A sneak peak into ‘Saat Khoon Maaf’

Priyanka Chopra had gathered ample critical acclaim for her negative role in ‘Aitraaz’. She comes up in greyer shades once again in ‘Saat Khoon Maaf’, a black comedy directed by Vishal Bhardwaj, based on the Ruskin Bond’s short story, Susanna’s Seven Husbands. Set for release on 18 February 2011, the movie has Priyanka play the role of Susanna Anna-Marie Johannes, who over the course of thirty-five odd years, gets married seven times due to the untimely and mysterious deaths of her husbands. The movie unveils the mystery of these deaths and as Priyanka’s character ages from 20-65, it took a lot of effort on everyone’s part to give Priyanka the look suiting her age. Vishal Bhardwaj hired renowned Academy Award winning, Hollywood special make-up effects artist, Greg Cannom of The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (2008), to create those seven different looks for Priyanka’s role in the film.
Besides Priyanka, the movie also stars Neil Nitin Mukesh as Edwin Rodriques, John Abraham as Jimmy Stetson, Irrfan Khan as Wasiullah Khan a.k.a. Musafir, Aleksandr Dyachenko as Nicolai Vronsky, Annu Kapoor as Keemat Lal, Naseeruddin Shah as Modhusudhon Tarafdar, Vivaan Shah and Usha Uthup as a Maid.

Mallika Sherawat: After Munni and Sheila, here comes Razia!!

The rage among Bollywood babes to sizzle in raunchy item numbers continues. After the flattering success of Malaika Arora Khan’s ‘Munni Badnaam Hui’ and Katrina Kaif’s ‘Sheila Ki Jawaani’ it is now time for sex kitten Mallika Sherawat to shake her legs on an item number.
Mallika has already shown her oomph factor in ‘Maiya Maiya’ and will now be seen in a raunchy item song in director Anees Bazmee’s next film Thank You. Like ‘Munni Badnaam Hui’, this song too has a desi folk appeal to it and it titled ‘Razia Gundo Mein Phas Gayi’ (Razia stuck with the goons).
Composed by Pritam, the song will feature Mallika with all the male actors of the film- Akshay Kumar, Bobby Deol and Sunil Shetty. Well, more so, Mallika is doing the number for free as she shares a good rapport with Bazmee which developed when she worked with Bazmee in ‘Welcome’.
Bazmi, who is currently busy shooting the song, confirmed the news saying, “Mallika is a very dear friend and suits perfectly for this song. She is shooting with us for five days, as the song will be shot with all the actors in the film.”

Check out John Abraham’s killer looks in ‘Force’

One cannot but agree with the fact that John Abraham has one of the best bodies in our tinsel town. However, despite the fact that the hunk has a physique which makes him a perfect choice for pure action thrillers, John has kept away from hard-core action flicks, the only exception being ‘Dhoom’ where his chemistry with bikes was more than obvious.
Now, finally John has turned to flaunting his perfectly toned body with eight-pack abs in a pure action flick produced by Vipul Amrutlal Shah and directed by Nishikant Kamat of Mumbai Meri Jaan fame. The movie is the remake of the Tamil film Kakha Kakha and chirpy Genelia D’Souza will play his love interest in the film.
Though the storyline of the movie has been kept into wraps, it is known that John plays an encounter specialist and given his killer looks in the poster just released one can definitely say that John is out to set many a heart ablaze there!!

Vivek Oberoi attends the Youth Concert barefooted

After displaying his acting talents in ‘Rakhtacharitra’, Vivek Oberoi displayed his ardent spiritual and devoted side when he came in barefooted to attend the Youth Concert with spiritual guru Sri Sri Ravi Shankar on the occasion of National Youth Day on Jan 12 at Andheri Sports Complex. His barefoot was aptly complimented with traditional attire of a veshti and an angvastram. He sat beside Hema Malini at the concert.
The concert saw performances by the musician trio Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy. Spiritual guru Sri Sri Ravi Shankar said there was a need to set up an ‘independent body’ to keep a check on corruption and financial scams.
‘Agencies that are supposed to check the scams are also involved in the same scams. We need to have people of character and honesty to check corruption. Such a body must be positioned independent from the government,’ Sri Sri Ravi Shankar told reporters.
The spiritual guru lauded the role of media in exposing the scams and said that without the media acting as a public watchdog, such ills would have been buried unnoticed.

