come altri esseri non umani, parlano. Se la Terra potesse farlo, cosa ci direbbe? (...)

«La Terra ci sta già parlando, e in modo chiaro. Non è solo l’acqua alta, penso agli uragani, ai tornado... Voi dovreste saperlo più di altri. L’Italia è uno dei Paesi più colpiti al mondo dalla crisi climatica. Il vostro ecosistema è estremamente fragile. Guardi la Sicilia: uno degli effetti dei ribaltamenti climatici è che il deserto del Sahara si sta espandendo verso Nord, e forme di siccità colpiscono la vostra isola. L’acqua manca ormai anche nelle città, in più momenti durante la settimana. Ma nessuno ne parla: forse la Sicilia e i suoi problemi sono finiti ai margini del discorso pubblico italiano ed europeo. (...) È avvenuto di nuovo nel 2018 e nel 2019. Penso ai recenti incendi in Australia. In Italia è accaduto lo stesso: sono stato da poco in Puglia, a Lecce ho visto la distruzione degli ulivi per la Xylella. So che non è effetto diretto del climate change, ma in realtà c’è un collegamento. (...) Con l’Illuminismo abbiamo cominciato a pensare alle risorse del pianeta come a cose che usiamo e controlliamo. Oggi è chiaro che non controlliamo noi i combustibili fossili, sono loro che ci controllano: così profondamente connessi con la nostra vita ci manipolano. Nella storia, nella mitologia greca come in quella indiana, l’umanità ha sempre temuto il “drago sotto terra”: ecco cosa sono gli idrocarburi. E quando si sveglia il drago... Da questo deriva il caos in cui ci troviamo».

Lei ha distinto un approccio alle catastrofi climatiche “occidentale” e uno “orientale”.

«Sì, all’inizio del secolo scorso, c’era una differenza sostanziale nell’uso delle risorse naturali, nella gestione dell’economia, nel modo di affrontare i cataclismi. Un esempio per tutti: Gandhi si opponeva strenuamente all’economia industriale. Ma oggi quella distinzione non c’è più. Chi va in India, in Cina o in Estremo Oriente vede l’assoluta convergenza verso il consumismo e lo sfruttamento delle risorse come sono concepiti in Occidente. Il vostro pensiero è dominante in ogni senso. Questo è ciò che più di ogni cosa mi disturba».

In concreto cosa significa?

«Quando ero un bambino, a Calcutta, mi è stato insegnato a non sprecare mai niente. Non potevo uscire da una stanza senza spegnere la luce o il ventilatore. Mai. Sarei stato punito! Era una cosa davvero importante. Ora non c’è niente più di questo. È tutto finito. Gli indiani sprecano proprio come fate voi in Occidente. Elettricità, acqua... tutto. Mi ricordo la prima volta che sono andato in America, 33 anni fa, vedevo tutte quelle macchine per strada, ognuna con una sola persona dentro. Allora, in India era impensabile: in ogni auto c’erano almeno tre, quattro persone! (...) Ingenuamente pensavo: l’India non sarà mai così! Ma se va in qualsiasi città indiana vedrà che sono diventate come quelle americane».

Cosa è accaduto?

«Di base, con la caduta del Muro di Berlino, c’è stato il trionfo del neoliberalismo. E l’ideologia ha pervaso e convertito tutto e tutti. Ha conquistato le menti. Mi correggo: in India come in Cina c’è una parte della popolazione, contadini e fattori, coloro che hanno a che fare con la terra, che ancora hanno un approccio diverso al mondo, e questo vale anche in Italia e altrove. Sono le élites globali che la pensano diversamente. “Il popolo di Davos”. (...) Sono stato invitato a Davos due volte, una quindicina d’anni fa. Ci sono andato soprattutto per curiosità. Mi sono reso conto che le élites del mondo vanno davvero lì per dare un’occhiata nel futuro, cercare di capire i problemi, e stringere mani, perpetuando il proprio ruolo di élite. Ma lì ho capito che davvero non comprendono la vera portata di questo problema. Lo dissi, la seconda volta che ci andai. Non mi invitarono più... (...) La gente che va lì, i supermanager, i tycoon, i primi ministri, hanno una e una sola religione: la “crescita. Non conoscono nulla all’infuori di questa».

E non esiste nessuna possibilità di mettere insieme “crescita” e “ambiente”? (...)

«Ci sono stati molti tentativi di costruire una “crescita green”, ma nessuno mi sembra convincente. L’idea della “decrescita” è più facile da rendere compatibile, ma non vedo come i politici possano prenderla in considerazione. (...) In India come in Italia, un politico che si presentasse a dire: abbiamo avuto tanto, ora accontentiamoci per il bene del Pianeta, verrebbe bocciato». (...)

