Celebrity Gossip: August 2010

"Angels» Victoria `s Secret in the new commercial laundry

Anna Nicole was over-medicated

The Iranian newspaper dubbed Carla Bruni prostitute

Scissor Sisters, GaGa to collaborate?

Indian film stars take salary cuts

Nicolas Cage 'for Bollywood gangster film'

Snooki's boyfriend proposes in magazine

Paris Hilton 'thought cocaine was gum'

A Magical Night At The Emmy Awards

Taylor Lautner Lawsuit Leads To Push-Up Challenge

Set in rural Bihar where nothing works except the law of the lawless, "Antardwand" takes the firm and gripping route to expose a hinterland-headline - the kidnapping of marriageable boys by desperate fathers of wannabe brides.This was a prevalent malpractice in Bihar until some years ago. Not so much any more.Debutant director Sushil Rajpal's film works more for its deeper resonances than just the surface sincerity. It is not so much the sensational value of the theme ('dulha uth gaya') that makes "Antardwand" watchable as the treatment of the layers of socio-political irregularities and caste aberrations that generate a society of anarchy where kidnapping an aspiring groom is serious business.The narrative is punctuated with bouts of savage humour. When the Delhi University civil service candidate Raghuveer (Raj Singh Choudhary) with a pregnant girlfriend (Himanshi), is kidnapped just yards away from his parents' home in rural Bihar, his confoundedness, and rage at the bizarre confinement is expressed in bouts and spasms of indignance. The director knows the milieu well. He doesn't waste time exploring rural Bihar just because he has chosen to film his story on location.The narrative never loses its momentum. Rather than opt for a dry docu-drama tone, director Sushil Rajpal has chosen to format the film as a thriller. The pace from the moment of Raghuveer's kidnapping to his escape is largely relentless.The second-half of the plot gets more introspective as it becomes the story of the humiliated bride (newcomer Swati Sen, well cast) who finds herself with a man who has been forced to marry her. The rage of confinement and the anguish of rejection ooze out of the tense frames.Sequences in the couple's bedroom with a gigantic tell-tale double-bed at its centre, capture the ironical nullity of a marriage based on bullying tactics. There is an element of naïve desperation in the couple's shared space. The writing is hard-hitting but relentless, supple and slender. There is ample room for innuendoes in the dialogues and situations."Antardwand" avoids the easy road to realism. The ambience does not depend on how the actors pitch the accent in the spoken word or their body language. Though these are authentic, it's the deeper malaise of a society buried neck-deep in prejudices and superstition that the director focuses on.The camera work by Malay Ray is exploratory but non-judgemental. Scenes of characters moving in and out of dark old-fashioned interiors are shot without wallowing in symbolism.The performances are thoughtful. Akhilendra Mishra and Vinay Pathak pitch into the ambience of rousing realism as the father of the bride and the kidnapped groom, respectively. Raj Singh as the precious groom last seen in Anurag Kashyap's "Gulaal" again reveals an admirable ability to blend into the bleeding fabric of mofussil mayhem. The film is suffused with sincerely sketched characters. Jaya Bhattacharya as the bride's far-from-persecuted bhabhi (sister-in-law) and for that matter the unknown actor Dadhi Raj Paney who plays Akhilendra Mishra's faithful servant, bring a kind of fringe fertility into the storytelling.The finale is self indulgent in its idealism. A society so breached by gender and caste biases cannot be lit up by a sudden beam of optimistic light.But no harm in trying.Antardwand is a commendable attempt to examine the underbelly of rural Bihar. It doesn't purport to shake up the status quo. The film only wants to remind us that we need to heal our collective social conscience before curing the discrepancies that feed into our dream of emerging from the darkness into the light.

