Salman beats Shahrukh in Times Celebex Ranking

Jun 25: Bollywood star Sushant Singh Rajput’s last movie “Dil Bechara” is getting a release on Disney+Hotstar on July 24.

With an aim to honour the legacy of the actor, the streaming platform is making the movie available to even the non-subscribers.

Rajput was found dead at his Bandra home on June 14 at the age of 34.

Billed as a soulful love story, “Dil Bechara” marks the directorial debut of casting director and Rajput's industry friend Mukesh Chhabra. The film is produced by Fox Star Studios.

“We are humbled to be able to play a small part in sustaining the legacy of a fine actor like Sushant Singh Rajput. In celebration of his life and his extraordinary work, 'Dil Bechara' will release directly on digital this July on Disney+ Hotstar; and will be available to all subscribers and non-subscribers across India. Our prayers and wishes to his family and loved ones,” Uday Shankar, President – The Walt Disney Company APAC and Chairman, Star & Disney India, said.

The actor had a long-standing relationship with the STAR & Disney India network, having started his career with the show “Kis Desh Mein Hai Meraa Dil” in 2008 to his Bollywood transition where he delivered some of his most memorable performances in “M.S. Dhoni: The Untold Story” (2016) and “Chhichhore” (2019), both produced by Fox Star Studios.

Chhabra said he never imagined he would release the film without Rajput.

 “Sushant was not just the hero of my debut film as a director, but he was a dear friend who stood by me through thick and thin. We had been close right from 'Kai Po Che!' to 'Dil Bechara'. He had promised me that he would be in my first film.

"So many plans were made together, so many dreams were dreamt together but never once did I ever imagine that I would be left alone to release this film. He always showered immense love on me while I was making it and his love will guide us as we release it,” the director said.

“Dil Bechara” is the official remake of 2014 Hollywood romantic drama “The Fault in our Stars”, which was based on John Green’s popular novel of the same name. The Hindi adaptation of the movie was done by Shashank Khaitan and Suprotim Sengupta.

“Dil Bechara” will see Rajput in a leading role alongside debutante Sanjana Sanghi, and Saif Ali Khan in an interesting cameo.

The music of the film has been composed by AR Rahman and the lyrics are by Amitabh Bhattacharya.

“Dil Bechara” revolves around Kizie Basu (Sanghi) and Immanuel Rajkumar Junior or Manny (Rajput) and explores the funny, thrilling, and tragic adventure of being alive and in love.

Together Kizie and Manny embark on an on-off-up-down-sad and sweet profound journey into the heart of that crazy little thing called life. It teaches them what it means to feel truly alive and fall in love.

Mumbai, Mar 28: Bollywood superstar Akshay Kumar has donated Rs 25 crore to Prime Minister Narendra Modi''s initiative PM CARES Fund to lend support to the ongoing battle against the coronavirus pandemic.

Akshay wrote on Twitter: "This is that time when all that matters is the lives of our people. And we need to do anything and everything it takes. I pledge to contribute Rs 25 crores from my savings to Narendra Modi ji''s PM-CARES Fund. Let''s save lives, Jaan hai toh jahaan hai."

Earlier, the government set up the Prime Minister''s Citizen Assistance and Relief in Emergency Situations Fund, or the PM CARES Fund, with the objective of dealing with emergency situations such as the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Contributors to the fund will enjoy tax benefits, it has been announced.

"People from all walks of life expressed their desire to donate to India''s war against COVID-19. Respecting that spirit, the Prime Minister''s Citizen Assistance and Relief in Emergency Situations Fund has been constituted. This will go a long way in creating a healthier India," PM Modi announced in a tweet on Saturday.

The Prime Minister is the chairman of the trust that includes the home minister, the finance minister the defence minister

Los Angeles, Feb 6: U.S. silver screen legend Kirk Douglas, the son of Jewish Russian immigrants who rose through the ranks to become one of Hollywood's biggest stars, has died, his family said Wednesday. He was 103.

One of the last survivors of the golden age of cinema and the father of Oscar-winning actor and film-maker Michael Douglas, the Spartacus actor was renowned for the macho tough guy roles he took on in around 90 movies over a six-decade career.

"It is with tremendous sadness that my brothers and I announce that Kirk Douglas left us today at the age of 103," Michael Douglas said in a statement posted to Facebook.

"To the world he was a legend, an actor from the golden age of movies who lived well into his golden years, a humanitarian whose commitment to justice and the causes he believed in set a standard for all of us to aspire to."

