Aishwarya Rai and Rajnikanth at world heritage site in Peru for Enthiran Shooting

What happens when super-duper star Rajinikanth and world’s most beautiful woman, Aishwarya Rai dance arm-in-arm? Obviously, an unprecedented visual treat! Yes, recently the awesome-twosome shot an amazing dance sequence for their forthcoming film ‘Robot’. The lady was seen wearing ostrich feathers and her Rajini sir was at his stylish best. The spicy song sequence was shot at the UNESCO declared world famous heritage site - Machu Pichhu in Peru and the film went on to become the first ever shot there. Wow!

‘Robot’, one of the most promising movies of 2008, has been in news for more than one reason. Earlier, Shah Rukh had to star in the film but due to 'creative differences' with dirtector Shankar, he opted out. In walked the ‘baap’ of all superstars – the one and only Rajinikanth. After some hussle and tussle between SRK and director Shankar, the film was renamed as Enthiram. Grapevine also has it that Shankar will be shooting for his film in other exotic locales like South America, too.

The film is to be produced by Ayngaran and Eros International. AR Rahman has been roped in for music. This will be the second film for Ash under Shankar's direction after 'Jeans'.

Earlier, in an interview to a news daily, Aishwarya talked in glowing details about the Tamil superstar, “Rajini Sir is such a wonderful human being. He has been so close to the family, too. I am glad and honoured to be working with him."

When asked about heroines getting sidelined in a Rajini film, Aishwarya refuted the claim, "I don't think it's a fair statement. You can't but be fascinated by this phenomenon called Rajini sir. He is so super-fascinating and intriguing to his audience. I don't think it's a deliberate attempt by any director to sideline any actor/character working along with him."

Hubby Abhishek, do we smell something burning? As for us, we can’t help but wait eagerly to see the fascinating pair onscreen!

Earlier, in an interview to a news daily, Aishwarya Rai talked in glowing details about the Tamil superstar, “Rajini Sir is such a wonderful human being. He has been so close to the family, too. I am glad and honoured to be working with him.”

When asked about heroines getting sidelined in a Rajini film, Aishwarya refuted the claim, “I don’t think it’s a fair statement. You can’t but be fascinated by this phenomenon called Rajini sir. He is so super-fascinating and intriguing to his audience. I don’t think it’s a deliberate attempt by any director to sideline any actor/character working along with him.”

It will be interesting to watch the good vibes between this fascinating pair on screen when Enthiram hits the theatres.

MGM with Star Den joins in Indian television market

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc (MGM) will be launching the MGM channel in India, the world’s third largest cable market. Carriage of the MGM channel will be handled by Star Den Media Services Pvt Ltd (Star Den), the distribution joint venture between News Corp's Star India, the leading television Network in India, and Den Digital Entertainment Network, one of India's leading cable companies.

The announcement was made by Bruce Tuchman, Executive Vice-President, MGM Networks at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc. Star Den will handle distribution of the MGM channel, wholly-owned by MGM, to cable platforms operating in a nation-wide cable market of over 70 million homes. This will significantly increase the reach of the MGM channel, which is currently available in India through Dish TV, the country’s largest direct-to-home satellite platform. In addition, the Star Den carriage agreement will also help the MGM channel secure carriage on new DTH and IPTV platforms that are emerging across the country.

In announcing the deal, Tuchman stated: “Being backed by Star India and Den is the ultimate seal of approval in the eyes of India’s cable operators, and we’re thrilled that we will be distributed as part of Star Den’s unrivaled bouquet of channel offerings. By working with Star Den, MGM will now have a compelling opportunity to extend and accelerate our channel’s reach throughout the widest possible audience in the large and burgeoning Indian television market.”
Commenting on the launch of MGM channel, Gurjeev Singh Kapoor, CEO of Star Den, stated: “MGM with its huge library of compelling Hollywood movies will bring a great value addition to the Star Den bouquet of channels and will indeed compliment the best of English programming it offers to viewers in the country.”

