Bollywood Zone : Blog, Movies, Celebs

Kareena Kapoor and Saif Ali Khan continue to be an item. The duo was out and about in the suburbs on Saturday evening. After a long discussion, they walked in together (almost hand-in-hand) at the VIP lounge of a popular Chinese restaurant. Like most celebrity couples, they seemed to be extremely comfortable with each other, say onlookers.

A guest present at the restaurant says, “They were behaving like a couple. They were lost in some discussion and were completely oblivious about their surroundings and onlookers.”

Once at their table, the duo who was accompanied by friends Dino Morea and Amrita Arora, sat very close to each other.

Kareena and Saif also indulged in some serious PDA. Saif kept hugging her throughout the evening, and they left together. A restaurant staff informs, Kareena and Saif were spotted together at a suburban restaurant over the weekend. Saif kept hugging and complimenting her all evening “Kareena seemed to be distressed and Saif was consoling her. He was often complimenting and hugging her. Their friends also took care to give them the much-needed privacy.” Kareena and Saif, were dressed in casual tees and denims, and were engaged in a conversation with the occasional remark, ‘Yeah, you are right!’ meant for the rest seated with them at the table. Kareena and Saif got along well on the sets of Tashan and ever since they have spending a lot of time with each other. However, Kareena is maintaining a stoic silence over her relationship with Shahid Kapur who is currently filming in Toronto. A source close to Kareena says, “Kareena and Saif are extremely fond of each other and the duo are spending a lot of time with together. She has also been vocal about Saif’s good nature to a few of us.”

He’s the last ‘King’ of Bollywood. Even at the other side of 60, Amitabh Bachchan is the reigning Shahenshah of moviedom. And no flames of Aag can lick this man. But all those suffering a momentary loss of faith have to do is view Rituparna Ghosh’s movie which premiered at the Toronto Film Festival last week. Even Shakespeare must’ve stirred from his 400-year-old slumber on hearing Big B’s rendition of his play. It had the celeb-studded audiences enthralled all right. His almost theatrical performance as an ageing Shakespearian actor leaves you feeling, ‘Yes! All the world’s definitely a stage’ for Amitabh Bachchan. Truly.

“Ironically, the role I play is that of an actor in Bengal, and in my early days I actually did do a lot of English amateur theatre there. This film gives a realistic approach not just to contemporary Calcutta, but to theatre and Shakespeare which many of you admire,” said Bachchan at the gala opening at the grand Roy Thomson Hall. This is AB’s first ever English language film, not that there’s any love lost for Hindi just yet.

We’ve all witnessed Shah Rukh Khan‘s awesome abs recently. Well, such things don’t happen overnight, and SRK too seems to have gone through the grind for it. And now the hard work seems to be worth every drop of sweat, and every morsel of cake that has been sacrificed. Shah Rukh, for more than three months went on a high protein diet and was disciplined with his workouts. Now the actor has the girls drooling over him in a different sort of way. From the chocolate boy to the sex symbol, our Badshah Khan seems to be enjoying his reign. And his fans seem to be enjoying it too.

Lara Dutta has injured her foot recently. The actress while shooting for an ad at the Kamalistan Studios tripped and injured her knees during a running sequence. She has also severely sprained her ankle.

A source revealed, “The shot required Lara to run around. The concept of the ad was such that the flooring had to be of green colour. There was an iron plank on the floor as well. Incidentally that was of green colour too. It was because the plank synchronized very well with the flooring that it was required for the shot. However, during the running sequence she failed to notice it and tripped over, badly injuring her knees and spraining the ankle in the process. To worsen the condition she had worn very high heels that aggravated the injury.”

The source said that Lara continued to shoot despite her injury. “She continued to shoot till late in the night. Lara found it difficult to do the running sequence initially because of the pain. But she somehow managed and completed the shot. She could have cancelled it if she wanted too, but she did want the company to suffer losses because of this accident.”