Madonna 'refuses Mercy's father access'

Lily Allen blasts cricket fixing reports

Paris Hilton 'faces felony drug charges'

Moore, Kutcher join Snoop Dogg on stage

50 Cent 'banned from Twitterpic'

I have compassion for Lohan

Alexandra Burke plays WAG birthday gig

Nicole Richie vets dad Lionel's partners

Lady GaGa 'terrified of mobile phones'

Abbey Clancy 'asked to pose for Playboy'

Lara Bingle signs with new celeb agent

Stepmothers are not always wicked

MUMBAI: Arjun Rampal, who plays a divorcee with three children in his upcoming film We Are Family, claims the film will break the image of the stepmom who is more often than not portrayed in a negative light in Indian productions.Rampal comes from a broken home and declares from experience, “It’s the children who suffer. You will see what happens to children and that’s the message we are going to give through the film.”“The film breaks the mould of the stereotype that stepmoms are like wicked witches, (which is) the way it has been portrayed on the silver screen so far. The film is not about that; it’s about the crisis (of divorce) and how love prevails over everything and finally, that new relationships can be made and I think that’s the beauty of the film.”Produced by Karan Johar and directed by Siddharth Malhotra, We Are Family is a Hindi adaptation of the 1998 Hollywood hit Stepmom and Kareena Kapoor and Kajol reprise the roles of Julia Roberts and Susan Sarandon respectively.Johar went through the right channels to get the rights to make the film in Hindi, “The stories need to be told. It’s better to take it and be noble enough to say this is what we are adapting from, rather than calling it an original idea,” said Rampal.The actor said it was not easy to act in an adaptation. “I think an adaptation is tougher because once you do it, comparisons are immediately drawn,” said Rampal. “This is not an easy film to act in. Julia Roberts and Susan Sarandon hd given very strong performances, but it’s wonderful to see how Kajol and Kareena bring their own to their characters. They bring a lot more of themselves and change it around so much that it makes it so watchable, enduring and beautiful,” he said.The 37-year-old actor, who recently starred in the political thriller Raajneeti, maintains men too have some responsibility in women-centric films. “There are some responsibilities on men in women-centric films; I hope I have fulfilled them. (Laughs) In the original Stepmom, Ed Harris played the character I am playing here and I think it was an older character and the way it was written, it had some restrictions. (However) the way Siddharth has interpreted characters in his film is a new part of the film and that is something which I really enjoyed doing,” said Rampal.The National Award-winning actor, who has two daughters, found it easy to play a dad of three children. “It was really easy to play a father because I am a father myself. Karan, on seeing the film, said my body language with the children was fabulous,” said Rampal who teamed up with child actors Aanchal Munjal, Nominath Ginsburg and Diya Sonecha.“I have seen how Kajol is with her daughter Nysa, very hands-on, very protective, she takes care of her every need and she is like that in the film as well. Kareena has no children (and so) her awkwardness in creating a relationship with kids came out very naturally.”The film is scheduled to be released on September 2 and is the first film of director Siddharth Malhotra. “Siddharth was fantastic. He brought in so much dignity. This film could be very melodramatic (but) he has given it a lot of realism,” concluded Rampal. iansPublished in The Express Tribune, August 31st, 2010.

