Robert Pattinson Is One Intense Guy: Would Kristen Stewart Agree?

Robert Pattinson and his impressive acting skills have been no secret to Twi-hards who have fawned over their favorite vampire, Edward Cullen, ever since The Twilight Saga commenced. And, most recently, all the buzz has been pointed at Pattinson and girlfriend Kristen Stewart's powerful scenes in the upcoming installment, Breaking Dawn, out in November.

But, aside from the Twilight zone, the British heart-throb has heated up a host of other flicks. They may have not received as much attention, but Pattinson still managed to impress fans, co-stars and directors alike with his talent that's all the more admirable, as it is tempered by his down-to-earth demeanor.

Take Water For Elephants with actress Reese Witherspoon, who became fast friends with Pattinson and had nothing but praise for her co-star. As well, Christina Ricci, Pattinson's love interest in Bel-Ami recently said, "He's great... He's so professional. He comes to set with no expectations or attitude. None of those things you worry someone of his level of fame is going to have."

Now, Cosmopolis director David Cronenberg has showered rave reviews on Robert Pattinson and his performance in that film, a role for which he notably butchered his signature hair, rocking an uneven, half-shaven 'do. Anything for his craft!

According to Hollywood Life, Cronenberg told Vogue Italia, "[Rob is] one of the most intense actors of this generation. He'll blow your mind."

Wow, that is some compliment. No doubt Kristen Stewart would agree, as Pattinson's talent and his passion is probably what she finds as one of his most attractive qualities. Robert Pattinson has long had the reputation for a slightly brooding and intense acting sensibility, making him perfect for Twilight-type roles and winning him countless fans the world over. Now, he's received quite the seal of approval from an influential director, too.

Bodyguard gets good opening in UK

Hindi film Bodyguard, starring Salman Khan and Kareena Kapoor, has opened well in the UK.

Movie Review: Bodyguard

Newyork Times Review: Bodyguard

"While expectations from a Salman Khan film on Eid are very high, Bodyguard has beaten pre-opening estimations. It has taken a stupendous start at the global box office. These include the single largest days collections in India and the highest opening day in India and the UAE," a spokesperson of the film said.

The film has also opened to a record mid-week in the UK. Tuesday saw limited screens at 32 cinemas taking 64,000 pounds. Wednesday's full release saw 51 cinemas culminating in 195,000 pounds, making it the highest opening day for any Indian movie to date.

Sanjeev Lamba, CEO of Reliance Entertainment, said, "Bodyguard has capped an extremely successful summer line-up from our stable, which also included stellar performers like Singham and Double Dhamaal."

Read more at: http://movies.ndtv.com/movie_story.aspx?ID=ENTEN20110183306&keyword=bollywood&subcatg=MOVIESINDIA&nid=130886&cp

Movie Review: New York Times reviews Salman's Bodyguard

Cast: Salman Khan, Kareena Kapoor, Raj Babbar, Hazel Keech, Aditya Pancholi and Mahesh Manjrekar Music: Sandeep Shirodkar, Himesh Reshammiya, Pritam Chakraborty Director: Siddique Producer: Atul Agnihotri and Alvira Agnihotri Writer: Siddique Lyricist: Shabbir Ahmed, Neelesh Misra

The Hindi-language film Bodyguard has nothing to do with the Whitney Houston and Kevin Costner love story from 1992, though it does concern an attractive woman and a man hired to protect her, and is a towering geyser of sentiment. But it’s a bit closer to Jason Statham’s Transporter movies, with plenty of over-the-top fight choreography. Except that the male lead isn’t tearing across the countryside in a black Audi. And there’s frustrated ardor. And music-video-style production numbers.

The barrel-chested Lovely Singh (Salman Khan) is a ramrod-straight protector hired by a tycoon (Raj Babbar) to attend to his precocious daughter, Divya (a one-dimensional Kareena Kapoor), at college. Annoyed by his humorless, unflagging devotion to duty, she resolves, with her best friend, Maya (the beguiling Hazel Keech), to distract him by posing as a secret admirer (with an untraceable number) on his cellphone.

