OCT 16 - India's official entry to the Oscars — Rang De Basanti — has
won the Best Film Award at the Indian film festival in Sydney.
"Rang De Basanti was adjudged the best film from among
several Indian films screened during the fourth edition of the Indian
film festival at Sydney, by an all Australian jury," the director of
the film Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra said in a release here.
Other films in the offering were Vishal Bhardwaj's 'Omkara',
Rajkumar Hirani's 'Lage Raho Munnabhai', Rohan Sippy's 'Bluffmaster',
Apurva Lakhia's 'Ek Ajnabee', Karan Johar's 'Kabhi Alvida
Na Kehna' and Kunal Kohli's 'Fanaa'.
"What was heartening to note was the fact that most of the people
watching the movie were Australians and not local Asians. Normally
when an Indian film is screened at a film festival abroad, there are
more Asians in the audience than locals," Mehra said about local
receptivity to the festival which concluded a couple of days ago.
Mehra said the response to the film as well as other Indian films
like "Being Cyrus" showed that Indian films with a universal theme and
content were getting acceptance from people other than Asians.
"In 2006, the festival featured the biggest range of Indian cinema
we have ever presented -- from the most mainstream commercially
successful Hindi films to the most experimental and interesting films
coming out of India at the moment," festival director Mitu Bhowmick
Lange was quoted as saying.
OCT 8 - Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie on a rickshaw ride
with their son Maddox in Pune, were chased by media and
forced to turn back after a 20-minute ride.
At every red light, security men traveling in another
rickshaw jumped out and surrounded the three-wheeler to
prevent the media from snapping pictures of Pitt and
Jolie.
Jolie and Pitt began shooting for a film about a US
journalist abducted and killed in Pakistan.
The film, "A Mighty Heart", is the story of Daniel
Pearl, a reporter with The Wall Street Journal who was
kidnapped in the Pakistani port city of Karachi and
killed in 2002 while researching a report in the
aftermath of the September 11 attacks.
It will be shot for a month in the industrial city of
Pune as security concerns prevented filming in Pakistan.
Filming began yesterday in a two-storey white bungalow
in Pune's Sindh Society locality, which has a striking
similarity to the district in Karachi - with its
boulevards, row houses and bungalows - where Pearl was
staying.
Oscar-winning actress Jolie plays the slain reporter's
wife, Mariane. Brad Pitt is the movie's producer.
The celebrity couple's arrival in Pune has thrown the
quiet city into a frenzy as hundreds of fans
throng their luxury hotel Le Meridian and the shooting locale for a
glimpse. Security for the star couple has been tight
since their arrival in Pune by private jet along with their
children Maddox, 5, Zahara, 18 months and 4-month-old
Shiloh Nouvel Jolie-Pitt.
The film is based on a book by Mariane Pearl, "A Mighty
Heart: The Brave Life and Death of My Husband Danny
Pearl".
OCT 16 - India's official entry to the Oscars — Rang De Basanti — has
won the Best Film Award at the Indian film festival in Sydney.
Mehra said the response to the film as well as other Indian films
like "Being Cyrus" showed that Indian films with a universal theme and
content were getting acceptance from people other than Asians.
OCT 8 - Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie on a rickshaw ride
with their son Maddox in Pune, were chased by media and
forced to turn back after a 20-minute ride.
