Hindi
Pyramid Saimira launches mega Kannada film Omm
BANGALORE: Pyramid Saimira Productions International Ltd (PSPIL) has announced the launch of a mega Kannada film project titled Omm, starring all the three sons of the late Kannada film icon Raj Kumar.
The movie will be directed by Ravi Srivatsava.
The three brothers – Siva Raj Kumar, Raghvendra Raj Kumar and Puneeth Raj Kumar – are well known, popular Kannada film actors and will be acting in a film together for the first time.
Industry sources peg the film‘s budget at Rs 100 million plus, which is a big figure for the Kannada film industry where films with budgets of Rs 50-60 million are considered as big budget films. While PSPIL officials refused to indicate the exact budget for Omm they did confirm that the budget was more than Rs 100 million.
Pyramid Saimira entered Karnataka about a year and a half ago and has so far converted about 45 screens to digital of around 225 screens that it has digitalized across India. The group operates 123 theaters in Karnataka.
On the group‘s Karnataka foray, PSPIL MD Saminathan announced that Avva, a Kannada film project under the PSPIL banner was complete. The film has been directed by Kavitha Lankesh and stars a popular Kannada actor Vijay.
Vijay will also feature in another PSPIL Kannada action film Putta to be directed by Om Prakash, a veteran who has directed more than 25 films.
PSPIL also announced that it has signed on another Kannada film actor Darshan for a two film deal to be released in January 2009 and January 2010. On the immediate Karnataka horizon is the distribution of six Kannada films. It has also acquired distribution rights for Naa Tata Naa Birla, Ganesha Mathe Banda, Minchina Ota, Naanu Neenu Jodi, etc just to name a few.
Saminathan also informed that the group plans to release one Kannada movie every two months. Pyramid Saimira will be investing Rs 7 billion to produce 37 films in India during the next one year.
Saminathan said that by March end 0f 2008 the group would have 1000 screens and hence would have the largest number of screens in Asia. At present, with 703 screens in the world, the Pyramid group is the third largest player globally in terms of number of screens. Pyramid has tie-ups in five countries.
Saminathan also said that the Pyramid group was interested in short fiction film projects – the story must be told completely in ten minutes. An announcement on this initiative would be made shortly informed Saminathan.
Further, while speaking with Indiantelevison.com, Saminathan informed that the profits for the third quarter of this financial year (2007-08) would exceed Rs 160 million. There has also been an increase in the occupancy which was lingering in the 40-50 per cent range, but Saminathan could not give the exact figures.
Pyramid Samira Theaters Limited has also temporarily shelved the Card Scheme that had been approved by its board in April 2007, because of apprehension by the industry. The demand for the card scheme was so tremendous that the first lot of 50,000 cards was sold out in one and a half hours in the few theaters it was launched. While refusing to disclose details, Saminathan conformed that his company is close to closing a deal for acquiring a TV company in the US. The deal/company is reportedly valued at $100 million.
The group has also roped in Bollywood director Raj Kumar Santoshi for a new Hindi film project/s to be announced shortly. Santoshi‘s Hindi film Halla Bol for PSIPL starring Ajay Devgan and Vidya Balan is slated for release. As announced earlier, Santoshi, who was also present at the Omm press conference in Bangalore has signed on a two film contract with the PVR group some time ago.
Hindi
Jio Studios unveils AI-powered Krishna teaser at NAB Show 2026
Global first look of Krishna uses Galleri5 AI pipeline on Azure, Historyverse slate as Jio’s Dhurandhar crosses Rs 3,000cr worldwide.
MUMBAI: Krishna has just dropped a divine teaser and this time the gods are powered by silicon, not just scripture. Jio Studios and Collective Studios’ Historyverse stole the spotlight at the NAB Show 2026 in Las Vegas with the world’s first teaser for their upcoming theatrical feature Krishna, directed by Manu Anand. The big reveal happened during Microsoft’s keynote “Powering Intelligent Media, From AI Experimentation to Real-World Impact,” where the film’s AI-native production pipeline took centre stage alongside Collective Artists Network’s in-house platform, Galleri5.
At the heart of this mythological spectacle lies a fresh cinematic workflow built by Galleri5 on Microsoft Azure’s advanced AI and cloud infrastructure. Forget bolting AI onto traditional VFX or animation, this is an end-to-end, production-grade system woven into every layer: world-building, character creation, shot design and final output. Yet the storytelling remains firmly director-led, emphasising emotional depth, stillness, music and performance rather than pure spectacle. The result? Large-format theatrical cinema rooted in Indian history and culture, but conceived in ways that were simply not possible before.
Collective Artists Network runs Galleri5 natively on Azure, leveraging Microsoft Foundry and cutting-edge AI tools to handle film, episodic and advertising workflows in a secure enterprise environment. Microsoft highlighted Collective as a “Frontier” organisation successfully moving AI from pilot projects to real production-scale deployment in cinema. The technology is also on display at Microsoft’s NAB booth in the West Hall (Booth W1731).
Jio Studios (Media & Content Business, Reliance Industries), president Jyoti Deshpande said the project advances the studio’s mission to take Indian stories global with scale, ambition and authenticity, “With Krishna, we are embracing cutting-edge AI-led filmmaking while democratising these tools to make them more accessible, intuitive and cost-effective for storytellers everywhere.”
Collective Artists Network founder & group CEO Vijay Subramaniam added, “We’re using technology developed in India to carry our culture and history to audiences worldwide at a scale never seen before.”
Microsoft, vice president for telco media & entertainment, gaming Silvia Candiani noted that the media industry has reached an inflection point, “AI is no longer about experimentation but delivering real impact at production scale… By building AI-native creative systems on Microsoft Azure, Collective exemplifies how storytellers can unlock new formats, move faster and realise a true return on intelligence while keeping human creativity at the centre.”
Krishna forms part of Historyverse, Collective Studios’ ambitious slate of history and culture-driven IPs. The slate draws from iconic figures and traditions that shaped the Indian subcontinent, including stories inspired by Kali, Karna and Durga. It builds on the already-released Mahabharat: Ek Dharmayudh series, showing how ancient narratives can be reimagined for modern screens.
Jio Studios, India’s leading content studio and the media and content arm of Reliance Industries, continues its blockbuster run. The studio’s Dhurandhar franchise led by Dhurandhar and Dhurandhar: The Revenge has become the first Indian film series to cross Rs 3,000 crore worldwide. It also delivered three consecutive years of India’s highest-grossing Hindi films: Stree 2 (2024), Dhurandhar (2025) and Dhurandhar: The Revenge (2026). In just eight years, Jio Studios has assembled a library of over 160 films and series, with more than 60 titles winning over 500 awards. Other notable successes include Laapataa Ladies (India’s official Oscar entry 2025), Stree, Article 370, Shaitaan and Mrs.
The NAB unveiling marks another step in Jio Studios and Collective’s push to blend Indian storytelling talent with frontier technology proving that the future of cinema may well be both ancient in spirit and thoroughly modern in execution. For audiences who love epic tales with a fresh twist, Krishna promises to deliver divine drama, this time with a little help from the cloud.