But soon her deception lands Lovely and Divya in hot water with her father’s underworld enemies, for reasons not elucidated, and imperils their inevitable romance. This grants Lovely the chance to pummel a horde of scowling grunts in a frenzy of whiplash editing and over-amped sound effects before returning to the fraught courtship.

Mr. Khan, seasoned Bollywood beefcake, is a well-muscled hunk who doesn’t take himself too seriously in fight scenes. (Like Mr. Statham in Transporter mode he manages to doff his shirt in mid-brawl, which prompted howls of delight at the screening I attended.) If only the film’s archly slick director, Siddique, had adopted the same winking attitude toward the romantic arc. A twist near the end sends this contrived movie into a maudlin stratosphere from which it doesn’t recover. But at least, in Ms. Keech’s supporting presence, understated yet palpable, we sense a performer of emerging, and remarkable, star power.

Preity Zinta to be honoured at Venice Film Festival

Actress Preity Zinta will be honoured at the Venice Film Festival for bringing cultural harmony through her work.

The actress will be awarded the "World Diamond Group Platinum Award for Peoples? Friendship" at the Kineo "Diamanti al Cinema" event at the 68th Venice Film Festival for her contribution towards reconciliation and cultural harmony among people of different cultures.

Preity will be felicitated with a white olive tree, with its tree trunk sculpted off a block of Carrara hand-carved marble, and its branches and leaves fashioned out of 3,333 grams of platinum and 3,003 diamonds - 2,503 marquise cut and 500 new 82 facets round cut - adding to a total of 366 carats.

Before leaving for the festival, an excited Preity posted on microblogging site Twitter Friday: "Its time 2 say goodbye 2 French Fries and Hi 2 French Fashion ! Yess... I will leave 4 Venice Film Festival Tomorrow. So excited."

Read more at: http://movies.ndtv.com/movie_story.aspx?ID=ENTEN20110183408&keyword=bollywood&subcatg=MOVIESINDIA&nid=131115&cp

Salman film breaks SRK's overseas record

Salman Khan-starrer Bodyguard is on a record-breaking spree. After a stupendous opening in the domestic market, the film has surpassed the record of Shah Rukh Khan-starrer My Name Is Khan by earning 194,000 GBP on the first day of screening in Britain.

My Name is Khan had collected 191,000 pounds on the opening day in Britain.

The film is also on its way to becoming the highest grosser in the Middle East. It has collected $1.6 million in the first two days, just a little behind the previous highest grosser Dabangg which collected $1.7 million.

"Reliance Entertainment's overseas team is delighted to have delivered one of the biggest overseas hits of the year. Bodyguard is poised to be a record-breaking success for Salman Khan in the international markets," Sanjeev Lamba, CEO Reliance Entertainment said in a statement.

The film, which also stars Kareena Kapoor in the lead, has earned $3.8 million in the US and is expected to overhaul the $5 million collections of Dabangg.

Read more at: http://movies.ndtv.com/movie_story.aspx?ID=ENTEN20110183405&keyword=bollywood&subcatg=MOVIESINDIA&nid=131113&cp

Movie Review: The Man in the Maze

Cast: Andrew Roth, Liana Werner-Gray, Erik A. Williams, Stephanie Long Lomenick Director: Mitesh Kumar Patel

There are some films which are so inconsistent in every department that it becomes a masterpiece of an example to show aspiring filmmakers exactly what not to do. The Man in the Maze is a film which reaches excellence in that department.

Three friends camping in the woods are assaulted by a stranger wearing bandages on his face. The fourth friend escapes and manages to sneak up on the masked man and save his friends. They beat up and tie the man and try to find their way out of the woods but it seems someone is trailing them.

