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What is method acting?

Method acting is not an acting tool nor is it a book it does not involve growing beard, loosing or gaining weight, living like the character or becoming a character. The most misunderstood term, misused by everyone and it spells nothing but ignorance about the craft of acting, to who ever use it without knowing what it actually is, now a days it is used more in a derogatory context to undermine the effort put by actors towards the craft of acting.

IN FACT There is nothing like method acting it is a wrong term to use.

What is “the method”?

Method is a school of acting,A training method, a technique, a philosophy towards the craft of acting. Better know generally as the American school of acting and specifically to the work done by a pioneer a legend of acting education lee Strasberg.
Method is the step wise approach to …

“It’s a great film”, we use this term often and,”it’s a really bad film” a little too often? What is there in a film, which strikes a chord amongst audiences? What pisses them off? Off course there will be people who like and hate a particular film. PFC has provided an awesome platform to interact with passionate film-makers. Their company introduced me to the term ‘honesty in film-making’. The outcome of a film heavily depends on this term. The following is the typical situation a film-maker faces
A film maker has a story he passionately believes in. He is desperate to tell it. By the grace of all mighty the day ultimately arrives, when he has the required resources. The shooting begins but alas theres an interruption. The film completion is delayed or the resources get exhausted. Without getting bogged down the film maker waits for the right moment. Does not …

Human beings always like to categorize, segregate other people in a particular group or category. It is always US against THEM. This groupism can be based on religion, region, sex, caste and many more categories. Its always those Bengalis, Marathis, Tamils, Europeans, Muslims, Americans, Indians, Dalits, Brahmins, Nerds, Yuppies, blacks, whites, brown and a number of groups. If a person can be categorized in a group, he/she will be. This groupism a lot of times leads to alienation of that group which can have a negative impact on the society.

The Marathi movie “Dahavi Pha” (10th Standard division F) explores this very concept without going into too much preaching. Dahavi Pha is a story of group of student studying in the 10th Standard of a school in the “F” division. The students in the school are grouped according to their …

Introduction
If there is any one in the history of Indian film industry who delivered crowd pleasing films with out going down on aesthetics and artistic values, only one name comes to mind – Mani Ratnam.

The name, Mani Ratnam needs no introduction. He is the man behind the films like ‘Nayakan’ – one of the two Indian films to be listed in top 100 films of the world, ‘Mouna Ragam’, ‘Agni Nachatram’, ‘Dalapati’, ‘Yuva’, ‘Dil Se’ and most recently ‘Guru’.

Mani Ratnam was born on June 2nd, 1956 in the temple town of Madurai in Tamilnadu. Films were his every day’s cup of tea. Being born in to a family of film producers and distributors (father “Venus” Gopalratnam was a producer and brother G Venkateswaran was a film distributor), Mani Ratnam plunged into the world of cinema immediately after his graduation.

From his first film “Pallavi Anupallavi” to his latest Bollywood ventures …

It started off as a fun project with friends. Two filmmaker friends needed help on a film they were making, and I volunteered. I have assisted them on other film related projects, and we have an interesting groove when we work together, the three of us have complimentary but different skills and tastes, and working with the two of them is always a blast.

I ended up becoming the Production Supervisor on the film, and learning a lot. But, that isn’t what this post is about.

During the course of making this film I became very, very excited because I realized that we were making something very, very good. A funny film, a film that has a broad appeal. A film that works because the actors are all great and the director has an eye for what makes gore funny and can tell a good story.

The excitement grew last …

Here are some good movies which released in the 80s. (The era of smugglers, revenge stories with lower technicalities. The signing stars were Mithun, Jeetendra, Reena Roy, Anita Raaj, Vinod Khanna……)

These are not great movies but entertains you for 3 hours surely. Not having Mahel type homes, designer sarees and kurtas, disco theques…. but containing good dialogues, greeping scripts and overall good performances. These all are family dramas describing love, sacrifice, moral values, envy, hate, generation gap and small and big middle class problems.

Sansaar (1987):
Rekha, Raj Babbar, Anupam Kher Dir: T. Rama Rao

Remake of some south Indian film Story deals with the “Takraav” of father and son, less time and space for husband and wife to make love, comparison between sons, management of money etc. Highly dramatical situations with an unusual climax.

Saheeb (1985)
Anil Kapoor, Utpal Dutt, Rakhee Gulzar, Amrita Singh
Dir: Anil Gangooly

The story of sacrifice. Utpal …

“Don’t worry be happy”, this is the tagline of the movie according to imdb. I never really got a chance to see the posters, got released today and I was there for the first day last show, thanks to one of my very close friend. So there I was… watching one more classic from Yash Raj and a film by “Siddharth Anand”.