In fondo, se è già difficile portare i temi ambientali anche solo al cuore della letteratura...

«Molti scrittori l’hanno fatto. Il vero problema è che i loro lavori non vengono considerati come letteratura. Vengono bollati come fantascienza, come un genere a parte, mai come narrativa seria».

Lei perché ha deciso di farlo?

«Non avevo un piano... Il libro è partito come di solito fanno i libri. Ho attinto a tante cose che non avevo mai considerato, la storia è arrivata».'

Kabir Bedi: messaggi per l'Italia

Nelle scorse settimane Kabir Bedi ha postato nei suoi profili Twitter e Facebook diversi messaggi di solidarietà dedicati all'Italia. Ve ne segnalo solo alcuni: video del 23 marzo 2020, video del 03 aprile 2020, video dell'8 aprile 2020.

Kay Kay Menon: I come from the believable school of performances

Vi segnalo l'intervista concessa da Kay Kay Menon a Priyanka Roy, pubblicata da The Telegraph il 31 marzo 2020. I come from the believable school of performances: Kay Kay Menon:

'Special OPS is unanimously being praised for its plot and performances, even being hailed as a landmark in the Indian web space. Are you hearing similar things?

I can’t really recall anything specific, simply because the response has been so huge and so overwhelming. To pinpoint one is very, very difficult (laughs). The quantity of accolades has been too much. Overall, I am very humbled by the response. We knew that we had made a good series, but this kind of a response was unexpected. It’s a very pleasant feeling.

Himmat Singh is a great character to play in the way he’s written, flawed yet upright and invested with so many layers. Was there a trigger point that made you certain that you wanted to do the part?

I think the trigger point was Neeraj (Pandey) coming up with a series like this. We have known each other for a long time now... 16 years. So when Neeraj told me that he was doing Special OPS and wanted me to play the lead, I had no qualms in saying ‘yes’. It’s more of a trust thing, you know. After that, of course, I read the script entirely. I began from the first episode and I simply couldn’t put down the script till I finished it. I realised that this was tremendous writing, a tremendous screenplay, and all we needed to do was to execute it well.

You have played shades of Himmat Singh in various other characters in your films. What was the biggest challenge of playing a man whose gut and intentions are scrutinised and doubted at every step?

I don’t look at parts as challenges... I categorise them as interesting and uninteresting. The thing is that I play people, I don’t play roles. No two individuals are the same, but two roles can end up being the same. So, say I play Mahesh the cop and Suresh the cop, I will play Mahesh and Suresh as people and not as cops. In Special OPS, I played Himmat Singh, who is, as a person, different from Rakesh Maria (the real-life Mumbai top cop that Kay Kay played in Anurag Kashyap’s Black Friday). The institutional values are perhaps the same, but the individuals are different. I look at roles as being very limited and, of course, limiting. There are perhaps only about 25,000 roles... lawyer, cop, doctor, terrorist... whereas the kinds of people out there are limitless. For me, Himmat Singh was a person who not only had to maintain a balance between his home and work, but his real character comes through in how he handles himself and his professional life during the inquiry. He had to put across his point without disrespecting his seniors who are conducting the inquiry and that, for me, was interesting because one stands the danger of becoming slightly heroic in nature and then losing it all. That balance was tenuous but interesting for me as an actor.

When you play a person, do your core values have to resonate with that of the man you play or as an actor, are you open to being every kind of man on screen, even if their values are different from yours?

No, I have to strongly believe in every character I play, even if he is an evil person. You cannot carry your personal ego or values into a character. I have to surrender my ego completely and be loyal to who I am playing. Only when you do that, then the person you play becomes believable for the audience... otherwise you end up faking it. If you think you are playing a villain, then you start playing a villain. I know that’s the trend, but that’s not how it’s meant to be done (laughs). That’s why I tell people that when I am playing a villain, then between ‘Action’ and ‘Cut’ don’t mess with me... because I don’t know how I will react! (Laughs) Kay Kay Menon doesn’t exist at that time, it’s only that man I am playing. Basically, I come from the believable school of performances. If you have to make things believable on screen, then you have to be that person... there is no alternative or shorthand to that. That also allows the actor in me to improvise because I am completely driven by the person I am playing. It’s not Kay Kay Menon being smart. (...)

You’ve been in the business for 25 years now. Would you say this is the most exciting time in the Indian creative space, given the wide variety of roles being written and the presence of different platforms to tell one’s story?