Celebrity Camp raises Rs300,000 for flood victims

PAKISTAN /LAHORE: Celebrity Camp at the Mall of Lahore collected Rs300,000 in some three hours for flood victims from the people who came to shop at the mall on Saturday night.There was no entrance fee for the event and volunteers carried boxes to collect the donations. The organisers stood out dressed in white T-shirts urging people to donate for the flood victims.The two-day camp was organised by a group of people from the fashion and entertainment world, who showed up at the event to ask shoppers to donate to the flood victims. Music bands including Lal, Roxen, Noori, Falak and singers Ali Sher, Noman Javed and Umer Nabeel performed on the occasion. Singer Ali Azmat and Fareeha Pervaiz also showed up at the event and asked people to donate money.In addition to collecting funds, some celebrities also put on their belongings up for auction. A cricket ball belonging to Shoaib Akhtar was auctioned for Rs50,000, the highest bid among all things that went under the hammer. A shirt by the bowler was sold for Rs10,000. Outfits by Maria B went for around Rs40,000.Designers Munib Nawaz, Khadija of Elan, Amna Haq, Ammar Belal and a few others also put their outfits on sale and donated the money for the flood victims.Maria B, one of the main people behind the idea of the Celebrity Camp, told The Express Tribune that the idea to mobilise people to donate generously for the flood victims in such a way was ‘a novel concept’.“This is a more of an awareness campaign rather than a fundraiser. We have been raising funds through different events, but this is a free event. The loss that we have sustained as a result of the floods is huge. We have to donate continuously till the people affected in the floods are rehabilitated. We will move to other cities and go to schools as well to raise funds for the flood victims,” she said.Shoaib Akhter said that it was a difficult time for the country and added that people should donate generously. “I think this is a great idea to create awareness among the people to donate as much as they can. We should not just donate once and think we have played our role. We need to keep ourselves mobilised to deal with this natural calamity,” he added.Singer Ali Sher who also performed at the event said that he had come to show his solidarity with the flood victims. “We should stand united and help our brothers and sisters who have lost their livelihoods in these floods,” he said.“It is good to see a lot of celebrities here raising funds for the flood victims. We should all empathise with the pain of those who have suffered in the floods,” said Saira Ahmed, one of the shoppers.Bilal Mukhtar of Bilal PR and Event Management said that the event was a success as a lot of people had shown up. “A good thing about this event is that it shows that we all stand together. Even though there wasn’t any ticket, considerable money has been raised from the shoppers,” he said.Sarfaraz Niazi, of JBnJaws said that the camp aimed at raising awareness among the people to donate for the flood victims.“We didn’t make it look like some concert because of Ramazan. We are already receiving calls from other cities who want us to go there and arrange similar fundraising events.Another benefit of this camp has been that we have formed a panel of celebrities who are willing to do a lot to raise funds for the flood victims. We are planning to visit other cities after Eid,” he said. The funds collected from this celebrity camp will be donated to the army’s relief camp, he added.Published in The Express Tribune, August 30th, 2010.

Al Pacino wins Emmy for best actor

Avatar re-release fails at US box office

Celebrity Women Who Are Bisexual.....

Sexuality is often treated oddly by the media. Lesbians are often ‘sexed up’ for films and magazines, but real lesbians can face a hostile reaction. And bisexuals? Well, the press are either fascinated or disgusted. Media aside, however, it’s about time we celebrated the female form…how many of us slave over our exercise regimes and diet plans to look great for the Summer?! And whether it’s a sexual attraction or just an admiration, here are the eight stars who’ve admitted to loving women too.

1. FergieBlack eyed peas lead singer Fergie has revealed she is bisexual, and has enjoyed lesbian relationships in the past. She’s always been a huge admirer of the female form, and in their latest video she even shoots some girl-on-girl action for the camera. I love the way she’s bold! I love her stage outfits, too, and have you ever seen her looking anything less then perfect?!

2. Megan FoxMegan sent the tabloids into overdrive when she admitted to having a lesbian relationship with a stripper when she was 18, but she also controversially admitted that she doesn’t like bisexual women. “I could never be with a woman who had been with a man.” Ah…well, never the less, the Transformers star says she is a man-only woman now anyway.3. Nelly Furtado

The ‘Maneater’ and ‘Promiscuous’ singer has recently admitted she loves the female form just as much as the male, and says she believes everyone is inherently bisexual. It certainlt got the rumour mill going! And looking like she does, I bet she’ll have no shortage of female admirers, too. “I believe what Kurt Cobain said that in the end, everyone is gay. Everybody should have the freedom to experiment. Sexual experiment is part of human history!”