And now I am sitting at my home, with my scotch, wondering ..is there anything else better I could have done on my last evening in LA?. Well I am moving to SFO tomorrow and I have to drive freaking 400 miles in the morning. Okay… so coming back to movie; couldn’t impress me, didnt even like it and I am not sure why am I writing my first film review on PFC for a film like ‘TA RA Rum Pum’.

There is only one thing I would really like …

In an age when film makers masquarade as reformers (read bullshitters), it is only apt that one remember the flag bearers of the REAL New Wave in Indian Cinema that had its inception in the early ’50s through the mid ’70s. A beacon of this New Wave was Ritwik Ghatak. The Anarchist. The Rebel. The quintessential Bengali Intellectual. The man who influenced a generation of film makers.

In a foreword to Ghatak’s seminal work Cinema and I, Rows and Rows of Fences: Ritwik Ghatak on Cinema, none less than Satyajit Ray said about him: “For him Hollywood might not have existed at all.”

Ghatak and his family formed part of the massive exodus from East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) to Kolkata owing to Partition of 1947 - the tragedy that haunted him all his life and kept coming back as a recurring theme in his films. Heavily influenced by Sergei Eisenstein and …

Hi Folks,

This post is strictly business. But with more cross border film deals happening both in Bollywood and here in the US, some financial and fiscal guidelines to keep in mind. Firstly if there are any legal (actually this entire write up is on the premise that you are transacting the business legally) exchange of remmuneration i.e. monies paid to artist/crew/filmmaker by distributor, etc from India to the US or vice versa, it will be subject to witholding tax or what we in Mumbai call, TDS (tax deducted at source). However, since US and India have a dual tax treaty, this can be avoided, if you inform the remitting party that you will be responsible for the taxes and will claim the benefit of the Witholding law (this has to be given in writing), otherwise there will be the witholding, do expect less in hand than what was meant to …

When I was doing my 12-week Film Intensive at NYU SCPS, one of the things I heard a few times was that to be a good director, you should take an acting class. As I made UNTITLED, I realized that understanding what an actor goes through, how he/she prepares, can help a director in ensuring she gets the best performance from her cast.

Now, I have acted as a child but as I grew into my teens, I veered more towards debate than acting. Primarily because I started to become extremely self-conscious - the surefire way to be unable to act (clearly this was just my issue - both my siblings acted into their teens and both were freaking fabulous at it). So despite the high will, the self-consciousness meant low skill and the nervousness prevented me from really doing what I used to love.

Anyway, back to the present …

If ever I were to make an award speech for a role in one of my films, the first name I would take after thanking my parents and my first (and only, so far) acting teacher, Gregory Justice (who introduced me to acting), would be John Johnson. Then, I’d thank Danny Leiner (Harold & Kumar). Then I’d thank Bryan Singer (Superman Returns). And finally, I’d thank Bruce Leddy.

Why would I want to thank the director of Harold & Kumar of all movies? And Bruce Leddy who?

There’s been a lot of discussion on PFC about the refreshing “new wave” that’s taking Indian cinema by storm. So far, the take on this “new wave” has been up and coming filmmakers who dare to think out of the box with respect to writing kickass stories and screenplays, stylizing the art of storytelling, and taking on the mammoth …

You rarely get golden moments like these. When you get the opportunity to kick ass… ;) literally…

So when you accidentally find a movie online (while browsing for indy cinema in India) that was made by Anurag Kashyap, you know Shakalaka Boom Boom was bound to happen for our banner boy Anurag. Expect another post called Fuck Fuck to Mahakali pretty soon :))

It’s his first direction and according to the video details it was made way back in 1997/98 for television. The length is about 50 minutes…. Enjoy and do post your reactions… Maybe you’ll like it or would love it… but it’s nice to see the dude’s directorial beginnings…

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Received from Worldwide Film Distribution yahoogroup… Please spread the word!

Let me take this opportunity to introduce you about me and social activities of our organization. …

I am working with a government organization, one of the most important & entertainment department called “NATIONAL FILM CIRCLE” is given to me and I am looking for your help to expand the membership.

What is “NATIONAL FILM CIRCLE” ?

The National Film Development Corporation Limited (NFDC) is a Government of India Enterprise set up with the objective of fostering excellence in Indian Cinema. It provides film enthusiasts in Mumbai an opportunity to see good meaningful World-Class Films throughout the year through the “NATIONAL FILM CIRCLE”.