I think so. I come from the time where there were no such opportunities... there was no Internet and hence no digital platforms (smiles). I see the young actors of today being given so many opportunities, which we didn’t have when we started out. It feels good to see that. Now, if you are on social media, you can become a star... if you have some talent, that is (laughs). I am glad that opportunities have opened up for this generation, be it artistes, writers, singers, everybody. It’s a good time because it also ensures that the standards go up because there is competition. At the same time, there is also the danger of diluting the quality. It happened with Indian television. It started off as a wonderful medium, we spoilt it... completely! We have to be careful not to do that with the web.

Is there a difference in how you pick your roles now as opposed to how it was a few years ago?

The medium doesn’t bother me... as long as the camera is there, I am fine. Apart from that, it’s difficult to pinpoint how I choose what I choose. It’s about the moment, you know... you read something, you like it, you fall in love with it and you want to do it. It’s simply the feeling of, ‘Okay, this needs to be done’. There is no clause or rule that I follow, it’s an overall subjective feeling. It’s a lot like love, for example. It’s something that you get attracted to at that point of time and say, ‘Let’s give it a try’. And many a time, it fails also... it’s not a foolproof method. I have failed more often than not, but you need to go in with that intent and positivity. (...)

Your Twitter timeline is dominated by fans saying how much they want to see more of you on screen. Has less always been more for you?

That’s not been a conscious decision. People tend to think that I have a plethora of offers at every point of time and that I am being choosy. I am choosy, of course, but that ‘plethora’ doesn’t exist (laughs). Of what’s offered to me, I skim through and do what appeals to me. The offers are definitely not as much as people assume them to be. Sometimes, the industry works in strange ways, I really can’t comment on that. But within the limits of what’s offered to me, I sort of pick enough stuff'.

Manoj Bajpayee: Professional life, even now, doesn't bother me much

Vi segnalo l'intervista concessa da Manoj Bajpayee a Mayank Shekhar, pubblicata da Mid-Day il 7 marzo 2020. Il testo include il video dell'intervista integrale. Manoj Bajpayee: Professional life, even now, doesn't bother me much:

'In a way, the journey of Bombay cinema's transition into millennial cool, late-90s/early-2000s onwards - what with even 'indies' beginning to merge with Bollywood mainstream - starts from a street in Delhi. It's officially named Sudhir Bose Marg, where colleges of Delhi University's (DU) North Campus are lined up one after another, on either side. If you survey this street late '80s onwards, you'd find Manoj Bajpayee enrolled in Ramjas College, fresh off a train from Bihar. Bajpayee says he also used to perform in plays at the next-door Hindu College. (...) When not representing university in cricket, Vishal Bhardwaj (from Meerut) would score music for those plays. "Rekha, Vishal's girlfriend [later his wife], was learning classical music." To the right of Shishir Bose Marg is Khalsa College, where Saurabh Shukla graduated from. To the left is Hansraj College, where Shah Rukh Khan was reading economics. Few years later, Imtiaz Ali (from Jamshedpur) founded Hindu College's dramatic society. At about the same time as Anurag Kashyap (originally from Benares), who was at Hansraj. "Oh there are just way too many people [to name]," Bajpayee trails off. (...)

The point for most of these DU students - who later made the move to Mumbai and cinema - wasn't quite to crack their final exam in history (Bajpayee), or zoology (Kashyap). It was firstly to gain access to the thriving theatre scene in the Capital. This is where Bajpayee co-founded the theatre company, Act One. It had, among others, Imtiaz Ali, (...) Piyush Mishra: "Shoojit Sircar used to design background music, and assist director. (...) Anubhav Sinha assisted [in direction], and was an important part of the circle." During the day Bajpayee trained under Barry John and his company Theatre Action Group (TAG), to secure a place in Delhi's National School of Drama - that ultimately rejected him four years in a row. It's at TAG that he first met Shah Rukh Khan: "No matter how talented we were, girls always flocked to Shah Rukh." Nothing's changed. "Shah Rukh (...) [era un] English theatre actor, (...) from privileged backgrounds in South Delhi," Bajpayee recalls. While everyone really made it on their own in Mumbai/Bollywood, with zero family connections, the one to scale the steepest climb is still likely to be Bajpayee. He was born into a farmer's family, with six siblings, raised in a village called Belwa in Bihar, bordering Nepal, where there wasn't even a local cinema, growing up. 

Besides, being Bihari meant a strong regional accent that he had to shed, in order to ready himself for multiple parts on stage/film: "If you're an actor, you can't be 'one type' in your real life - a Bihari, for instance. You should be able to play a Marathi, Punjabi... For many years, from my Hindi, many people couldn't figure out where I was from." What he worked on harder still is English. Which is just a language, yes, but it also denotes social access in India: "I always knew English is a tool to compete in this country; to fit in, and get your work done - even if I decide to work in the Hindi film industry. I didn't take it as a burden." It was quite common for Bihari students (nicknamed 'Harries') to land up in DU, to pursue courses in sciences and liberal arts, and take a shot at several entrance exams later - chiefly for the civil services. Bajpayee made sure he spent significantly more time with the few foreign students in his college, rather than the 'Harry gang': "The Kenyan/Nigerian guys would listen to my English, quietly, without judgment. Five hours of my day spent with them meant only speaking English, flat-out - gaining command/confidence over the language. Barry John, who took me under his wing, started giving me roles in English plays as well."