4.Drew BarrymoreI love Drew…she has such gorgeous features, and she’s so too the point! There was no does she/doesn’t she when she was questioned about her preferences, with Drew freely saying, “Do I like women sexually? Yes I do. Totally.” Bold AND beautiful, Drew’s fantastic! She went on to describe her feelings, “I think a woman and a woman together are beautiful, just as a man and woman together are beautiful.”

5.Lindsey LohanI think Lindsey’s a stunner, and she certainly set the tabloids alive when she started a relationship with DJ Samantha Ronson. The media were convinced it was a publicity stunt, but the two really did suit each other, and the break up clearly left Lohan broken. “I appreciate people, and it doesn’t matter who they are, and I feel blessed to be able to feel comfortable enough with myself to say that.” Go Lindsey!

6. PinkI was surprised to hear Pink talking about her bisexuality, after her marriage to biker Carey broke down.. “I would also be just as happy with a new woman. I’m not complicated, I sing about love in all its shapes, forms and colours.” She revealed. Although rumour has it that she has recently renwed her vows, so she might me a one-man-only woman now!

7. Lady GagaA relatively new star, Lady Gaga has done an amazing job of making women feel sexually liberated, and showing it is acceptable.She claimed her hit single Poker Face was about bisexuality, and said, “I’m girl-crazy too. It really depends on where I am. I love men, I love women and I love sex.” Well said!8. Angelina Jolie

“Can you imagine Lara Croft as a lesbian? At the end of the day, I really like women. I’d love it if the girls in the cinema watching Lara Croft find me just as hot as their boyfriends do.” So while she might be one half of one of the most famous couples in the world, Angelina certainly isn’t a man-only women, and has even admitted a fling with female co star Jenny Shimizu. So there’s hope for all of us Angelina admirers yet!How empowering are these women?! Whether you are bisexual or straight, everyone can admire the female form, and having these women doing it in public is a great way to raise awareness and help women to feel sexually liberated. After all, this is the 21st Century, ladies! Can you think of a bisexual celebrity I’ve forgotten? I’d love to add them!

Shakira's Crack Exposed

Hello Darling

A blatant copy of Hollywood film of the 80s, Nine To Five, Hello Darling is for those who enjoyed comedies like Kya Kool Hain Hum and Apna Sapna Money Money. Sat (Eesha) comes to Mumbai for a job from Haryana. She joins a fashion house headed by Harddick Vasu (Javed Jaffrey), a lecherous boss who leaves no chance in sexually harassing his employees. Though married to a devoted wife Purvi (Divya Dutta) Vasu is philandering and harassing his female employees. Also, working in his office are Candy (Celina) as his personal secretary and Manasi (Gul Panag) as a senior manager. They two are fed up of his constant passes. Sat joins Manasi and Candy to teach him a lesson. Circumstances lead to Manasi accidentally pouring rat kill powder instead of coffee meant for Vasu. Vasu collapses but it is because of his chair falling down. But the three ladies mistook him for dead and the chaos that follows leads them to stealing a wrong dead body from the hospital thinking its Vasu's.Meanwhile Vasu captures this all on his mobile video camera and blackmails them into spending a week with him at a hill station. The three ladies have no option but to say yes to him but with a condition that he will spend the seven days in Manasi's house instead. What plan do the three ladies have in store for Vasu and what all it leads to forms the rest of the film.The film is full of double intender jokes and one-liners that amuse you at times but don't really entertain. While the first half is quiet pacy and hilarious at places, the pace drops considerably after Vasu's visit to Manasi's house. Nothing much happens in the second half and it simply drags. The climax too is unnecessarily stretched and the entry of Sunny Deol (in a cameo) doesn't add much. One wonders why his voice appears dubbed by a mimicry artist. The whole section of Chunky Pandey being mistaken as Divya Dutta's hubby and kidnapped by Seema Biswas's hench men is howlarious at first but then gets repetitive.While Javed Jaffrey enacts his part well he doesn't appear lecherous from any angle. He however gets his comic timing perfect. Gul Panag, Eesha and Celina all three have managed to do their job well. Eesha especially displays a better comic timing than the rest two. Chunky Pandey as Celina's unfortunate boy friend in a desi Elvis avatar is first rate. Divya Dutta is endearing.Music by Pritam is nothing worth to rave about and the only passable song being the redoux version of yesteryears super hit track Aa Jaane Jaa.Hello Darling seems to be aimed completely at the front benchers. Watch it if you like corny humour.

