For them, brand ambassador of Narendra Modi’s Gujarat for the Left-controlled state is sacrilege. Mr Bachchan, who had accepted the Kerala’s government’s proposal a week ago, had in the CPM’s eyes committed the cardinal sin of praising Mr Modi. Mr Bachchan had said that he was promoting a state, not an individual. Read more…

So now the director who has constantly been identified with gritty films is back in form, with Amitabh as his hero.

Speaking for the first time on the song-less, rigorously researched saga of an elderly NRI’s struggle abroad, Santoshi says, “I’m returning to my style about one-man crusade that I patented in Damini and Ghayal. The Outsider is a story of man’s fight for justice and tolerance. It’s the story of a hero who stands up for what he thinks is right, even if it means losing everything.”

The recurrent theme in Santoshi’s cinema is one individual’s fight for his or her beliefs. “And that’s precisely where I’m taking Mr Bachchan in The Outsider. Interestingly, in Khakee he was a law maker, in Family he was law breaker. In The Outsider he’s placed in an ambivalent position. The challenge is to project this amazing actor in a new light. In The Outsider Mr Bachchan’s character controls the entire plot and its movements.” Read more….

“Finally, I have accepted Raj Kumar Santoshi’s new project ‘The Outsider’ to be produced under the banner of Feroze Nadiadwala,” Bachchan wrote on his blog stating he was coming together with the production house after a huge gap.

“I think we did something in 1973, perhaps Adalat.. and then nothing,” Big B said.

The superstar, who had three releases in a span of last three months — in Paa, Rann and Teen Patti, said he had signed his last film more than a year ago. Read more…

The veteran thespian, who will chair the concluding session of the meet on March 28, will read a Marathi poem, possibly by renowned poet Suresh Bhat, and verses from ‘Madhushala’, the immortal work of his father, the late Harivansh Rai Bachchan.

“On Friday evening, we got confirmation about his attendance for the meet. His office sent us a fax saying he will be present for the meet on March 28,” said Satish Desai, president of Punyabhushan Foundation, one of the organisers of the meet. Read more…

Amitabh was supposed to present the Filmfare Lifetime Achievement Award to the 71-year-old actor, but could not attend.

However, Amitabh saw pictures of the event later and was shocked — just like so many of his other fans.

“…the affable (Filmfare) editor Jitesh Pillai had asked me if I would give the Lifetime achievement Award to Shashi Kapoor and I had agreed. With great pleasure. I missed that more than thee expectation of winning the best actor award. Seeing him confined to a wheel chair, was something I could never associate with Shashi ji,” the 67-year-old posted on his blog bigb.bigadda.com.

“Shashi Kapoor, that handsome gentle man. A smile on his face forever. A considerate calling on each meeting, now in this condition? Never,” he added.

They were seen together in hits like Deewar, Trishul, Namak Halal and Silsila.

Remembering the times they spent together, Amitabh wrote: “Film after film we did together, Shashiji and I, shared some of my most memorable times together in the Industry. He is now my relative. His elder brother, the great Raj Kapoor’s daughter Ritu’s son Nikhil is married to (my daughter) Shweta. Read more…

“Najibullah, the former President of Afghanistan was a great fan of Hindi films and he had urged Indian Government to arrange our visit to the country,” Bachchan said in a media interaction.

“When we were discussing the script of ‘Khuda Gawah’, I said let us go to Afghanistan to shoot. We went to Mazar-e-Sharif to shoot the sequence of traditional Afghan spot of Buzkashi,” the legendary actor said.

“The President provided us excellent security when the shooting was on. Fighter Jet planes were keeping vigil in the sky and Army tanks were at the side of the sets. It just felt like a battle field,” he said. Read more…

It is a tautly-scripted and brilliantly executed film on the deep-rooted link between financial ambitions and moral compromises.

Writer-director Leena Yadav gives the theme of monetary indulgence a dizzying but pinned-down spin. She speeds confidently across out-of-control lives on a college campus with the confident vision of raconteur who spins a seemingly indecipherable web of deceit, intrigue and crime.

Miraculously, Yadav’s yarn preserves its pencil-sharp edge of intrigue and wit right to the end. The story of the eccentric math-magician’s adventures takes the narrative from underground addas to high-class casinos where Professor Venkat Subramaniam, his junior colleague Madhavan and four students convert the professor’s newly-discovered mathematical theory into hard cash on gambling tables.

The plot reveals layer after layer of conspiracy until we come to the core idea.

The story unravels through an extended dialogue in Cambridge between Subramaniam and a British maths professor Perci Trachtenberg played by Bachchan and Sir Ben. Just watching the two distinguished baritones exchange notes on academia, life and their overlapping quirks is a pleasure that makes for full paisa-vasool viewing. Read more….

“Filmfare belongs to the same media house that owns one of the Mumbai tabloids – the same one that ran a very derogatory story about Aishwarya a couple of days back. And when she issued a statement, they simply published an edited version and haven’t yet officially apologized to her. This has upset the entire Bachchan family. And that’s why Ash has taken this stand,” says the source. Read more…