This interview is wholly in English. He's as fluent as it gets. This, he says, surprises his former flat-mates - a full-on 'English medium type' in particular, who'd make fun of him back in college. By the early '90s, having spent enough hours perfecting his diction, reading literature, watching plays, doing street theatre, exposing himself to arts and [alternate] cinema, what he calls the "best days of my life", Bajpayee began to 'belong' - to Delhi's intensely active stage scene. (...) This is the catchment area filmmaker Shekhar Kapur, along with his assistant and casting director Tigmanshu Dhulia, tapped into to cast for Bandit Queen (1994). Post its commercial success, the Bandit Queen 'alumni' pretty much migrated en masse to Mumbai. (...) "Seema Biswas got [the lead role with] Sanjay Leela Bhansali. (...) Saurabh Shukla in fact was the busiest..." And Bajpayee? Because his character Maan Singh in Bandit Queen didn't have many lines, despite strong screen presence, he remained relatively unnoticed. (...) What followed is four years of "no work, consequently no food," and life in a chawl. The primary talent he developed in these years, Bajpayee jokes, is an ability to time his entry into friends' homes - right at the moment when lunch was getting served; or a booze bottle was being cracked open! An important lesson that showbiz teaches most aspirants though, and something that Bajpayee appears to have imbibed as a personality trait, is the strength/perseverance to repeatedly face rejection, and calmly move on, before it breaks one's resolve/spirit. "I am basically dheeth [stubborn]," Bajpayee says more than once to describe himself. (...) 

The turning point in Bajpayee's career is obviously the iconic/immortalised 'Bhikhu Mhatre' from Ram Gopal Varma's Satya (1998). Varma, Bajpayee reckons, is the man who singularly altered the landscape of Lokhandwala, and indeed (mainstream) Hindi films. Varma was looking for writers for Satya. Bajpayee introduced him to Anurag Kashyap and Saurabh Shukla. Satya led to Varma's Kaun? (1999), also written by Kashyap, and a role that Bajpayee says he practically remodelled on the first day of shoot - turning Sameer Purnavale into a goofy bloke, rather than a serious fellow. Shool (1999), written by Kashyap as well, followed. Among Bajpayee's contributions to this lead part of a quiet cop, diametrically opposite to the boisterous Bhikhu, was the name Samar Pratap Singh. Samar was what Bajpayee wanted to officially change his own name to, but couldn't do paper-work for, before the release of Bandit Queen: "Everybody in Bihar is called Manoj." (...) Up until Chandraprakash Dwivedi's Pinjar (2003) that won Bajpayee his second National Award (first was for Satya), what you sense is an unlikely Bollywood star, on an enviable dream run, both at the box-office, and with critical acclaim. And then everything starts tumbling downhill thereafter - for seven frickin' years straight!

He had a fall-out with Varma, when the latter was at the top of his game: "I used to be angry, sensitive - not an easy person to deal with." Kashyap and he parted ways. He was going to both act in, and co-produce Kashyap's debut: "Anurag had mistakenly presumed that I wasn't interested in the role/film." He looks back at the fallow period, "Those weren't easy times. No work was coming [my way]. And whatever was, didn't match up to standards. Also, I was not keeping well." (...) Bajpayee's actual career graph effectively resembles a symmetrical ECG report, with extensive highs and lows, almost equally spaced out! He agrees, "I still call filmmakers for work, if I've enjoyed their recent film. The hardest part was to convince friends that I was still good enough. (...) When I reminisce [those times], I feel only I could've survived it. Because I don't take it to heart. The only thing that could break me is [upheaval on the] personal front. The professional life, even now, doesn't bother me much. Mumbai says it most beautifully, 'Yaar, load kyun leta hai [Why take stress?]'.

"TV crews that used to hound me started putting their cameras down, watching me enter events. I could hear the reporter, who wouldn't even lower his voice, instructing this to his crew. (...) And that happens with work. I was sure I was going to come back. But I needed a role. When I got Raajneeti, I knew this was it." (...) Raajneeti (2010), a major hit that Bajpayee, 51, admits resurrected his floundering résumé. (...) He earned matchless street-cred as Sardar Khan with Kashyap's masterpiece Gangs Of Wasseypur (2012). Kashyap and he are back to being friends. Of which he laughs, "Anurag is incredibly talented, but a loner. If you meet him for three days in a row, he starts hating you!" Further, his most challenging lead role in the current phase could well be as the Marathi, gay Professor Siras in Aligarh (2015): "A leading journalist had written about how actors' careers got ruined, once they played gay characters on screen. My career got made as a result." (...)

