After much hype and a disastrous launch with Saawariya in 2007, the new year looks bright for Ranbir Kapoor who has made his presence amongst the biggies in the industry. Besides the untitled Yash Raj film with 4 beauties- Bipasha Basu, Katrina Kaif, Deepika Padukone & Minisha Lamba , he has also bagged a Ravi Chopra film. Ravi Chopra’s next is being directed by Rahul Dholakia of the Parzania fame and the film is all set to have Ranbir play the lead in a story that revolves around friends . The rest of the cast is yet to be finalised. Ranbir seems to be on a run with a spree of big movies lined up and reports suggesting that all’s well on the personal front with lady love and co-star Sonam Kapoor. Great going lad!

Aamir Khan indeed has a reputation to make his directors cry (ask Amole Gupte, if you don’t believe so). But this time its Aamir’s Taare Zameen Par that’s minting those bucks while millions of cine goers are tremendously touched and moist eyed with the excellence the film offers. Shahid Kapoor too cried and was in complete awe of Aamir’s excellence. Shahid is reported to be a die hard Aamir fan and has not missed a single Aamir film .Post TZP, Aamir has featured in Shahid’s top list of directors too. Hope Shahid isn’t expecting Director Saab Aamir to offer him a role in his next. In any case -Kudos Aamir !

Do you know that actor cum producer Prakash Raj’s desire on his role in his own production was turned down by the director, who was introduced by him? Viji, the director of Prakash Raj and Prithviraj starrer ‘Vellitherai’, has refused to accept the desire by the producer, who dons an important role in the film. ‘Vellitherai’, dealing with the other side of the glittery world of cinema, has two main characters. One is a famous hero and another one is an assistant director. Prakash plays the hero while Prithviraj plays the assistant director. Prakash is believed to have requested the director to swap the roles between the two but the director did not pay heed to the request. Prakash, the perfect professional, took it in his stride and chose to leave the choice to the director. He has indeed given his outstanding performance in a role, which was not his first choice. Viji got into fame with his dialogue writing skills in the films ‘Azhagiya Theeye’ and ‘Mozhi’, both produced by his mentor Prakash Raj. Now he has been promoted to the position of director in the movie ‘Vellitherai’. Prakash, however, despite giving a top notch performance, gives a tough time to the director by not attending the shooting as per the schedule. Since he is hooked in quite a many projects, he is not able to honor his commitment for his own film.

For quite some years, it has become a notion in Mollywood that the first film that will get into theatres on a new year, will fail to bring in audiences. This has been the fate of many films that were the first to get released, every year in the past. But Jayaraj, the producer -director of the new flick ‘Of The People' don't believe in this theory and is preparing to offer this new film as the first one of 2008. The film is all set to get released in forty odd centres, this week end. Featuring a group of young artists, the movie is a sequel to super hit 'Four The People' released five years back. Jayaraj himself has been the victim of this kind of early releases in 2000, in which he released his big budget film 'Millennium Stars'. The film did not do well in the box office, but also bought its producer Kireedom Unni into dire streets. After this big loss, Kireedom Unni who had been the producer of many neo classics in Mollywood had only been able to associate with a couple of small time productions in these eight years. Anyway, Jayaraj seems to care less for these filmi beliefs and is going ahead with surety to fetch a winner, on the very first go.

Shyamaprasad the director of ‘Ore Kadal’ is more than surprised about the reactions that his film is amassing in every film circuits. The flick which was shown in many international film festivals also did a reasonably good business in home box office. It was selected as the inaugural film in IFFI that was held recently at Goa. After fetching a lot of appreciation there, the film also was showered with a lot of awards in IFFK 2007 that included the FIPRESCI award for best Malayalam film and the NETPAC award for best Malayalam film, where it was not even included in the competition section. "Since my film was not even in the Competition Section of the IFFK, the awards came as a pleasant surprise," said the director. Nafisa Ali, chairperson of Children's Film Society, who enjoyed the film so much in IFFI, commented in an interview that ‘Ore Kadal’ was her choice for the Oscars. When ‘Ore Kadal' was screened at Asiatika International, Rome, which showcased the most outstanding films of the Asian countries this year, the director was amazed with the viewer responses. With such an unprecedented support from all kind of viewers, Shymaprasad is now planning to release it in all the metros of the country with sub-titles.