There are so many things wrong with the film that it will perhaps take a book to recount them all. But let's state a few.

The major problem is the story. It is inspired by the French time-travel film Timecrimes with elements of mysticism added to it.

However, while Timecrimes was a perfectly logical film that ties all loose ends and explains all doubts, this one does such a shoddy job, relying on disgracefully shot scenes of Red Indians (played by its Indian director Mitesh Kumar Patel) that you squirm in your seat with disgust.

Secondly, the writers have a misconception about them being good dialogue writers. The four characters thus go on and on for a majority of the film without either the horror or the suspense ever unfolding.

Finally when it does, the treatment is so bad, that it seems to have been not only done by someone who has never wielded a camera but someone who has the brains of a junior school kid.

The camera work is inconsistent, acting is nowhere to be seen, music is all over the place, the conceptualisation of scenes and flow is so bad that you have to literally tear your head.

For example, after almost being killed by a masked man, and in a jungle that is far from civilization, the four friends go through the jungle as if they are taking a walk in the park. No one seems scared or in any hurry.

Movie Review: That Girl In Yellow Boots

Cast: Kalki Koechlin, Naseeruddin Shah and Shiv Subramaniyam Director: Anurag Kashyap Producer: Anurag Kashyap

The only hint of colour that there is in the life of the female protagonist is confined to her boots. It is significant that we do not see that piece of fancy leather footwear ever again after the introductory scene, which provides a worm’s eye-view of British citizen Ruth (co-screenwriter Kalki Koechlin) patiently waiting for her turn at the foreigners’ registration office in Mumbai.

The girl is here to seek an extension of her tourist visa. But she doesn’t palpably have a chance in hell in this beehive of slothful, corrupt and predatory government functionaries out to extract their pound of flesh.

Director Anurag Kashyap projects this den of exploitative red-tape as a microcosm of sorts of a pitiless city that breeds social and moral deviants who think nothing of riding roughshod over the destinies of the defenseless.

The superbly crafted, wonderfully acted and consistently evocative That Girl in Yellow Boots paints a dark, dismal and desperate portrait of life inside Mumbai’s daunting entrails where Ruth hopes to find salvation and a father who went missing from her life when she was only five.

In order to merely stay afloat in this putrid urban cesspool, the girl works in a massage parlour where she services wrinkled, lustful old men, going beyond the call of duty to make some money on the side.

Just as gloomy and grim is the dank ambience of Ruth’s little home, which seems to be under constant siege. It is invaded frequently by a coke-snorting boyfriend Prashant (Prashant Prakash), a Kannada-speaking gangster Chitiappa (Gulshan Devaiah) and sundry other strangers out to exploit her vulnerability.

That is the price that she must pay for being an illegal migrant: the search for her father brings her face to face with the dregs of society as she is dragged head first through the moral muck of a massive metropolis where Ruth is reduced to a hapless prey.

Kashyap’s film is structured like an urban thriller sans the fisticuffs and gunfights. But the sights and sounds of the city remain on the fringes of Ruth’s ill-fated quest for happiness. The focus of the drama is squarely on the protagonist’s inner traumas as she negotiates dangers and bitter truths at every step.

That Girl in Yellow Boots does not traverse familiar thriller terrain. We see stray bits of the city entirely from the perspective of Ruth’s alien eyes. She isn’t familiar with the dynamics of Mumbai; so the view is tempered with a degree of bewilderment.

We see Mumbai from a half-open window of the massage parlour or from the entrance to her home or in the form of what Ruth catches from a moving auto-rickshaw or taxi. She does not have the wherewithal to come to grips with Mumbai. It is too overpowering for her.

The Mumbai that we usually see on the big screen has as much music and magic as mayhem and madness. But in the city that this film depicts, there can be no room for a fairy tale. It gnaws into the vitals of individuals in insidious ways and leaves them gasping for a gust of the fresh air of innocence and honesty.