In 2019, Bajpayee stormed into mainstream web with Amazon Prime's smashing success, The Family Man, directed by Raj & DK, playing a spy Srikant Tiwari, who could be any other guy on a Mumbai street. As a basic brief, even that sounds a little lot like Bajpayee's breakout role in Satya: "Bhikhu Mhatre was the most real [gangster] that this country has ever seen on the big screen. He could be standing by a restaurant or a paan shop, and you wouldn't know he's a dreaded don. Which is true for people doing extraordinary things - they're extremely unassuming in day-to-day life. Srikant Tiwari has all the same elements, but we went a little further ahead in this realistic direction - he's even more casual, nervous, anxious [than Bhikhu]." If life/career must indeed be shaped into a circle, let's look at Bajpayee's last major film, Sonchiriya (2019) that (...) is set in the same time-frame and location (ravines of Chambal) as Bajpayee's debut, Bandit Queen. Like with his debut, Bajpayee appears as a quiet dacoit named Maan Singh. It's directed by Abhishek Chaubey (...) who, like his mentor (and Bajpayee's contemporary) Vishal Bhardwaj, went to Hindu College, from the same Sudhir Bose Marg in Delhi'.

Devi

Vi segnalo il cortometraggio Devi, diretto da Priyanka Banerjee, interpretato da Kajol, Neha Dhupia e Shruti Haasan.

Kareena Kapoor: messaggio per l'Italia

Lo scorso 23 marzo, Kareena Kapoor ha postato nel suo profilo Instagram la fotografia che vi propongo e un messaggio per l'Italia colpita dalla pandemia di COVID-19: 'Amore Italy. My love and I are praying for you all'.

Amitav Ghosh in Italia

Amitav Ghosh è in questi giorni in Italia. Il 29 gennaio era a Venezia, invitato dall'Università Ca' Foscari per partecipare all'Environmental Humanities Seminar and Lecture Series del Center for the Humanities and Social Change. Il 31 gennaio, sempre a Venezia, lo scrittore ha tenuto una conferenza dal titolo Imparare dal passato: i libri e il loro futuro in un’epoca di catastrofe, a chiusura del 37esimo Seminario di Perfezionamento della Scuola per Librai Umberto e Elisabetta Mauri. Oggi è stata la volta di Cortina d'Ampezzo, dove lo scrittore è stato ospite dell'evento Una Montagna di Libri. Video TGR Veneto.

Arati Kadav on taking her indie space film Cargo to the SXSW Film Festival

Vi segnalo l'intervista concessa dalla regista Arati Kadav a Suchin Mehrotra, pubblicata ieri da Film Companion. Arati Kadav on taking her indie space film Cargo to the SXSW Film Festival:

'[Cargo], which world premiered at the Jio MAMI Film Festival with Star last year, stars Vikrant Massey and Shweta Tripathi. A deceptively fascinating examination of connection and isolation, it follows a male astronaut with the morbid job of helping the recently deceased pass on to what's next, until a female astronaut is sent to assist him.

Cargo has such an inventive and innovative premise. Where did this concept come from?

I've been working in the sci-fi space for half a decade now and before Cargo I'd written a few sci-fi screenplays, so I was very sure this was the space I wanted to be in. But I also wanted to make a story that's very rooted in India and see how I could weave in our mythology. Before this, I was actually trying to tell a story about a bunch of superheroes coming together on a spaceship, but the budget was just blowing up so much that I decided to stick to the story of one guy in a spaceship. Then I thought about what profession to give him and then it all sort of fell into place. I loved the world-building and finding ways to connect our middle-class problems and lives to the story. (...)

When you were casting, were you ever worried about how actors would respond to it given it's so different to what Indian audiences have seen before?

What I really spoke to Shweta and Vikrant about was longing and departure. That's what I really wanted to convey with the film - that nobody ever truly leaves you. (...) And they're very intelligent actors so I really lucked out that they got what we were talking about and that this wasn't some spectacle sci-fi film, but more of an intimate drama.

Why do you feel sci-fi is something Hindi cinema has stayed away from?

All the big sci-fi films (...) are all from the same predominantly western school, which were all very successful so there was no reason to explore other sci-fi narratives. And now it's become such a big genre. But I think eastern sci-fi stories and fables reflect Indian society more and are more relatable to us. I think there were a lot of false starts for sci-fi in India. They all started by trying to make films that were from the West. I think they should explore different stories. There aren't many examples of sci-fi in India but something like Mr. India they got right because they made it with a lot of honesty. I think in India we don't experiment much. If one or two were to work, then everyone here would be making sci-fi films. I'm sure of that.