Douglas was Oscar-nominated for his roles as a double-crossing and womanizing boxer in Champion (1949), a ruthless movie producer in The Bad and the Beautiful (1952) and tortured artist Vincent Van Gogh in Lust for Life (1956).

But his only Academy Award came in 1995 -- an honorary lifetime achievement statuette "for 50 years as a creative and moral force in the motion picture community."

Douglas is survived by second wife Anne Buydens, 100, and three sons. A fourth child, Eric, died of a drug overdose in his 40s, in 2004.

"(To) me and my brothers Joel and Peter he was simply Dad, to Catherine (Zeta-Jones), a wonderful father-in-law, to his grandchildren and great grandchild their loving grandfather, and to his wife Anne, a wonderful husband," said Michael.

"Kirk's life was well lived, and he leaves a legacy in film that will endure for generations to come, and a history as a renowned philanthropist who worked to aid the public and bring peace to the planet."

Kirk Douglas rose to the heights of Hollywood from an impoverished childhood as the son of Jewish Russian immigrants.

He was one of the last survivors of the golden age of cinema, often portraying the macho and not-always-likeable tough guy in around 90 movies over a six-decade career.

With charming dimples and a cleft chin, Douglas was a renowned ladies' man but also admitted to being angry into adulthood because of his difficult New York childhood.

"I still have anger in me," he said in a New York Times article in 1988 after the release of his first autobiography.

"I think I'm loath to let it go because I think that anger was the fuel I used in accomplishing what I wanted to do; you see it in my films, you see it in imitations people do of me."

Screen legend

The role that perhaps immortalized him as a star was that of a rebellious Roman Empire slave turned gladiator in the 1960 epic Spartacus.

Douglas also produced the film, which took four Oscars. He won praise for listing in the credits the real name of Hollywood screenwriter Dalton Trumbo, who was blacklisted for his Communist sympathies and wrote under a pen name.

There were Oscar nominations for his roles as a double-crossing and womanizing boxer in Champion (1949), a ruthless movie producer in The Bad and the Beautiful (1952) and of tortured artist Vincent Van Gogh in Lust for Life (1956).

But his only Oscar came in 1995 as an honorary lifetime achievement award "for 50 years as a creative and moral force in the motion picture community."

Other major acting roles were as a French private in a botched suicidal mission in World War I in Paths of Glory (1957) and American Western legend Doc Holliday in Gunfight at the O.K. Corral (1957).

"Often cast as a villain, amoral climber or self-obsessed grabber, Kirk Douglas took care to color his hard edges with suggestions of pain, wit and sympathy," says American Film Institute, which ranks him as 17th on its list of the greatest male screen legends.

In the 1970s he stood behind the camera, directing Scalawag (1973) and Posse (1975).

He also took up writing, penning his first autobiography The Ragman's Son in 1988 and following with around 10 other titles.

In the autobiography, Douglas writes: "I always worked in the theory that when you play a weak character, find a moment when he's strong. And if you're playing a strong character, find a moment when he's weak."

Tough childhood

Douglas was born in New York on December 9, 1916 to illiterate Jewish Russian immigrants, an only boy with six sisters.

He started out as Issur Danielovitch, later Izzy Demsky. It was tough, he recounted later, with the family poor, anti-Semitism rife and his distant alcoholic father forced to earn a living as a ragman.

"In a sense, I've always felt on the outside, looking in," he said in the New York Times article.

"It's my background, damn it. My father was an illiterate Russian immigrant, a ragman, the lowest rung on the economic scale."

His dream of a way out was through acting and he started in high school, eventually entering the American Academy of Dramatic Arts and changing his name along the way.

To survive he took jobs as a waiter, labourer and porter. In 1941 he hit Broadway but his budding career was interrupted by service in the Navy. After the war, he headed for Hollywood.

His romantic conquests were many, although he once said he had never counted, and included starls such as Rita Hayworth, Marlene Dietrich, Joan Crawford and Ava Gardner.

Douglas' four sons followed him into cinema.

Oscar-winning actor and producer Michael and Joel were from a marriage to actress Diana Webster, whom he divorced in 1951.

Three years later he married Belgian-American Anne Buydens, having Peter and then Eric, who died in 2004 from an accidental overdose.

Douglas has also brushed death: he survived a helicopter crash in 1991 and a massive stroke in 1996 that nearly robbed him of speech.

Around the time of his 100th birthday in 2016, he attributed his remarkable longevity to his second marriage.

"I was lucky enough to find my soulmate 63 years ago, and I believe our wonderful marriage and our nightly 'golden hour' chats have helped me survive all things," he said in celebrity magazine Closer Weekly.