Entertainment News

Ever since gay rights activist, writer and celebrated filmmaker Nishit Saran died in a car accident at Lodhi Road six years ago, his mother Mina goes to the accident site every day and lights a candle at the memorial she built for him and his friends a year after their death.

On the penultimate day at the HDIL India Couture Week, there were a lot of expectations in me as two designers whom I hold in high esteem were readying themselves with their couture presentations. After being at hundreds of fashion shows over the past several years, one tends to develop a sense of conviction that certain designers are sure not to let you down with their collections.

He has done it yet again. Aamir Khan's Taare Zameen Par has been chosen to represent India at the Oscars. This will be the actor's third film to be nominated to represent India at the Academy Awards, after Lagaan (which made it to the last five) and Rang De Basanti.

Earlier this year, the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights had been asked to look into reality shows featuring children. This was after Shinjini Sengupta, unable to bear the harsh comments passed by the judges of Dhoom Macha Le Dhoom on ETV Bangla, faced near paralysis.

It has been raining celebrities on the runways of the HDIL India Couture Week all of these past few days. A new face on the ramp today will be that of India's boxing sensation Vijender Singh, who will wear an embroidered sherwani just like that of Akshay Kumar's heavily embroidered coat in Singh is Kinng.

He may be the smaller of the two Bachchans but he's big among students. Almost 4,000 were inside the auditorium and a thousand more outside to see Abhishek Bachchan at Pulse 2008, the AIIMS annual fest, on Friday evening, even as the skies opened up.

For quite some time now, Shah Rukh Khan has been keeping quiet. Be it the brawl with Salman Khan, or the talk of Akshay Kumar as the new box-office king, SRK has not reacted. We ask why, and he pours his heart out.

This one could have been an outlandish, politically-incorrect spoof à la Borat. Unfortunately, You Don't Mess with the Zohan is anything but. The script introduces us to a macho Israeli secret service agent (Sandler, of course) who dreams of becoming a hairstylist.

Perhaps to compete with Sony Pix, Zee Studio has also launched a short film contest. Zee Studio's contest began on August 30. As for Pix, it had announced its second contest earlier this month.

Ear ear. Jaideep Varma's Hulla is not the poorer sister of Hulla Bol. It's about a man who can't sleep because a security guard keeps blowing a whistle way beyond midnight. What a fright. Just sit tight, take some cotton buds along. Because they keep blowing the whistle in Dolby surround, and don't let you sleep either.

It's a wonderful word. Whether it's a political piggy, a demented woman who can only cry through her nose, or a clinic 'compounder' who flips out for the village widow, they speak a lingo that's absolutely earthy, down-right bingo.

Celebrate. For once, there's a very caring mum who doesn't offer her sulking daughter, a tub of gaajar halwa. But the heaps of goodies around vanish in a flash. Must have been yum. Saas Bahu aur Sensex was probably meant to be a movie about women bonding. But it has neither an original voice nor a sharp style.

Movie buffs this season will have to wait a while to see the films they must have been eagerly waiting for. Six big Bollywood's releases have been postponed until next year.

This terrific Turkish feature made waves earlier this year at the Cannes festival, where it fetched Nuri Bilge Ceylan the Best Director prize. Ceylan creates a multilayered character study that keeps us absorbed throughout.

Nuri Bilge Ceylan in the film Three Monkeys skillfully brings out the adversity faced by a family that suffers from a major communication breakdown during their struggle to get through the hardships.

A politician falls asleep behind the wheel of his car on a country road. He hits and kills a pedestrian and then coerces one of his employees to take the rap for him and serve a nine-month prison sentence with the promise of a healthy pay-cheque when he gets out.

Zohan Dvir (Adam Sandler) is an Israeli Mossad agent who dreams of becoming a hairstylist. On a mission to recapture Phantom, a terrorist, he takes advantage of the showdown to fake his own death.

The story has the Sensex as a backdrop to the lives of the most unlikely investors. This film is an attempt to make people aware that the Indian economy is growing and hence this is the right time to invest and make money. The film shows that in a light-hearted way.

Drona and Alladin have yet to see the light of day, but their sequels are already in the pipeline. Both are fantasy movies - Drona's eponymous lead character is a mythological superhero, and Alladin is based on the Arabian fairytale.

Cajun and creole are to New Orleans cuisine what garlic and ginger are to Indian cuisine. The seasonings, which are a mix of natural herbs, are the soul of any Louisiana cooking. At the ongoing New Orleans food festival at the Jaypee Vasant Continental, Chef Jeremy Lespoir from - you guessed it - New Orleans, enlightened us about the intricacies of this region's food.