For the past twenty-five years, National Film Development Corporation (NFDC) has produced/co- produced more than 200 films in 15 languages, including English. Amongst these all several internationally acclaimed films like Gandhi, The Making of Mahatma, Mirch-Masala, Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar, Sardar, Parinda and …

One of my friend Raaj Ashoo called me up on 13 march morning that he is going to record a song in MUSICIANS STUDIO,shastri nagar,lokhandwala .The singer was LAABH JANJUA of PAPPE PYAR KARKE PACHHTAYA.I supposed it to be a good chance to meet with laabh janjua as well as all crew members of the team.This team is about an INDO-CANADIAN FILM which is under pre production.One of my good friend ravinder ( ravi ) is the associate director of the film.DEL KALRA,the director of the film ,was found to be very very excited about his 1st song recording.The song was written by SANJAY KABIR one of the talented lyrics writer, having a different approach to the song.The key word of the song is MUTTIYAR, a pure Punjabi word means attractive and heart snatching girl .DEL KALRA entered with his handycam as he wanted to capture all those moments when …

Oh! … I remember the saga that is called the Valley of Flowers. I won’t talk of the story because it will be damn unfair to do so. I don’t know the story. Yeah!
But I did sit for the two n a half hour or may be longer (at least it seemed to be) of VOF.
Ok. First things first. Why? Why was the movie made?
Possibility no. 1: It was a very personal film (shouldn’t have been for Pan Nalin’s home video collection?).
Possibility no. 2: Milind tied Pan and forced him to make it (oh! I am certain about this one).
Or possibility no. 3 and more could come from the ones who have been through it…
I saw the Hindi version. It looked beautiful. It looked even better, but I wanted it mute. I wanted to see the cinematographic (Michal Englert) beauty to be put to better …

Christina Marouda, President of IFFLA is the brains behind the annual Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles. Having completed 5 years, IFFLA, as we saw it has been growing by leaps and bounds, bringing to the world priceless gems from the Indian cine scene.

IFFLA has become an upcoming junction for anything cinema, anything Indian. Distributors, producers, directors, Indian movie buff (most of them non-Indians), the business community. Yet, there is much more to come.

All this flurry of activity was quite intriguing and I had to have Christina come out from behind the curtains from where she is quite content in running the IFFLA team - over a hundred volunteers who drop everything in hand to make IFFLA happen each year, every year.

In her words “the flag is getting heavier and heavier with each passing year”… which it is… what with tragically not many from the Indian business community …

So I’ve finally landed onto the PFC platform and all thanks to Oz and Vijay. Being my very first post, I would have loved to introduce myself as a ‘learning film-maker’ and go on about my tryst with film-making and film-makers, but all that can wait. Because right now I am nothing but just an avid cinema-goer just like all of us. Why is that you ask? Well that’s because the topic that I am posting is about a meeting I had with a man who goes by the name of Quentin Tarantino. But before you start showering me with abuses, let me tell you that it was a chance meeting of which even you could have been a part of, if you were here at LA for the Indian Film Festival.

Anyways, a short run down of how the things took place. We were all chilling at the ‘Arc Light …

Story:
“Man of Marble” (Czlowiek z marmaru) examines the story of the rise and fall of a working class hero, Mateusz Birkut, through the eyes of a rebellious young film maker, Agnieszka. As part of her thesis film, Agnieszka - a student from Krakow film school, embarks on a difficult journey of seeking the truth behind the one time national hero, Birkut, who was hailed as a national hero for his extraordinary feats in brick lying and became as famous as any film star, only to disappear from the record books in 1952.

We first get to know about the story of Mateusz Birkut through a series of communist propaganda films, “Birth of a City” and “Architects of Our Happiness”. It’s through these films Birkut is shown raising to the level of national hero from a naive and hard working brick layer.

Agnieszka is puzzled about the whereabouts of this one …

Update: Vijay just mentioned that Kya Tum Ho is Anish’s debut movie: Wow dude…mad props to you

My first time attending any film fest and boy oh boy was that an experience or was that an experience. Met all the who’s who and ” who are you” of the industry. I still pinch myself to make sure that it was not a dream. Ouch it hurts..haha. Though i would have loved to watch a lot more than i ended up doing, but every minute spent at the Arclights or the countless pints of beer at afterparty’s was something i would cherish for a longtime. Had always heard that Film Makers are easily approachable and great conversationalist at film fests and IFFLA proved it right. Be it Anurag Kashyap( He is from mars), Nishikanth kamat( OMG..such a lovable human), Uma D Cunha, Quentin Tarantino, Soumitra Ranade( I am sorry i missed his …

“I don’t like the sordid and I am not a part of the New Wave trend of today.”
- Satyajit Ray, as told to Marie Seton

Thus spake The Master. We are talking about it again. The latest ‘New Wave’, so talked about in this forum and elsewhere, has it all the makings of a Revolution - a widespread movement strong enough to take the status quo (the bromide of popular cinema) head-on?

The buzz started with films like Mixed Doubles, Being Cyrus, Page 3, Iqbal, Mr. & Mrs. Iyer, 15 Park Avenue et al doing decent business at the Box Office. Cinematic merit of most of the above mentioned films being unquestionable, the talk about …