As one of the most powerful brand names in film entertainment, the 24-hour MGM channel offers film lovers in India round-the-clock movies from MGM’s celebrated 4,000 title library, the largest modern film library in the world. Highlights among the channel’s planned movie offerings in the coming year are Woody Allen’s Manhattan, Network, Carrie, A Passage To India, Midnight Cowboy, The Pink Panther Strikes Again, Mystic Pizza, Desperately Seeking Susan, and many others.

Ajith will be paired with Sameera Reddy - FOR Gautam Vasudev Menon Direction

With Aegan set for a Diwali release, Ajith will begin his next project on November 2. The yet-to-titled movie will be directed by Gautam Vasudev Menon and Ajith will be paired with Sameera Reddy.Shooting for this movie, which will be produced by Sivaji Films, is set to begin in Chennai and is expected to continue in Rameshwaram. Despite being an action movie, Ajith will not be a cop in this movie, which will be the first time Gautam teams up with Ajith. The movie will also bring together Gautam and Harris Jayaraj, whose streak of five movies with Gautam, was broken by Chennaiyil Oru Mazhaikalam, in which AR Rahman scores the music. The new project will have Nirav Shah as the cinematographer.Meanwhile, Gautam’s Vaaranam Aayiram is finally heading for an audio launch on September 24 at Sathyam Cinemas.

Priya Mani previews in Chennai

On Wednesday night (September 17), Priya Mani held a special show of her controversial Malayalam film Thirakkatha at the Four Frames for her close friends and family members.

In the film based on the life and romantic journey of the late yesteryear actress Srividya, Priyamani is brilliant. The film's writer and director Ranjit too was present for the show.

Kamal - Srividya romance is now a film!

Those who attended the show included Dhanush, Revathy, Seven Arts Vijayakumar and personalities from Malayalam film world. After the show, all the women were seen trying to hold back their tears as the film leaves a lump in your throat.

Revathy in her trade mark off-white salwar-kameez went and hugged Priyamani. Said Priya after the show: “I am extremely fortunate to have bagged this wonderful role at a time when heroines have nothing much to do in mainstream cinema. I am happy to balance my roles in commercial and off-beat films as I enjoy doing both”.

Priya Mani in an all-new gallery

Priyamani who has just completed a song shoot of her Bharath starrer Aarumugham in Hyderabad, flew down to attend the preview show.

Priya Mani pictures:

Kollywood's New Film Production Company

More movies are in the offing for the Tamil film buff as TV networks take to film production. After years of speculation, Sun TV network has finally ventured into film production and distribution.

The Kalanithi Maran controlled media conglomerate which dominates the television market in the south, already has a presence in print media, FM Radio and DTH. They also have the biggest Tamil film library in the world holding the telecast rights of nearly 3000 Tamil films.

According to a recent market study, television channels which have their own film production units will rule, as cinema has far more reach than soaps or reality shows.

The entry of corporates into Kollywood and the launch of new Tamil channels have further intensified the competition between television channels for film content. At a glittering function in Chennai last week, the COO of the company Hansraj Saxena unveiled the logo and announced the setting up of Sun Pictures and also talked about its future moves. As of now, their first release will be Atlantic Cinema’s Kadhalil Vizhundaen, which has the chartbuster Vijay Antony number Nakku Mukka.

The film is to be the launch pad of Boys Nakul as hero. They also have two Jeeva films — Thenavattu and Siva Manasilla Sakthi (SMS) — and Sundar C’s Thee and Narain’s Pookada Ravi.

Hansraj Saxena, popularly known as Sax, is Kalanithi Maran’s right-hand man, the one behind the network and all its channels in Tamil, Telugu, Kannada and Malayalam. Sax is on first name terms with most Kollywood stars and producers. He says, “For the last three years, we have been looking to set up our own film production and marketing company. We feel the time is now ripe as Kollywood is booming and small movies made on a reasonable budget are also doing good business. Added to that, we needed to create content for our network, and producing our own films makes good business sense.”
It is a Hollywood style studio management system that is being followed by them. The company funds independent producers who have a decent proposal, after Sax and his team clear the script and the actors. The nitty-gritty of production and daily hassles of shooting and completing the project on time is the responsibility of the line producer.
According to Sax, “At the end of the day, it is the opening a film gets that matters, so we will use all our resources for that.”
Recently, after Junglee Music and the FM channels made the Vijay Antony composed song Nakku Mukka, from Kadhalil Vizhindaen an anthem of sorts, Sun Pictures, who were marketing the film, decided to re-shoot it giving it a rich look.
Now, they will be premiering the song on all television channels, a week before the film’s release later this month. Sax says, “We are gung-ho about Tamil cinema, where new faces and ideas are being accepted.”
Sreedhar Pillai