Sherawat 'not interested in Dhamaal fee'

Kagna Ranaut to play British detective

Kate Moss ends Topshop partnership

Praying for hit film

Aashayein

This is a film about coping with dying. But that’s not what makes it such a special experience. It’s the writer- director’s profound understanding of human nature that furnishes the simple story with a lucidity and coherence even when the protagonist’s mind is so numbed by physical pain he can barely think straight.Aashayein is structured as a journey from a bright delusory light into a place where the radiance comes from a consciousness of why mortality is not to be feared.In John Abraham’s eyes are mapped the entire history of the human heart, its follies and foibles as it struggles to make coherest the indecipherable logistics that define our journey across that bridge which everyone crosses from this world to the next.As that very fine actress Prateeksha Lonkar (a Kukunoor favourite) says, “The only difference between the healthy and the ill is that the former don’t know when they are dying and the latter do.”Between that state of blissful oblivion where we all think life is forever (and a day) and that one moment when our delusions come crashing down there resides some very fine cinema. Hrishikesh Mukherjee’s Anand where Rajesh Khanna smiled his way though that wobbly bridge taking us to the next world, is an interesting reference point in Aashayein.I also thought of the actress Supriya Choudhary shouting into the dispassionate mists in the mountains, “I want to live.”The echoes reverberate all the way to Kukunoor’s heartwarming funny and elegiac exposition on the truth that lies on the other side of that illusory mountain we call life. Kukunoor pays a homage to life per se, and life as we know in the movies about death. Even in the most poignant places in the art Kukunoor ferrets out some humour.When John’s lovely girlfriend (Sonal Sehgal) hunts him down in his exilic place of the dying John quips, “So you are not going to behave like one of those heroines in films who dumps the dying hero?”The fantasy element creeps into the hospice (yes, that’s the spotless space that the story inhabits unostentatiously) with the least amount of fuss. There’s a little boy (the bright and expressive Ashwin Chaitale) who weaves mystical tales borrowed from the comicbooks for the desperate and the dying. Here Kukunoor brings in an element of rakish adventure borrowed from the edgy hijinks of Indian Jones.Who says money can’t buy love? John uses bundles of cash to bring a smile into these doomed lives. When he doubles up with pain in womb-like postures of helplessness we feel his pain.John in Harrison Ford’s hat and whip cuts a starry figure. He has never been more fetchingly photographed. John’s smile reaches his eyes, makes its way to his heart and then to ours. This film opens new doors in John’s histrionic hospice.It’s a performance that heals and nurtures.John’s finest moments are reserved for a hot-tempered sharp-tongued 17-year old girl on a wheelchair, played with intuitive warmth by Anaitha Nayar. He guides the relationship between these two unlikely comrades of unwellness with brilliant restrain and candour.She wants him to make love.He does with his eyes using his unshed tears as lyrical lubricant.Here is a performance that defines the character through immense measures of unspoken anguish. Rajesh Khanna in Anand? Nope. John pitches his performance at a more wry and cynical world where true feelings are often smothered in worldly sprints across a wounded civilization.This is unarguably Kukunoor’s most sensitive and moving work since Iqbal. We often find little sobs pounding at the base of our stomachs. Not all the characters or situations are fully formed and fructified. But even the partly-realized truths in Aashayein convey more common sense and uncommon affection for life than the “entertainers” of today’s cinema where laughter is generated through cracks in places very far removed from the heart.

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