Bigg Boss 3 Malayalam stopped by Police - Contestant Dimple- Manikutaan RT report not given

Bigg Boss Malayalam season 3 shoot at EVP Film city in Chennai was stopped by Police after Chennai Corporation directed it to do so. The remaining contestants wearing PPE suits were shifted to the city hotel, Dimple Bhal ,one of the contestant, had left for Delhi- Meerut to attend the cremation of her father and two weeks later reported back on the show sets. Corporation officials have asked producers to show the negative result of Dimple on the day of joining the set.

On the 94th day, Corporation officials got 17 positive results from the camera unit of the show. They were asked to stop shoot. The shoot continued at EVP film city citing that Govt had not informed them and that the affected were removed from the film city. Tamil Media reports pointed out the stance of Show must go on of the Producer despite the citing of positive cases in the unit. Producers said that the crew did not come into contact with contestants as per the show's rules and other than contestants no body were inside the Bigg Boss House and all equipment and cooking provisions were given after sanitised.

The police was asked to seal the EVP film city exit points and the Bigg Boss house. Crew members numbering 60 were taken away in vans from the spot and contestants shifted to a city hotel for quarantine.

Complaint has been raised about the exit of contestant  Manikuttan for a brief period and said to be in the secret room and coming back as he should have been tested  but no mention was made about it by the producer in the show. Similarly Dimple Bhal was in Delhi- Meerut during the peak of Covid 19 surge in these cities.

As she was attending the cremation of her father, her coming into contact with outsiders was possible. Her being in quarantine or her test result was not mentioned in the time of re-entry to the show. Every week the host Mohanlal undergoes a RT PCR test before the shoot starts. Corporation has filed charges against EVP on various sections of the Pandemic Act and levied a Rs 1 lakh penalty. The show that ends in 100 days extended for 14 days as the contestant were quarantined for that period before entering the Bigg Boss House.

Film- TV trade unions apex body FEFSI had publicly announced that they were withdrawing their members from TV shoots as many were dying or in serious condition. FEFSI had got TN CM Stalin to allow 16 TV shoots to continue despite lock down. As toll mounted, FEFSI withdrew the members. Bigg Boss crew has majority of crew members who come from Mumbai and not members of FEFSI. When Bigg Boss Tamil started , it was all Mumbai crew. FEFSI threatened to stop shoot and even barged into shooting spot. Host Kamalhassan struck a deal with FEFSI by which  40% members were from the Chennai union.There was a grouse that Mumbai technicians were paid as per rates for Hindi TV shows while local guys got paid one third of it.

Rekated link: https://southfilmy.blogspot.com/2021/05/bigg-boss-malayalam-3-contestants-get.html

For once a Good News to cheer !!! Suriya -Sudha Kongara film Soorarai Pottru third best after The Godfather

Chennai,May19: Soorarai Pottru starring Suriya in leading role and directed by Sudha Kongara is third best film rated globally by IMDb, after Shawshank Redemption and Godfather. Reacting to this news, she told The federal that "  “It is the greatest pleasure. Being right next to my most favourite film, and the film that inspired me to get into cinema—The Godfather.”. IMDb the online date base for movies and streaming content has user rating done globally. Usually Indian movies compete for the worst rating, the recent addition to this list being Radhe of Salman Khan and directed by Prabhudeva.

Sudha, a former AD to Mani Ratnam came into prominence with Irudhi Suttru starring Madhavan as a boxing coach ( Saala Khasoos in Hindi) and her recent outing was in Netflix anthology Paava Kadhaigal, Sudha felt that the movie moved up the charts due to the present situation in the world. She said“These are heart-breaking times for people across the globe. The core of Soorarai Pottru is bravery and human triumph in the face of the greatest challenges and adversities. Perhaps that is why it is resonating with the viewers in these difficult times.”

She read several times Simply Fly the autobiography of Capt Gopinath who founded Air Deccan, the first low cost airline in India. On acquiring the rights, Sudha reveals - “I was reading everything about him, and after I had one success to my name, I met him to get the rights of his book,” she said. The reason why she felt that there was a common bond between her life and that of Capt Gopinath was that both of them wanted to be different. Generally woman directors have not been able to get the dates of top box office draws especially an actor like Suriya. She proudly says - “They want to work for me because of my stories,” she explained, pointing out that both Madhavan and Suriya fell in love with her scripts and were obsessed with giving their best.

Breaking News: 6 tested positive in Bigg Boss Malayalakm 3

 

Chennai, May 16:  Bigg Boss Malayalam season 3 is in trouble as six people on the sets tested positive, according to sources in the production house. Weekly tests conducted for the crew members and the participants showed that six people tested positive as they had fever and some symptoms of Covid 19 virus infection. The finale of the reality show was planned for June 1st week telecast and shoot winding up in last week of May.

Sources did not reveal that six of those who tested positive were participants or crew members. Unconfirmed reports say that to avoid bad publicity, the production house is planning a way to end the show without creating a scare in public.  There are many fan groups operating for the contestants in the social media.

