Hindi
Little Zizou’s international duties goes to American World Pictures
MUMBAI: The recent Slumdog phenomenon has forced Bollywood to believe that to expand a film’s audience base beyond the Indian diaspora internationally, filmmakers have to strategically join hands with international marketers who exhibit a better understanding of the overseas cinematic landscape. Slumdog was marketed and distributed by Fox Searchlight.
And now taking a hint from this, The Indian Film Company (TIFC) has roped in LA-based world sales company, American World Pictures (AWP), to handle the international sales of its first international feature presentation Little Zizou.
Little Zizou, Sooni Taraporevala’s first directorial venture, is a Mumbai-based film that is presented by TIFC and Mira Nair (of Monsoon Wedding and Vanity Fair fame).
“We look forward to our association with AWP who will be enabling Little Zizou to reach out to audiences in countries across the world,” said IFC CEO Sandeep Bhargava.
In a bid to attain global recognition that would help international marketers to push the film across the global region, Zizou was showcased at the Mahindra Indo-American Arts Council Film Festival in New York and at the Asia-Pacific Festival of First Films, held in Singapore.
While the film bagged two awards – best director and best screenplay – at the Mahindra Indo-American Arts Council Film Festival, it clinched the best producer award at the Asia-Pacific Festival of First Films held in Singapore.
Said AWP Sr VP – international Sales Jeffrey Goldmann, “We fell in love with Little Zizou on watching it. It is a simple, sweet and well-intentioned comedy with a message of tolerance at its heart. We introduced the film to buyers at EFM (Berlin) and will continue to do so at the upcoming markets to lock distribution.”
Initially, Studio 18 will undertake a selective Indian theatrical release of Little Zizou on 13 March and depending on the film’s audience response, the company will expand the number of releases further.
The film stars Boman Irani, Sohrab Ardeshir, Zenobia Shroff, Shernaz Patel, Mahabanoo Mody- Kotwal, Imaad Shah, Kunal Vijaykar, Kamaal Sidhu in pivotal roles and introduces Jahan and Iyanah Batlivala. It also features John Abraham in a guest appearance.
Hindi
Remembering Gyan Sahay, the lens behind film, television and advertising
From a puppet rabbit selling poppadums to Hindi cinema, he framed it all.
MUMBAI: There are careers, and then there are canvases. Gyan Sahay, the veteran cinematographer, director, and producer who passed away on 10 March 2026 in Mumbai, had one of the latter. Over several decades in the Indian film and television industry, he turned lenses, lights, and the occasional puppet rabbit into something approaching art.
A graduate of the Film and Television Institute of India (FTII) in Pune, Sahay built his reputation as a director of photography across a career that stretched from the early 1970s all the way to the digital age. He was the kind of craftsman who understood that a well-composed shot is not merely a technical achievement but a quiet act of storytelling.
For most Indians of a certain age, however, Sahay will forever be the man behind the rabbit. His direction of the iconic long-running television commercial for Lijjat Papad, featuring its now-legendary puppet bunny, gave the country one of its most cheerfully persistent advertising images. It was the sort of work that sneaks into the national subconscious and takes up permanent residence.
His big-screen credits as cinematographer include Anokhi Pehchan (1972), Pagli (1974), Pas de Deux (1981), and Hum Farishte Nahin (1988). In 1999, he stepped behind a different kind of camera altogether, making his directorial debut with Sar Ankhon Par, a drama that featured Vikas Bhalla and Shruti Ulfat, with a cameo by Shah Rukh Khan for good measure.
On television, Sahay was particularly prized for his command of multi-camera production setups, a skill that made him a go-to technician for large-scale shows and reality programmes. In an industry that has never been especially patient with complexity, he was the calm hand on the rig.
In later life, Sahay turned teacher. He participated regularly in masterclasses and Digi-Talks, often hosted by organisations such as Bharatiya Chitra Sadhna, sharing hard-won wisdom on cinematography, the comedy of timing in a shot, and the sweeping changes brought by the shift from celluloid to digital. He was also said to have been involved in a project concerning a biographical film on Infosys co-founder N.R. Narayana Murthy.
Tributes from the film industry poured in following the news of his passing, with colleagues remembering him as a senior cameraman who served as a rare bridge between two entirely different eras of Indian cinema. That is, perhaps, the finest thing one can say of any craftsman: he kept up, and he brought others along with him.
