No Shahrukh in Bollywood film fest in Poland

The fourth Bollywood film festival in Poland opens Monday but this time there won’t be any movies of superstar Shah Rukh Khan.This is the first time this has happened. Though the distributors were keen to organise a special show of "My Name Is Khan", they could not persuade the 20th Century Fox, distributor of the movie, to agree.

Shah Rukh’s popularity in Poland is amazing and every Bollywood buff knows him. His biography has been translated into Polish.King Khan is being replaced by "Singh Is Kinng" (Akshay Kumar). It is a great opportunity for Akshay Kumar to make a place in Polish psyche with his masala dances.

Apart from the Akshay starrer, films selected for screening include "Laaga Chunari Mein Daag", "Tandoori Love", "Amal", "Dulha Mil Gaya", "Jannat", "Blue" and "Videsh".

The festival is being organised by EPLPOL, a prominent distributor of Hindi films, along with Multikino, a chain of multiplexes in Poland. The organisers this time selected cities like Krakow, Wroclaw, Poznan, Gdansk, Gdynia, Szczecin and Zabrze apart from capital Warsaw to screen the movies.

Bollywood films have become a regular diet for Poles. Bollywood has raised the profile of India throughout Poland.

First look on Delhi-6 at Dubai International Film Festival

The wait is finally over! Delhi-6, the keenly awaited collaboration of UTV Motion Pictures and Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra was unveiled at the Dubai International Film Festival, before an audience comprising key entertainment media from around the world.

The film is about American-born Roshan (Bachchan), who brings his ailing grandmother back to India. Little does he know that the quick trip will turn into the longest journey of his life—a journey within.

The imagery and music was tremendously captivating, setting up tremendous anticipation for the wordwide release of the film on February 20th, 2009.

Rakeysh elaborated on his key influences and the theme of the film.The actors said that their experience of working with Rakeysh was a good one.

The audience was treated to a glimpse of the teaser theatrical trailer slated to be in theatres later this month as well as a longer "first look" of scenes and music from the film.

Seventh Asian Film Festival starts in Mumbai

Maharashtra Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh on Thursday evening inaugurated the seventh edition of the Asian Film Festival. The festival will showcase 80 films from 20 countries of Asia as well as from Palestine and Egypt and will last for eigtht days.

Deshmukh highlighted Mumbai as a destination for the Asian filmmakers and urged them to explore the city for their cinematic ventures. He said films had evolved greatly over a period of time as the gap between offbeat and commercial films have decreased. He also promised the organisers of the festival - The Asian Film Foundation and The Enlighten Society - of more financial help from the government.

The festival has two competition sections - the best debutant directors and the best fiction films which will be judged by a panel comprising national and international filmmakers. During the inaugural function, Korean director Park Kwang Su was honoured with the Asian Film Culture Award, while P.K. Nair, former director of National Film Archives, received the Satyajit Ray Memorial Award.