She breezed like a whiff of fresh air in Bollywood, flashing those glorious dimples, after conquering the Ms India pageant in 1999. Since then, this intelligent lady has made her presence felt everywhere-from anchoring, to acting in TV serial and films like Dhoop, Jurm and of course Dor, in which she won critical accolades in the role of Zeenat. Now she’s ready to don a ‘volatile facade’ for her forthcoming film, Manorama Six Feet Under. NT catches up with the pretty woman.

These days Gul is quite excited about her forthcoming film. Ask her what makes it all that special and the gal enthuses, “Manorama Six Feet Under is a whodunit kind of film-a murder mystery, which is set in the backdrop of a small town. It’s an intensely woven film, which is highly believable. I play the role of Nimmia woman with mercurial twists of temper, who’s married to Abhay Deol, a PWD engineer.”

While the plot sounds intriguing enough, does she really think there is audience out there for these kind of films, which are reminiscent of Agatha Christie and Poirot era? Gul repartees, “Thanks to multiplexes, there is a discerning audience available today, which wants to experiment with different intelligent genres.” There’s no denying the fact that Gul is a complete package, with right kind of looks, petite frame and ample amount of talent to boot. What then, kept her away from scaling the skies of popularity in Bollywood? “I agree, that I don’t exactly belong to the top slot because I would just not do the hackneyed stuff to get there-which has been done by 40 people before me and will be repeated by at least 40 after me. I would rather stay there and do consistent good work for a long time.”

She adds philosophically, “The winds of change are flowing in the industry. You can either carve a new path with your own intelligence or merely join the bandwagon and do what everyone else is doing. I have chosen the former.”

What about her relationship with Sikander Kher, that supposedly went kaput a few months back? She answers in that clipped tone, “I have never spoken about my personal life and I don’t intend to begin now.” But what about her views on love? Or is that a taboo topic too? To this Gul finally warms up and says, “Love is an emotion, which evolves with time. I have changed my views on love at least six times in the past and I am sure I have a lot to learn even now. Love is about respecting the vision and ideals of your partner.”

And where does marriage fit into all this? After all, isn’t she going around with a good-looking pilot? “I have deep faith in the institution of marriage and when I do get married, it will be for keeps. But that will have to wait,” she says.

Any Bollywood hunk, that makes her go weak in the knees? She gurgles happily and reveals, “Akshay Kumar with his awesome physique and Shah Rukh with his intelligence, would make any woman swoon. I am no exception!”

How does she cope with all those complements bestowed on her, thanks to her dimples? “That’s the safest compliment that men can give, without seeming to come on too strongly. I take these in my stride. Dimples are dead muscles after all!”

Some years ago tough cop KPS Gill had his reputation smeared and was convicted by court when he dared to pinch IAS officer Ruppan Deol Bajaj’s bottom. Actor Rohit Roy must consider himself more fortunate that co-star Dia Mirza is not seeking legal recourse for his cheeky act. The former Miss India had a horrifying experience last week while she and Roy were at an outdoor shoot for the film Alibaug. According to sources from the film’s unit Dia was relaxing in the swimming pool at Goa’s Hotel Taj Village, where the cast was staying when Rohit also joined her. After a while just as Dia was getting out of the pool, Rohit swam from behind and pinched her butt. The shocked actor left the pool in tears.

But the real drama unfolded the next day when Rohit met Dia as if nothing had transpired the day before and insisted on greeting her and chatting with her as usual. The infuriated actress refused to talk to him till he tendered an unconditional apology. But Rohit, whose wife Manasi Joshi Roy was also in Goa, refused to apologise saying he hadn’t done anything wrong. At which point Dia threatened to make his act public and also inform his wife about the whole thing.

An eyewitness on condition of anonymity told this newspaper, “The first evening Dia Mirza left the pool crying and no one got to know what happened. However, the next day when Rohit wished her as if nothing had happened she was very upset and threatened to tell everyone about the incident if he did not apologise.” Reportedly things got even uglier at this point and Rohit retorted that he saw nothing in Dia that would prompt him to make advances at her. The heated argument went on for sometime till the rest of the cast intervened and Rohit apologised for his behaviour later.

When contacted Dia Mirza said she did not wish to discuss details. “All I can say is that such issues need to be handled with maturity.” Sources say that Dia refused to take the matter further as she did not wish to hurt Rohit’s wife and daughter.

