I’ve Made a Career with Unconventional Choices: Anushka Sharma on Completing 10 Years in Films

Los Angeles, Apr 28: A top-secret documentary feature about former first lady Michelle Obama is set to start streaming worldwide on Netflix from May 6.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, the doc shares its title with Michelle Obama's best-selling 2018 memoir "Becoming" and recounts some of the same history of her life.

"Becoming", like the best documentary feature Oscar winner "American Factory", comes from Higher Ground, the production company run by former President Barack Obama and the former first lady, which has an exclusive pact with the streamer.

The documentary marks the feature directorial debut of cinematographer Nadia Hallgren known for her work on "Trouble the Water", the 2008 indie about a couple surviving failed levees, bungling bureaucrats, and their own troubled past and a portrait of a community abandoned long before Hurricane Katrina hit.

"Becoming" also picks up where that story left off by following her on the 34-city tour that she undertook while promoting her book.

"Those months I spent traveling meeting and connecting with people in cities across the globe drove home the idea that what we share in common is deep and real and can't be messed with.

"In groups large and small, young and old, unique and united, we came together and shared stories, filling those spaces with our joys, worries and dreams. We processed the past and imagined a better future. In talking about the idea of 'becoming,' many of us dared to say our hopes out loud," Michelle Obama said in a statement.

The former first lady also addressed the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.

"It's hard these days to feel grounded or hopeful, but I hope that like me, you'll find joy and a bit of respite in what Nadia has made. Because she's a rare talent, someone whose intelligence and compassion for others comes through in every frame she shoots.

"Most importantly, she understands the meaning of community, the power of community, and her work is magically able to depict it.

Jaipur, Jan 24: Actor Sonali Bendre has said that she came into the movies to make money but fell in love with the profession where she discovered herself and found her family and friends. The 45-year-old actor said she owed a lot to Bollywood which is the most wonderful place to be, both mentally as well as creatively.

"I came into movies to make money and I fell in love with the profession. It was the most wonderful place to be, mentally and creatively," she said.

"I found myself there, found my friends and family over there. I owe a lot to Bollywood. It was one of the most wonderful things that happened to me," Sonali said here on Thursday.

The actor said her entry into movies by purely because she happened to be at the right place and at the right time.

Sonali added when acting offers came her way she knew that in no other field could she have made as much money, and as quickly, as she did in movies.

"Basically, I got into this because it was great money," she said.

The actor was speaking at the Jaipur Literature Festival and also talked about books and how her book club named ‘Sonali's Book Club' came into being.

Sonali, who has been convalescing after undergoing treatment for cancer in the US, said that books gave her strength and kept her afloat while she was going through one of the toughest phases of her life.

The actor was diagnosed with high grade cancer in July 2018 and underwent treatment for it in New York.

"Books were my friends other than my sisters while I was growing up. I'm nowhere remotely connected to movies. I have a very middle class Maharashtrian upbringing. When I got into movies, it was like being on another planet. Again in this world where it was easy to feel the peer pressure and do certain things or not do certain things, or look a certain way, books kept me grounded," she said.

"'A Gentleman in Moscow' (a 2016 novel by Amor Towles) was uplifting and I got so much strength from that book during my treatment in New York," Sonali said.

The actor, who often shares posts about books and authors on social media, said one should stop feeling guilty about not completing a book.

"Sometimes you start judging yourself by not completing a book, but I have reached a stage where I understand that I'm a book-lover, but that doesn't mean I will like all the books. It's okay if you don't like a book," she said.

Sonali also said that nobody wanted to know about the intellectual capacity of Bollywood stars as it was not "entertainment enough or gossipy enough".

Earlier before her session, Sonali launched author Ashwin Sanghi's latest book ‘The Vault of Vishnu', the sixth book in the Bharat series, at the 13th edition of the festival.

Kolhapur, Feb 21: Voicing against Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA), renowned lyrics and thinker Javed Akhtar has said that the act was an assault to secularism and integrity of India and with the ongoing protests, the nation had reached a threshold for an another struggle.

Speaking here on Thursday night at an event organised on the 5th death anniversary of CPI senior leader and progressive leader Com Govind Pansare, Mr Akhtar said the newly amended citizenship act was a plot to split the country.

Mr Javed said that communalism has a deep root in India and it spread after the formation of Hindu Mahasabha and Muslim League in British India. "Muslim league got Pakistan but Hindu Mahasabha is still unsatisfied," he alleged and added that BJP was now 'working as a branch of RSS' and trying to 'split the country' through NRC.