Hindi
Aayna Ka Bayna to close ReelWorld Film Fest
MUMBAI: Samit Kakkad‘s Marathi feature Aayna Ka Bayna will be the closing film of the 13th ReelWorld Film Festival that will be held from 10 to 14 April, 2013 in Toronto.
Aayna Ka Bayna narrates the story of nine juvenile delinquents in a detention centre under a tyrant warden. They dance for passion, for hope and for their dreams to come true. The film released in India in November 2012.
Suman Ghosh‘s Shyamal Uncle Turns Off the Lights and Vikram Dasgupta‘s Calcutta Taxi will also be presented under the Free Family Screening.
Shyamal Uncle Turns Off the Lights is about an eighty year old pensioner who wants the street lights switched off during the day to save waste and fights bureaucracy. The film has traveled to the Busan International Film Festival 2012 where it was picked up by the Global Film Initiative for North American distribution. The film premiered in India at the Mumbai Film Festival 2012.
Revolving around three lives that coincide and affect each other in a way that each one gains and loses something, Calcutta Taxi, is a Canada – India co-production.
The film was put in competition in the 35th International Short Film Festival of Clermont-Ferrand and won the best short award at the 12th River to River Indian Film Festival in Florence, Italy.
Started in 2001, the ReelWorld Film Festival celebrates dramas, documentaries, shorts and music videos. This year the festival will screen 85 films and videos from 17 countries.
Hindi
Jio Studios, Sanjay Dutt team up to revive Khal Nayak
Rights acquired for new version, format under wraps as remake plans take shape.
MUMBAI: The villain is back and this time, he’s rewriting his own script. Jio Studios has partnered with Three Dimension Motion Pictures and Aspect Entertainment to revive the 1993 cult classic Khal Nayak, marking a fresh chapter for one of Bollywood’s most iconic anti-hero stories. The original film, directed by Subhash Ghai under Mukta Arts, was a commercial and cultural milestone, with Sanjay Dutt’s portrayal of Ballu becoming one of Hindi cinema’s most memorable performances.
Dutt, along with Aksha Kamboj, has now acquired the rights from the original creators, bringing on board Jio Studios and its President Jyoti Deshpande to steer the project creatively.
While the exact format whether remake, sequel, prequel, or a completely new narrative remains undisclosed, the collaboration aims to reinterpret the story for contemporary audiences while retaining the essence that made the original a defining film of the 1990s.
The move taps into a broader industry trend of reviving legacy intellectual property, particularly characters with strong recall value. “Khal Nayak” was notable for pushing mainstream Hindi cinema into morally grey territory at a time when heroes were largely one-dimensional, making Ballu’s character a standout.
The project also marks the film production debut of Aspect Entertainment, signalling a push towards more technology-led storytelling frameworks. Meanwhile, Jio Studios continues to expand its slate, having built a library of over 200 films and series, with more than 60 titles collectively winning 500-plus awards.
For Dutt, the revival is as much personal as it is strategic, a return to a role that reshaped his career. For the industry, it is another sign that nostalgia, when paired with scale, remains a powerful box-office proposition.
Because in Bollywood, some villains never fade, they just wait for the perfect comeback.