While Rohit Roy dismissed the whole thing as a “misunderstanding”. “Misunderstandings happen on every set and whatever happened was sorted out that very minute. But there is no truth in that I pinched her. No one asked me to apologise. In fact, if Dia were unhappy she would have told me then and there itself. We were shooting together till Tuesday night and there is no issue whatsoever.”

Urmila Matondkar’s really ecstatic and her excitement has nothing to do with her bagging yet another film. Rather, the sexy star has just returned from Dubai where she along with Imran Khan managed to raise around Rs 3 crore at a charity event organised by the former Pakistani cricket superstar. Urmila, who’d met Imran at common friend Parmeshwar Godrej’s party, was invited to be a part of the event after Imran learned of her involvement with several charitable causes. Ask Urmila about it and she confirms rather modestly, “When we met, Imran had discussed this hospital and a diagnostic centre that he wishes to start in Karachi. I’ve sort of formed a bond with Pakistan during my previous visits to the country. And when he asked me, I just couldn’t refuse.” The event consisted of an auction followed by a telethon and Urmila kickstarted it with a donation of Rs 1 lakh. But the highlight of the do was Urmila’s impromptu singing. “Since I wasn’t carrying anything much that could be auctioned, I thought of singing a song. It was a last minute idea, but it raised about 25,000 dirhams,” says Urmila, who crooned one of her favourite numbers Kisi Ke Muskurahaton Pe Ho Nisaar… The Mehbooba gal left her fans asking for more and even Imran couldn’t help, but compliment her on her singing prowess. “The response was so fab, I’m now thinking of starting to have my own concerts,” she laughs. But how was it working with Imran? “Oh, we’ve grown up idolising him. He was and is a rockstar. I don’t think there’s any woman who hasn’t had a crush on him at some time,” she says blushing. And is she one of them? “Well, we did form a mutual admiration society,” she laughs, adding, that while Imran praised her nineteen to the dozen, it was amazing to see his killer instinct on field now transform into a passion for charity. On a serious note she adds, “I am very fortunate to be able to contribute something to humanity. And causes like these are not bound by boundaries of religion or countries. That’s the beauty of it all. It’s a different high altogether.”

After having turned down Nach Baliye 3, Malaika Arora Khan has just signed a reality-based television show. If sources are to be believed the model-turned-actor is now more keen on hosting shows rather than just wielding the judge’s baton on television. Malaika, who signed the dotted-line last week, starts shooting in January next year. Presently, she is actively participating with channel heads in the process of concept development of the show.

A reliable source from the channel informs, “We have signed on Malaika for a reality television show. Since our channel is going to be operational from next year she will start filming early next year.”

The content of the show has been kept under wraps. However, the format has not been borrowed from any international reality shows.

Of late, Malaika has been flooded with offers. Our sources from another channel informed that they wanted Malaika as to host Jhalak Dikhlaa Ja’s second season. But she turned it down.

If sources are to be believed, Abhishek Bachchan has been hitting the gym with a vengeance. Post his extended honeymoon, AB junior now wants to look better. The actor wants to shed 15 kilos and embrace a healthier lifestyle, inform his close friends. Apparently, he is already being careful about his food habits. Our source from the sets of Drona says, “Abhishek, who has always been a big foodie has been keeping a watch on what he eats.”

This new development comes in the wake of Shah Rukh Khan sporting an awesome sixpack abs, which he has been flashing onscreen for Farah Khan’s Om Shanti Om. An industry insider reveals, “Shah Rukh’s in his new body beautiful avatar has prompted everybody in Bollywood to get into shape.” Abhishek however, cannot be blamed entirely for his lagging fitness. The actor had to put on excess weight for the character of Gurukant Desai in Mani Ratnam’s Guru. Immediately afterwards, he got busy with his wedding preparations followed by the celebrations.

Of late, the actor has been complaining about his body and that is when a friend of his recommended him to join a gym and follow a diet. Another source from the sets of Drona informs, “Abhishek’s fat hasn’t been a problem. He has just shot an action sequence for us and he has done a superb job.”