Is your dream to one day make the definitive large-scale Indian sci-fi film?

Yeah, that's my mission in life. People used to ask me why I only want to stick to sci-fi. But for me the mission in life is really to make magical stories. Every day I wake up and ask myself what magical story I can tell today.

The CGI to create the spaceship was very impressive. What went into getting that right? (...)

There was a lot of design thought that went into everything, from the which font should be used in the spaceship to getting each and every screen and panel in the spaceship right. I was also very clear that I wanted a retro sci-fi feel with the buttons and knobs. Even for the spaceship, the desing was very important. I wanted to make it like a jellyfish mechanism'.

FICCI Frames 2020

FICCI è la Federazione delle Camere di Commercio e Industria indiane. FICCI Frames è il convegno internazionale dedicato alle imprese che svolgono attività di intrattenimento più importante del continente asiatico. La 21esima edizione si svolgerà a Mumbai dal 18 al 20 marzo 2020. Il Paese partner sarà l'Italia. Al convegno parteciperanno delegati provenienti da tutto il mondo e personaggi noti del cinema, della politica, della televisione, della stampa, nonché rappresentanti di case di produzione occidentali. 

Aggiornamento del 14 novembre 2023: a causa della pandemia di COVID-19, l'evento era slittato al periodo 7-11 luglio 2020, e si era svolto interamente online. Alla manifestazione avevano aderito ventinove aziende e Film Commission italiane. Il nostro ambasciatore in India era stato invitato alla sessione inaugurale. In programma due seminari dedicati all'Italia: 

- Italia Country Focus - Collaborare con l’Italia: incentivi fiscali, fondi regionali e opportunità di coproduzione, a cui avevano partecipato, oltre all'ambasciatore, diversi funzionari di ANICA (incluso Francesco Rutelli), IFC Italian Film Commissions e Istituto Luce Cinecittà;

- conferenza focalizzata sulle opportunità di coproduzione nel settore dell'animazione. 

Autori vari: Avatar - Fantascienza indiana

Notizia favolosa. Future Fiction pubblica Avatar - Fantascienza indiana, un'antologia di nove racconti scritti da autori vari. Nel comunicato stampa si legge: 

'India, futuro prossimo: questi nove racconti, come fili protesi verso il domani, esplorano il variegato arazzo della narrativa di speculazione indiana, toccando temi come l’avvento della biopolitica, i collegamenti tra i nuovi (social) media e il linguaggio, l’ascesa inesorabile di Big Data e algoritmi, la diffusione delle stampanti 3D, il riscorso sempre maggiore a protesi e potenziamento umano, senza tralasciare i rischi connessi all’uso delle biotecnologie e della sorveglianza informatica, per finire con i dilemmi filosofici posti all’immortalità dalla presenza degli avatar virtuali e l’emergenza climatica nell’era dell’Antropocene. Per provare a comprendere le questioni più impellenti dei nostri tempi dobbiamo rivolgere lo sguardo al futuro'.

La lista dei racconti:

L’uomo senza quintessenza (The Man Without Quintessence) di Anil Menon

Microbiota e le masse: una storia d’amore (Microbiota and the Masses: A Love Story) di S.B. Divya

Comunitario (Communal) di Shikhandin

La rete di Indra (Indra's Web) di Vandana Singh

Sostituzione (Replacement) di Rimi B. Chatterjee

Upgrade di Manjula Padmanabhan

Madre (Mother) di Shovon Chowdhury

Messo in pausa (Paused) di Priya Sarukkai Chabria

La via della seta (The Silk Route) di Giti Chandra.

Vi segnalo l'articolo Avatar: la fantascienza indiana sbarca in Italia, di Pietro Ballio, pubblicato oggi da Fantascienza.com:

'In un dettagliato resoconto, il dr. Srinarahari, segretario generale dell’Indian Association for Science Fiction Studies di Bangalore, in India, spiega che la fantascienza, in questo paese, viene generalmente associata allo studio dell’impatto della scienza e della tecnologia sull’esistenza umana. Si tratta di una letteratura di rottura portata alla luce dalla creazione di avveniristici dispositivi tecnologici e di rivoluzionarie scoperte scientifiche. Un altro elemento chiave della science fiction made in India, precisa Srinarahari, è l’associazione della stessa a una serie di temi mitici, come lo spazio, il tempo, il viaggio verso terre lontane e i tentativi di prolungare la vita umana. Le origini di quella che può essere definita proto-fantascienza indiana possono essere rintracciate nella grande poesia ed epica indù: i Purana, il Ramayana e il Mahabharata, sono i testi più citati dagli studiosi come prodromi di questo genere letterario. La descrizione dei Pushpaka Vimana che trasportavano le persone in qualsiasi mondo in una frazione di secondo, la trasmissione in tempo reale di eventi bellici mediante futuristici device telepatici, i più disparati metodi per restituire la giovinezza e prolungare la durata della vita, sono ampiamente e vividamente descritti dagli antichi autori indiani.