Trade union leaders who scounted the various TV serial shoots found that though majority of the crew were Covid positive, shootings were going. This they felt would act as a spreader in the residential areas where they stayed. TV serial Producers President Sujatha Vijaykumar said that shootings continued even after lock down announcement as they did not get any specific direction from the State authorities and claimed that they have a buffer of two week footage.

Will Santosh Sivan Inam on OTT irk pro Eelam groups ?

 Chennai, May 16 : Santosh Sivan tweet that Inam the Tamil film ( Ceylon in English) he directed will be seen soon on an OTT and an opportunity to those who missed it would be bad news to the pro- Eelam groups across the globe. Sivan tweeted -"Inam will be soon on an Ott platform for folks who want to see it.pl see the film first#its a tax free film from TN govt". Madras Cafe - Hindi film directed by Sircar and whose release in Tamil Nadu was objected by Eelam groups is currently available on Amazon Prime.

Inam was given by CBFC a U certificate and screened in TN theatres in March 2014, The timing was wrong. At that week of release, UN Human Rights body had voted for an investigation into the assault on LTTE by Lankan Army and it was the time that State was holding the Lok Sabha polls. BJP ally MDMK of Vaiko, a pro Eelam supporter , opposed the screening of the film and protests erupted. Jayalalithaa  had given the film a tax free certificate as one of the producer was Lingusamy, director- producer who was close to AIADMK. Lingusamy pulled out the film and the shooting of his film Aanjaan directed by him with Suriya faced protests.

Later in 2017, Lingusamy is said to have deleted scenes that the pro- Eelam groups found objectionable. Scenes objected were -Prabhakaran, referred to only as “The Leader", is dead. Eelam propagandists hold that Prabhakaran is alive, A Buddhist monk—belonging to the majority Sinhala community—offers a pomegranate to Rajini and three other orphans as they flee for their lives. One of the characters, Nandan, finds a dead Sri Lankan soldier clutching a photograph of his daughter in his hand. In another sequence, LTTE soldiers disrupt a classroom lesson and screen propaganda videos for the students. A scroll at the end suggests a death toll far less than that claimed by Eelam supporters.

The film is a story seen through the eyes of a Lankan Tamil woman  who runs an orphanage in Jaffna during the time of the crucial war. Saritha , Karunas are in the cast and Aravind Swamy has given the voice over while actor Udhayaa's wife has given voice to actor Sugandha Ram. Critics had panned the movie with The New Indian Express saying - "Inam is a pretentious piece of work, one is not exactly sure what the director wishes to convey. The film is neither entertaining nor thought provoking. There is a total lack of clarity of purpose, focus and sensitivity" Times of India wrote - Yet, somehow, Inam stops short of being a hard-hitting film. It is very reluctant to spell things out, which...makes everything a little hazy, as the context isn't firmly established...there are times when we can see Sivan leaning a little too much on his visuals to create the desired impact"

 Noted critic Baradwaj Rangan review said - "Sivan is happiest when concocting near-surreal imagery that hints at mood rather than tells a story. The big scenes, on the other hand, don’t work as well. The slice-and-dice vignettes approach results in broad characters rather than complex people capable of holding together a sustained narrative. The effort to humanise them (at least cinematically) through songs doesn’t work"

FEFSI asks TV serials to stop work till May 31 - Mani Ratnam donates Rs 10 crores for film workers

 

Chennai, May15 : Film workers apex body FEFSI announced that 16 TV shoots that were going on after getting permission from TN CM , will no longer work as the spread of Covid 19 in the cine field was rapid. FEFSI President R K Selvamani announced that Director Mani Ratnam and co- producer Jayendra deposited Rs 10 crores in the ICICI bank and has made arrangements for 10,000 FEFSI workers to get six months an amount of Rs 1500 to buy provisions for cooking . This he said was got by the director putting together an anthology project in which Suriya  and many others worked free.. The money got sale to OTT  Netflix was used for the film workers welfare. Actor Ajith has donated Rs 10 lakh to the FEFSI.

Elaborating the present situation,, Selvamani said that he had got permission from TN CM to allow TV serials numbering 16 to continue shoot as they were in various stages of production. He said that a random check showed that 25 out of 36 unit members tested positive in a TV shoot. The aged father- mother staying with the unit hand also tested positive and was hospitalized. All three of them died and the wife is yet to know about it, he said.

As most of the film workers lived with families in one room houses, the spread was harming the society at large. He said that the producer's were washing their hands off and insurance companies were citing small print to deny death beniefits due to Covid 19. In the present  situation where hospital beds are scarce, it is better that shootings be stopped. " Most of the workers reported for work as they thought that even if they were infected, their family will be free from starvation. But now it is seen that it is spreading to society at large. In the first wave, there was few deaths in filmdom but now the toll is more. Only known faces death are coming in news but several others are dying ," said Selvamani.

He said that more than giving money to FEFSI, a project like Mani Ratnam did would in the long run be helpful to film workers as 99% of them were surviving on daily wages.

