Shivaay doesn't have religion angle: Ajay Devgn

August 8, 2016

Mumbai, Aug 8: Actor-producer Ajay Devgn says his upcoming film "Shivaay" won't hurt any religious sentiments as the movie deals with human elements of Lord Shiva.

ShivaayAjay, who has also directed the movie, said he is not portraying Shiva but a common man, who is a devotee of the God.

"There is no religion (angle in the film). I am not portraying Shiva. If you see my lines also, 'jiske bheetar basa Shivaay', (means) who has Shiva in his heart. In the film also, he is not sitting and meditating and praying. He has got tattoos of Shiva all over his body and he is called Shivaay in the film," the 47-year-old "Drishyam" star said in an interview on the sidelines of the film's trailer launch in Indore. Ajay said Shiva was the only God who had flaws and that was an interesting concept to toy with.

"The thought is, man who believes in the supernatural power. Shiva, I feel, is the only God which also connects to today's youth. Every other God is flawless, Shiva is the only god with all the flaws.

"He smokes, drink 'bhang', when he gets wild he will kill randomly, then he will realise that he has made a mistake, people can fool him also. He is good by heart.. When he gets violent he is terrible. This is what humans are. Shiva, I feel is the only God which has all the elements," the actor said.

This much-ambitious project took two years to complete and Ajay said the film needed special attention as he didn't want to make "mediocre" stuff.

"I am bored of making films which are mediocre. We have to raise the bar. Somebody has to make an effort. For that you have to make lots of sacrifices. I have not worked for the past two years in any other film."

The actor cut his fee too for the movie as he believed the grand scale of "Shivaay" needed sacrifices from him.

"Technically, people will think I've lost so much of revenue because I've not worked. In a film like this, to make it on this scale, if I would've kept my remuneration as an actor and a director, I don't think that was possible. So, that also I sacrificed."

When asked how did the idea to make "Shivaay" struck him, Ajay said it was writer Sandeep Srivastava who came up with a thought which was inspired from a true incident.

"There was a thought which Sandeep my writer had, which was inspired from a true incident. Not that I made (the film on) true incident but it was inspired from there, we had read an article. From there, I thought the emotional ground was very strong. It's not about the story, its about the screenplay. So that's how it started."

Ajay is making a return to direction after eight years. His last directorial venture was romantic drama "U Me aur Hum", which had him and wife Kajol in lead roles.

The film didn't do well at the box-office and the actor feels it was because people didn't have an idea about Alzheimer's disease on which the movie was based.

"The kind of response I got for 'U Me aur Hum', here the emotional drama was concerned, you'll see some articles stuck in my office also..It did very well in overseas and urban market.

"But you can't call it a blockbuster because half the country didn't understand what Alzheimer's is." Meanwhile, "Shivaay" is set to release on October 28. It also stars newcomers Sayyeishaa Saigal and Erica.

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May 24,2020

Los Angeles, May 24: Filmmaker Frank Marshall, one of the producers behind Jurassic World: Dominion, says the forthcoming film is not a conclusion of the franchise.

Colin Trevorrow, who rebooted Steven Spielberg's blockbuster Jurassic Park franchise with 2015's Jurassic World, is back on the director's chair after sitting out on second movie Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (2018).

Asked about the upcoming movie, Marshall told Collider: "It's the start of a new era."

Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard are coming back for the third film, which will also feature original stars of 1993's Jurassic Park -- Laura Dern, Jeff Goldblum and Sam Neill.

The producer also revealed how he sees the film franchise extending into the future.

"The dinosaurs are now on the mainland amongst us, and they will be for quite some time, I hope," Marshall said.

The film was three weeks into production when it was shut down over coronavirus concerns, but the producer said the team has the sets built in London and will be "back in business" once they have guidelines from the British government.

Dominion is still slated to be released on its scheduled date of June 11, 2021.

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News Network
February 12,2020

London, Feb 12: Oscar-winning British director Steve McQueen is returning to his art roots with a series of short films at London's Tate Modern art gallery, offering a sensory exploration of black identity.