La data di nascita della science fiction indiana contemporanea viene usualmente fatta risalire al 1897 con la pubblicazione di Palatak Toofan (La tempesta fuggita), la singolare storia di un mare burrascoso placato da una comune goccia d’olio che potrebbe aver dato impulso alla successiva diffusione della teoria, fisico matematica, del caos. Già in precedenza, tra il 1884 e il 1888, era comparso sulla rivista Peeyush Pravah, il romanzo a puntate Aschary Vrittant (Lo strano racconto). Probabilmente influenzato dagli avventurosi romanzi di Jules Verne, l’autore Ambika Dutt Vyas narra l’affascinante viaggio di Gopinath sotto la superficie terrestre.

In realtà il fenomeno letterario fantascientifico indiano è piuttosto diversificato e si ramifica nelle numerose lingue parlate nel subcontinente e non solo. Si avrà, quindi, una science fiction in hindi, una in tamil, un’altra in bengalese, un’altra ancora in telugu e così via. Negli ultimi anni sta riscuotendo un ottimo successo internazionale la fantascienza scritta, in inglese, da autori di origine o nazionalità indiana, ma residenti all’estero, tanto che alcuni critici autoctoni si stanno domandando se, in questi casi, si possa ancora parlare di science fiction made in India.

La casa editrice Future Fiction, che si prefigge la missione di conservare la biodiversità narrativa del futuro a livello globale, presenta una nuova antologia di fantascienza contemporanea indiana. Una serie notevole di racconti degli autori più promettenti, alcuni dei quali già presenti nel suo catalogo. Tra i titoli disponibili, Entaglement di Vandana Sigh, una climate fiction che unisce all’accuratezza scientifica la narrativa postcoloniale di fantascienza e Runtime di S.B. Divya, finalista al premio Nebula 2016, la storia di un folle futuro cibernetico, né utopia né distopia, dove ricchi cercatori di brividi si sfidano sulle montagne della Sierra Nevada. Tarun K. Saint, che con Francesco Verso ha curato la raccolta, qualche mese orsono ha dato alle stampe, per l’editore Gollancz/Hachette India e con la prefazione di Manjula Padmanabhan, un florilegio di racconti in lingua inglese, The Gollancz Book of South Asian Science Fiction, che riunisce alcune delle menti più creative della letteratura indiana contemporanea ed offre nuove prospettive sul nostro mondo iperglobalizzato, alienante e paranoico, in cui l’umanità e l’amore possono ancora trionfare.

In Avatar: antologia di fantascienza contemporanea indiana è presente una selezione dei migliori testi del genere, sia di scrittori affermati che emergenti, i quali esaminano i problemi urgenti del nostro tempo, dall’informatica alla tecnocultura, dalla biopolitica alla biotecnologia. In questa raccolta, perciò, non verranno trattati i temi classici della fantascienza come il viaggio nel tempo o la colonizzazione dello spazio, ma argomenti di estrema attualità che ci spingeranno a riflettere sul nostro futuro prossimo e sulle responsabilità dell’uomo verso i suoi simili e nei confronti del pianeta che abita'.

Anil e Sonam Kapoor in Italia

Anil e Sonam Kapoor sono attualmente in vacanza a Roma con la famiglia. Sonam ha più volte dichiarato che la nostra magnifica capitale è la sua città estera preferita.

A definitive recap of Bollywood over the last decade

Oggi The Hindu pubblica una lista degli eventi salienti che hanno contrassegnato l'industria hindi nella decade 2000-2009. Si spazia dal centenario del cinema indiano, al 50esimo compleanno del regale triumvirato dei Khan, all'ascesa di Ranveer Singh e del favoloso trio Kaushal / Khurrana / Rao. E poi la svolta sociale e patriotica di Akshay Kumar, il successo delle pellicole nazionaliste, il movimento #MeToo, i titoli al femminile che hanno sbancato il botteghino, il clamoroso trionfo della saga di Baahubali anche in versione hindi, i film d'autore e non che hanno toccato temi delicati come l'omosessualità, la polemica sul nepotismo, l'ingresso in scena dei figli d'arte, il ritorno aggressivo dell'entroterra indiano come location, l'avvento delle piattaforme di streaming, la potenza promozionale dei social, e, purtroppo, i decessi illustri. A definitive recap of Bollywood over the last decade, Namrata Joshi.