‘Dabangg’ rules at the Apsara Awards

The gone by year 2010 was surely the year of Salman Khan’s ‘Dabangg’ and the movie seemed to rule at the Star Screen Awards continuing its winning streak to the recently held Apsara Awards as well.
Salman Khan won the best actor awards for ‘Dabangg’ which was chosen as the best film of the year. The Best Actress award was shared by Vidya Balan and Anushka Sharma for their performances in Ishqiya and Band Baaja Baaraat respectively. Karan Johar bagged the Best Director award for My Name Is Khan.
The glamour and glitter was at its peak with dazzling performances from stars like Shahrukh Khan, Priyanka Chopra, Akshay Kumar and Anushka Sharma. Other present at the occasion were Amitabh Bachchan, Aishwarya Rai, Yash Chopra, Katrina Kaif, Akshay Kumar, Rani Mukherjee, Karan Johar, Farah Khan, Govinda, Malaika Arora, Arbaaz Khan, Sunny Deol, Bobby Deol, Dharmendra and Ramesh Sippy, and others.
Other winners include:
Best Debut Male
Ranveer Singh – Band Baaja Baaraat
Best Debut Female
Sonakshi Sinha – Dabangg
Best Actor in a Comic Role (Male)
Paresh Rawal – Atithi Tum Kab Jaoge?
Best Actor in Negative Role
Sonu Sood – Dabangg
Best Actor in a Supporting Role (Male)
Arjun Rampal – Raajneeti
Best Actress in a Supporting Role (Female)
Prachi Desai – Once Upon A Time In Mumbaai
Best Male Singer
Rahat Fateh Ali Khan – Tere Mast Mast Do Nain (Dabangg)
Best Female Singer
Sunidhi Chauhan – Sheila Ki Jawani (Tees Maar Khan)
Mamta Sharma – Munni Badnaam Hui (Dabangg)
Best Choreography
Farah Khan – Sheila Ki Jawani – Tees Maar Khan
Lifetime Achievement Award
Dharmendra

When will Bollywood stars respect their legal responsibilities?

This is not the first time that the Bollywood celebrities top the list of those who have tax payments due and nonetheless, it shocks us no less. Bollywood actors have larger than life images and their fans adore and look up to them.
Among the celebs who feature in the list of Stamp Duty Evasion list are cricketer Sachin Tendulkar and Bollywood actors like Kareena Kapoor, Bipasha Basu, Fardeen Khan and Suneil Shetty feature in the Stamp Duty evasion list. These celebrities are most sought after names in the advertisement world and have signed mega endorsement deals between the period of 2006 - 2009. Under article 5(H)(A) of the Bombay Stamp Act 1958, duty needs to be paid on signing any endorsement contract, this duty can either be paid by the company itself or the celebrity that is endorsing the product.
For the year 2008, Bipasha Basu had Rs. 37,500 due as the stamp duty. Her penalty due was Rs. 48,750 which makes her total outstanding (as of 2008) dues as Rs. 86,250. For the same year, Kareena Kapoor had her stamp duty due at Rs.1,85,000. Her penalty due was Rs.1,31,450 which made her total outstanding (as of 2008) dues to Rs. 3,16,450. It is high time that Bollywood stars realize their social and legal responsibilities.

Kangana Ranaut still nursing her grudges against Roshans

Well, it seems Kangana Ranaut has not gotten over the betrayal played by the Roshans in their mega project ‘Kites’. We all know how Kangana’s role was chopped off to mere bits.
So, it did not come as a surprise when the actress firmly refused to be a part of ‘Krrish 2’ where she was asked to play the second lead after Priyanka Chopra. Though, both Rakesh and Hrithik tried to convince her that the role carried enough weight and had been written with Kangana in mind, Ranaut simply refuses to trust them.
With a national award to be proud of and with many promising projects in her kitty like Tanu Weds Manu, Rascals, Game and Dhamaal 2, Kangana definitely does not need to risk her career with Roshans.
On the other side of the coin, Rakesh Roshan denies having spoken to Kangana about Krrish 2. “Kangna wasn’t offered a role. Only Priyanka [Chopra] is final,” he stated.

Bollywood stars in Dabboo Ratnani’s 2011 calendar

Dabboo Ratnani launched his much awaited calendar for 2011 at a star studded event which was attended by the whos who of Bollywood. King Khan was full of praises at Dabboo’s picture with a bicycle. Vidya Balan blended well with King Khan and Hrithik Roshan as well as Farhan and Adhuna Akhtar. Abhishek Bachchan attended the function with wife Aishwarya and mother Jaya Bachchan who spent a lot of quality time with Dabboo, his wife Manisha and their baby. Priyanka Chopra came dressed in black and Sonakshi Sinha was attired in white.
The event was also attended by Bikram Saluja, Schauna Chauhan, Mandira Bedi, Raj Kaushal, Rohit and Manasi Roy, Zayed and Mallika Khan, Genelia D’Souza, Mehr Jesia Rampal, Sarah Jane-Dias, Divya Dutta and Tulip Joshi among others.