Sivakumar and sons Suriya- Karthi donated Rs 1 crore to CM fund in a first followed by Ajith who gave Rs 25 lakh. Rajanikanth's daughter Soundarya wrote, "My father-in-law Mr S.S.Vanangamudi, husband Vishagan, his sister and I visited the honorable Chief minister @mkstalin sir this morning to hand over our contribution of 1cr for the chief ministers #CoronaReliefFund from our pharma company Apex laboratories, Makers of #Zincovit (sic)."  Rs 25 lakhs was donated by director- producer A R Murgadoss.

The Navarasa nine part anthology is produced under the banner Justickets in association with AP International and Wide Angle Creations as executive producers. The films will be directed by actor Arvind Swamy (“Roja”), making his directorial debut, Bejoy Nambiar (“Shaitan”), Gautham Vasudev Menon (“Vinnaithaandi Varuvaayaa”), Karthik Subbaraj (“Petta”), Karthick Naren (“Dhuruvangal Pathinaaru”), K.V. Anand and Priyadarshan among others has Suriya (“Soorarai Pottru”), Parvathy Thiruvothu (“Halal Love Story”), Vijay Sethupathy (“96”), Nithya Menen (“Breathe: Into The Shadows”) and Siddharth (“Leila”) in the cast.

Radhe ; Most Wanted on OTT and not in theatres

 Chennai.May15 : Radhe release lessons : If you show crap on OTT and expect audience to come to theatres also, this does not work out, as far as overseas audience is concerned. You can no more boast that Salman Khan movies do not depend on reviews- the public reviewed it on their FB and twitter page after watching it on OTT. Radhe has revealed how mediocre - trash movies broke box office records as they manipulated the exhibition sector to keep STARDOM intact.

Take the first reports of Radhe that come in from countries where theatre releases were held and especially in the Gulf Countries where there is Eid celebrations on.

First day reports on overseas collections.- Film managed to collect $600k in overseas on day one which way below par considering trade was expecting 3 million plus numbers. Film scored poor 40k$ in USA and 50k$ in Australia. Film released in 12 Screens of  Singapore and compared to earlier release of Zero- Bharat and Dabbang 3 the response for Radhe was only 30% of what these movies got. Radhe does not beat Zero in Singapore market.

The Gulf market on which Salman Khan film sells is no longer the market that is as wide as it was in normal times. Kuwait is a no-no and other areas where it opened the response is average. Trade says that if last two days- Saturday and Sunday show phenomenal turnout only can Radhe be termed a hit in overseas. USA and Australia have thumbed down the movie. Going by first day response in Gulf, a $3-4 million collection would best expected. Dabbang 3 collected $5 million and Bharat $6million on opening weekends in Gulf.

Trade says that Radhe overseas figures will decide how Hindi films will be traded in future. Secondly, trade will have to weigh in on the option of whether it can go with OTT alone since it  can kill theatre collections if the content is crap or otherwise as pay per view is still cheaper than a movie ticket. In that case the film budgets will have to be pruned accordingly. If the old method of theatre first and OTT later is followed, gullible crowds will come to theatres and go out cursing bad content  and the box office moolah is already in the box. OTT is a bonus.

If a hybrid release takes place then theatres will have to sell tickets at low prices as more than the OTT release is the availability of the film on DTH platforms. Many DTH agents made money by enabling those who did not know to get the film on their TV set. This in turn would bring back the video parlour.

Bigg Boss Kannada Season 8 ends due to Covid - BB Malayalam 3 says show will go on

Chennai/ Bengaluru, May 14 : Bigg Boss Kannada Season 8 housemates exited the glasshouse yesterday after completing 71 days . Bigg Boss Malayalam Season 3 on the other hand gave a contestant re-entry and announced that the show that been extended for another two weeks. Lock Down in Chennai ( where BB3 is shot) and Bengaluru continues and yesterday TN CM Stalin announced more restrictions as daily infections are spreading and increasing.

Primary reason for Bigg Boss Kannada to shut down was that host Kicha Sudeep is unwell and not able to come on stage. Secondly, TRP is at the lowest. BB Malayalam 3 too has TRP which is less than a serial. With lockdown, the channels with exception of Asianet ( platform on which BB is aired) is expected to go in for re-runs and hence only fresh content will be BB3, is the calculation.

May 16^th will see  Colors Tamil premiere Nayanthara’s Nee Enga En Anba and Zee Telugu’s celebrations of 16^th anniversary

 Colors Tamil will is all set to bring the world television premiere of Nee Enge En Anba, a crime thriller that stars Nayanthara in the lead roles. The movie will be premiered in Colors Tamil as a part of its Movie of the Month segment on 16 May at 02.00 PM, and a repeat telecast at 05.00 Pm on the same day. Directed by Sekhar Kammula, Nee Enge En..is remake of Kaahani starring Vidya Balan and was remade in Telugu as Aanamika with Nayanthara..

 Zee Telugu has completed 16 years in the industry. The channel began its journey on 18 May 2005, and since its inception, it has been curating compelling content that matches the tastes and preferences of a varied palette of viewers and has carved a special place in the hearts of Telugu audiences. Zee Magaotsavam will be telecast on May 16^th at 5 PM. Anuradha Gudur Head of Zee Telugu thanked the viewers.