Bheeshma: le riprese in Italia

La troupe del film in lingua telugu Bheeshma è in Italia per effettuare alcune riprese. Bheeshma è diretto da Venky Kudumula e interpretato da Rashmika Mandanna e Nithiin. Nei giorni scorsi i set sono stati allestiti a Minori e a Maiori, in Costiera Amalfitana. Alcune sequenze verranno girate a Bari (Lungomare San Girolamo), Alberobello, Positano, Ravello e forse anche a Roma. 

Aggiornamento del 26 dicembre 2019: a Positano, Nithiin e Rashmika reinterpretano Ghungroo (video).

Aggiornamento del 13 maggio 2020: 

- video dei brani Super Cute e Hey Choosa.

- Rashmika racconta a The Hindu le sue disavventure veneziane: l'attrice, durante il soggiorno nel nostro Paese, decide di concedersi una vacanza a Venezia e viaggia in treno da Roma a Venezia, ma scende alla fermata sbagliata. Non riesce a prendere un traghetto perché non incontra persone che parlino inglese, e raggiunge il suo albergo alle due del mattino. When Rashmika Mandanna went on a solo trip to Venice: 

'I was awestruck. The entire world comes here for vacation. Maybe, it was my bad luck that nobody could understand what I was trying to ask them, like 'where to go', 'how do you reach here'. I have never walked so much in my life. It was just me dragging my suitcase and walking around a residential street; there was not a single soul in sight. My phone battery was going to give up, I didn’t have a map and I started to think 'okay, what if I am supposed to spend the rest of my life here?'. I’m not kidding because I was so scared. Imagine, you are walking and you don’t see any one, there are just two people walking by and staring at you, probably because they think you are weird. I stayed in the hotel the next day because I was tired, but then the next two days I was out and about, taking the water taxis all around Venice trying to figure out the city, which stop connected to which place, talking to locals and clicking pictures. I did get lost in Venice but now I feel like I know each and every spot there. I feel like I’m a boss of Venice now'.

(Le fotografie che vi propongo sono state scattate a Ravello, qualora non diversamente indicato).

Nithiin e Venky Kudumula

Bari

Roma

(Località non precisata)

Michael Douglas e Catherine Zeta-Jones a Delhi

Michael Douglas e Catherine Zeta-Jones, in compagnia di Anil Kapoor, hanno partecipato ieri a all'evento Hindustan Times Leadership Summit 2019, organizzato a Delhi. Catherine e Anil hanno anche danzato insieme sul palco.

Catherine Zeta-Jones says she’s obsessed with Om Shanti Om, dances with Anil Kapoor on film’s song at HTLS 2019, Hindustan Times: 

'Actor Catherine Zeta-Jones has confessed that she is obsessed with the 2007 Hindi musical Om Shanti Om, and knows it ‘verbatim’. (...) “My friends Shah Rukh and Farah are going to be very happy,” Kapoor said. (...) “My kids have been brought up singing Om Shanti Om,” Zeta-Jones said, while her husband, actor Michael Douglas, nodded next to her. “It’s true,” he said, and added, “On Christmas, everyone in our country sings Christmas carols, our house sings all the songs from Om Shanti Om.” “I’m a big Bollywood fan,” Zeta-Jones said, adding that she would have loved to do a typical Hindi song-and-dance film in her career. “I don’t think people understand my obsession with Om Shanti Om,” she continued, suggesting that it would have made for a wonderful Broadway musical. “But I can’t play it because I’m not Indian,” she said regretfully'.

Tenu Vekhi Javaan: le riprese in Italia

La troupe del video musicale punjabi Tenu Vekhi Javaan è in questi giorni in Basilicata e in Campania per effettuare alcune riprese. Le località selezionate: Potenza, Sant'Angelo Le Fratte, Latronico, Maratea, Lagonegro, Caggiano. Sul set l'attore Himansh Kohli e la modella Shivani Jadhav. Shivani si è prestata anche a sfilare indossando abiti creati dagli studenti di un istituto di Potenza.

Aggiornamento del 15 aprile 2020 - Himansh Kohli: When I shot in Italy three months ago, I never realised the situation would get so serious, Tanvi Trivedi, The Times of India:

'“My music video 'Tenu Vekhi Javaan' was shot in Italy. I can’t believe how things have changed in just three months. Italy was like heaven on earth. I have a lot of friends and fans in Italy, and they are constantly in touch with me through social media. They are all scared, which is understandable. The roads are all empty similar to the lockdown in India. (...) I am spending my time watching videos that my friends send from Italy. Today, reading the various forwards that are circulating on social media has become painful, and if this continues, it will soon affect people’s mental health, too”.'