Business news: Indian Hotels opens Gateway to better branding

Indian Hotels Company Ltd (IHCL), that runs Taj Hotels, Resorts and Palaces, launched its third brand, The Gateway Hotel (upscale brand), on Thursday in addition to the already existing brands including Taj (luxury) and Ginger (economy). The group will be soon launching a fourth brand as well.

“We plan to have specific brand to cater to a different set of travellers. Some of the properties did not match up to the demand of the customers. Taj kept acquiring properties that were not matching what the Taj stands for and there was a need for positioning the brands in such a manner that the customers get maximum satisfaction,” said Ajoy K Misra, senior vice president, sales and marketing, Indian Hotels Company Ltd.

Under the Gateway brand, Taj group is aiming to have 50 hotels in the next three years. “We will be bringing 16 existing hotel properties under this brand, 10 new properties will be added soon, and 15 properties are under negotiation,” said Misra.

“The Gateway Hotel will be a new brand catering to the emerging set of contemporary travellers. Gateway is a part of the Taj Group’s strategy to have a large footprint across India,” said Raymond N Bickson, managing director, Indian Hotels Company Ltd.

Bickson said that the group is looking at scaling up the brand to a large number of hotels across India. The group is open to both owning and management model for the brand. The brand will be present in all business districts and leisure locations across India.

Currently, the group has about 1,300 rooms already under the Gateway brand, which it plans to double in the next three years. The average room rate of Gateway brand hotels will range from Rs 3,000 to Rs 6,000 depending upon the location.

The hotels that will be re-flagged under the Gateway brand are in cities like Agra, Bangalore, Calicut, Chikmagalur, Coonoor, Jaipur, Jaisalmer,Madurai, Mangalore, Nasik, Sasan Gir, Surat, Vadodara, Varanasi, Vijayawada and Vishakhapatnam. While the new locations looked at for the Gateway brand are Mumbai, Bangalore, Chennai, Pune, Jullunder, Mysore, Navi Mumbai, Raipur and Gondia.

On investment, Misra said, “Around Rs 40 lakh per room will be invested in the new Gateway hotel project, while investment in existing projects that are being refurbished is much less. The properties under this brand currently have around 100-200 rooms.

Source:financial express.com

Tamil Cinema: A different route for a Tamil film

I DIDN'T know anything about this movie when I went to see it except that it starred popular actors Prakash Raj and and Jayaram (a Malayalam film comedian).

So, it was a surprise to find 2½ hours passing by quickly. These veteran actors were not the main characters in the movie, however, they were five new youngsters.

Saroja is unlike most Tamil movies in that it's a kind of road movie with lots of action and suspense.

Four friends (Vaibhav, S.P. Charan, Premji and Shiva) decide to go on a long-distance trip — from Chennai to Hyderabad — to see a cricket game.
At some point in the journey, they are forced to take a shortcut that takes them through hell. They become involved in a kidnapping of a girl called Saroja (Vega) and have to use their wits to stay alive and also flee from criminals.

There is plenty of humor throughout the movie and, and the songs are mercifully kept to a minimum.

Director Venkat Prabhu's first directorial venture Pacecode Chennai 600028 (also about cricket) proved to be an unexpected hit.

While most scenes have been handled well, a few show up the director's inexperience. For example, the four face death at every turn, but for some strange reason, they don't arm themselves with the knives and guns they seize from the bad guys.

Some scenes look grainy, probably because many of them were filmed at night.

Running the goof-ups at the end of the film's credits seems out of place in an action movie.

Prakash Raj plays Saroja's father while Jayaram is the police officer assigned to rescue her.

Rather than the actors, it is the story (inspired by Hollywood's Judgement Night) and its treatment that is the winner here.

Saroja will satisfy moviegoers looking for a Tamil film with a difference