McQueen, who became the first black director to win the best picture Academy Award in 2014 for "12 Years a Slave", is now based between London and Amsterdam and is focused on championing diversity in the film industry.

Visitors to his new exhibition will be greeted by "Static", a film of New York's Statue of Liberty, scrutinising the iconic symbol from every possible angle at very close range against a deafening backdrop of the helicopter from where the footage was filmed.

"What interests Steve is our view of the world, how humans are trying to represent Liberty," said Fiontan Moran, assistant curator of the exhibition.

"7th Nov, 2001" features a still shot of a body while McQueen's cousin Marcus tells of how he accidentally killed his brother, a particularly traumatic experience for the artist.

"Western Deep" is another visceral work, giving a sense through sights and sounds in an interactive installation of the experiences of miners in South Africa, following them to the bottom of the mine.

"Ashes", meanwhile, is a tribute to a young fisherman from Grenada, the island where McQueen's family originated.

The images of beauty and sweetness filmed from his boat are tragically reversed on the other side of the projection screen, which shows a grave commissioned by McQueen for the eponymous young fisherman, who was killed by drug traffickers.

African-American singer, actor and civil rights activist Paul Robeson (1898-1976) is honoured in "End Credits".

The film shows censored FBI documents detailing the agency's surveillance of Robeson, read by a voice-over artist, for five hours.

"He is... testing the limits of how people can be documented in an era of mass surveillance," said Moran.

In a similarly militant vein, the exhibition features the sculpture "Weight", which was first shown in the prison cell where the writer and playwright Oscar Wilde was imprisoned.

It depicts a golden mosquito net draped over a metal prison bed frame, addressing the theme of confinement and the power of the imagination to break free.

The show runs alongside an exhibition of McQueen's giant portraits of London school classes, many of which appeared on the streets of London last year.

"I remember my first school trip to Tate when I was an impressionable eight-year-old, which was really the moment I gained an understanding that anything is possible," said McQueen, adding it was "where in some ways my journey as an artist first began".

He recently told the Financial Times newspaper the difference between his art films and his feature films was that the former were poetry, the latter like a novel.

"Poetry is condensed, precise, fragmented," he said. "The novel is the yarn".

The exhibition opens on February 13 and runs until May 11.

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Agencies
August 2,2020

Mumbai, Aug 2: Oscar-winning director Alfonso Cuaron has come aboard as an executive producer on filmmaker Chaitanya Tamhane's movie The Disciple. The Marathi feature is set to represent India at the 77th edition of the Venice Film Festival. It will be screened in the Competition section of the prestigious film gala.

The movie, which is Tamhane's follow-up to his National Award-winning feature Court, has also been selected for 2020 Toronto International Film Festival's official line-up.

"I met Chaitanya through a mentorship program where I had the opportunity to watch his very superb debut film, Court  I was immediately impressed by his sense of cinema and fearless confidence to tell stories.

"He was part of most of Roma's process and I jumped to the opportunity to be part of the process of his second film The Disciple. I believe Chaitanya is one of the most important new voices of contemporary cinema," Cuaron said in a statement.

Tamhane said he is honoured to have Cuaron aboard the film.

"It’s a bit surreal and an incredible honour for me to have one of the most recognised and acclaimed filmmakers in the world be part of 'The Disciple'. In some ways, this validation from Alfonso Cuaron is even more," he added.

The Disciple, a 127-minute long feature, stars Aditya Modak, Arun Dravid, Sumitra Bhave, and Kiran Yadnyopavit. It has been produced by “Sir” actor Vivek Gomber through his Zoo Entertainment Pvt. Ltd.

The Disciple marks Tamhane’s return to Venice after he won the Best Film - Orizzonti and Lion of the Future award for Court in 2014.

Court, a poignant commentary on India's judicial system, also won the National Film Award for Best Feature Film in 2015 and was India's official entry for the Best Foreign Film at the 2016 Oscars.

Endeavor Content will sell North American rights and New Europe Film Sales boards the film as an international sales agent.

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