Film on Indira Gandhi not a biopic: Producer

By Hindustan Times

Australia’s Bruce Beresford is all set to direct, Birth of a Nation, a film that will feature the dramatic elements that went with Indira Gandhi’s prime ministerial tenure during the 1971 Bangladesh liberation war. The movie will underline her pluck in defying the Richard Nixon administration and the Chinese leadership in order to help East Pakistan break away from West Pakistan and emerge as Bangladesh under Mujibur Rahman.

Though the film may loosely resemble a biopic, its producer, India-born America-based Krishna Shah, tells me over the phone from Mumbai that it is not one. “It is a war drama about the birth of a nation, similar in scale to the movie, Gandhi, as well as in the purview of Pearl Harbour. The material is in public domain.”

Since the script will rely on such material, the film will hopefully not raise controversies. The Congress Party is known to be quite finicky about granting permission to make biopics of anybody in the Nehru-Gandhi family, and it is well known that Jag Mundhra wanted to make a movie on Sonia Gandhi, the present Congress president, but his efforts went in vain. He died last year with an unfulfilled wish for a project that he once told me was dear to his heart, but approval for which was not easily forthcoming.

Shah says he spent six months travelling around the world, meeting helmers as varied as Kathryn Bigelow (The Hurt Locker), Jonathan Demme (Rachel Getting Married) and Jodie Foster (The Beaver, Carnage), before he zeroed in on Beresford. His 1989 Driving Miss Daisy won the Oscar for Best Picture.

“He loved the script of Birth of Nation. Was fascinated by its story. Was impressed by Indira Gandhi. And he loves India. He is perfect for Birth of a Nation, like Richard Attenborough was for Gandhi”, Shah avers.

Beresford is well known in Australia – having directed works like Don's Party, The Getting of Wisdom, The Club and Breaker Morant. The last film garnered critical acclaim for him, and this pushed him to explore newer pastures. Hollywood it was, where his Tender Mercies earned him an Oscar nod for direction in 1982.

Black Robe, one of Beresford’s later works, is considered his best, though it did not catch the eye of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (which decides the Oscars). His 2009 Mao’s Last Dancer, on the life of the ballet dancer, Li Cunxin, broke box-office records in Australia, and travelled to many festivals, including Toronto.

Birth of a Nation will be shot all over India and in Russia, the USA and the UK, and the movie’s casting will begin in May. American and British actors will be auditioned, but the most exciting aspect of this search will centre on the actress to play India’s Iron Lady.

(Incidentally, The Iron Lady was the title of a recent biopic on Margaret Thatcher, played on the screen by Meryl Streep, who won the Best Actress Oscar this year.)

Will it be Madhuri Dixit as the grapevine would have us believe? But Shah’s answer to that is an emphatic “no”. It will be “essayed by either a newcomer or a Bollywood star, somebody who can capture the spirit and stature of Indira Gandhi”, he adds.

Now who is that someone with the steely spirit of Mrs G?

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John to turn producer, director, maybe writer!

By Hindustan Times

It’s been nine years since John Abraham made a sizzling debut in Jism (2003). And now the model-turned-actor, who has an MBA degree, is keen to build himself as an “honest, credible, commercially viable” brand with three verticals: actor, producer and director.

And, maybe even scriptwriter. His role model is Farhan Akhtar who started out as a writer-lyricist, before moving to producing, directing, acting and singing in movies. Today, he balances all his roles.

“Acting will always be my focus, and the big-budget films that define John Abraham such as Housefull 2, Race 2 and Dostana 2 will keep coming. But I also want to make commercial, entertaining movies that reflect my ideology. I want all the verticals to co-exist in a revenue model that benefits my studio and the paying public, ” he says.

John’s been working closely with Sanjay Gupta on Shootout At Wadala, which went on the floors on Thursday. For now, the actor has been reading up on Manya Surve and meeting those who knew the late gangster.

He’s also been brainstorming with Shoojit Sircar on Vicky Donor, JA Entertainment Pvt Ltd’s maiden production that opens on May 11. In September, his second production, Jaffna will kick off.

“Shoojit was surprised I knew so much about Sri Lanka and its history. I’m very socially and politically aware and know more about the world than what’s happening in Bollywood. I have been writing a lot recently, mostly fiction. Maybe one of the stories could turn into a screenplay and I could turn director,” he says, adding, “If the idea is good, I could fly with it next year or in two years or maximum five years.”

After almost a decade, actor John has turned the corner. And the buzz is that post his break-up with Bipasha Basu, he’s found the perfect match in Priya Marwah with whom he secretly tied the knot in Los Angeles earlier this year.

He laughs off the rumours, “Married? Thank God there aren’t any children yet. I’ve always been fiercely guarded about my personal life, so all I’ll say is that there’s a lot happening in my life now. It’s a new beginning.”

Jaffna in Sri Lanka
“George Clooney’s geopolitical thriller, Syriana (2005) ranks amongst my favourite films and I want to enter the same space with Jaffna,” says John, who’s gearing up to go shoot his second production in Sri Lanka with local artistes.Previously, his film Water (2005), which was nominated for the Oscars,was filmed in Sri Lanka. Refusing to divulge more, John insists that Jaffna will go beyond the LTTE and the contentious Tamil issue and surprise people with a well-researched story about what actually happened in Sri Lanka.

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Bollywood producer in trouble for faking police letterhead

Mumbai:  The Mumbai police has registered a case against producer Sanjay Gupta. As part of the promotions for his new film, Shootout at Wadala, Mr Gupta copied the letterhead of the Mumbai Police Commissioner; this was used to send out invites for the film's unveiling.

The police case against Mr Gupta accuses him of cheating and forgery.

He has been summoned by the police to record his statement.

The film is being produced by Ekta Kapoor's Balaji Films and Gupta. It releases in December this year and stars Anil Kapoor, Kangana Ranaut, John Abraham and Tusshar Kapoor.

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