Everyone decided to start the work week by giving bollywoodhungama stories that may or may not be true depending on what the future holds. I should join in! I can tell bollywoodhungama that I am currently planning to make a flash mob youtube video that will go viral. Will I? Doesn’t matter! The story is that, as of this moment, I am PLANNING to do so.
Suniel Shetty in an American Film
I got all excited about this, and then I looked for more details and discovered it doesn’t exist yet and may never exist. The sorrow! Anyway, it’s supposed to be an indie American movie called “Call Centre” about an Indian cop (Suniel) who brings down a bunch of youthful conman running a call center. (story here)
But the listed director is Jeffrey Gee Chin who has done a lot of interesting work, shorts and stuff, but never a mainstream full length movie. And I don’t see this film listed on his upcoming list. Maybe it might still be true, I would certainly like it to be true, but I find it far more likely that this is a film floating stories in an effort to find funding, or a short film that will barely get a release.
Ranveer Singh’s Next Movie Starts Soon
The YRF promotion machine is in overdrive today. “Sources” say that Ranveer will probably start filming this movie in November. And there will be an actress opposite him, possibly Shalini Panday from Arjun Reddy. Oh, and he will speak in a Gujurati accent. That’s it, that’s the extent of the story (story here).
Well I am certainly excited about this movie that may or may not start filming, which may or may not feature a heroine, and which probably will have a Gujurati accent involved! Except, NOT! This is so sad, they don’t even have enough information set to leak something interesting, but they are so eager to leak anything at all that they are trying to make potential casting and schedule dates exciting.
War May or May Not Be a Franchise
The director already said in a press conference that he wrote it intending a franchise, and any idiot could see that from the open ending. But now the story is that “sources” say YRF also wants it to be a franchise. Or, to put it another way, “sources” want people to think YRF might make it a franchise so they can see how the public reacts to that and if they should move forward. (story here)
I don’t much like being a mass media guinea pig but yes, YRF, if you are reading this, I as a member of the public would be interested in a War franchise. But only if you keep the same director and star as the first one, and bring back Tiger or else some other nubile young man to play opposite Hrithik.
Preity Zinta May or May Not Return to Acting
Supposedly, Ashutosh Gowariker wants her for his next film. Not the one filming now that will release soon, the one AFTER that which has no title, no funding, no cast, and no schedule. So, a real solid job offer. Not that this is about the job offer, this is about Preity’s team floating her return to acting. (story here)
According to the “sources” Preity has not been acting because she has been focusing her energy on her IPL team. Which doesn’t seem quite right? I mean, all the other team owners treat it as a part time job 10 months out of the year and a full time job for the 2 months of games. Pretty sure she could have squeezed in an acting job, pretty sure this is more a matter of no one offering her work/her just not wanting to act right now. But it sounds better to put it as “she is working hard all the time just at different things”. And it definitely sounds better to phrase it as Ashutosh really really wanting her instead of the other way around. That part I kind of believe, because if you are going to make up a director who really really wants you in his movie, why would you pick Ashutosh? There must be a grain of truth there at least. And Ashutosh, if you are reading this, I as a member of the public would indeed be very excited about a Preity movie.
Maddy May or May Not Be in Bunty Aur Babli 2
You see what I mean about the 2000s coming back? All the little buzzy stories today (except the Ranveer Singh one) are about old time stars, and now here is one about an old time star and an old time film. The Bunty Aur Babli sequel is still in the unofficial stages, and now there is an unofficial casting. (story here)
Bunty Aur Babli 2 hasn’t had a big promotion push, no poster reveal or anything, that makes me think it is really really official. Rumor has it that Siddhant Chaturvedi will be the lead (the guy who stole Gully Boy from Ranveer). But the newest rumor says an unknown first time actress will be opposite him, which tells me the studio doesn’t have much faith in the project. And then the media at least has been trying to say that Rani and Abhishek will be coming back. And then decided Rani would (probably assuming she will always do anything YRF asks) but not Abhishek. Than Saif’s name was floated. And now Maddy. To be clear, I believe NONE of this. I believe that Siddhant is in talks to make a YRF movie and maybe, at some point, someone discussed a romantic conman film idea. After that, the media and rumor machine has just spun along by itself, taking the little bits officially leaked from YRF and combining them with people scene driving onto the YRF lot and their own imaginations into creating this whole thing. I mean sure, people could be in “talks” about the project, but then I am also in “talks” about doing a flashmob video (meaning, at one point while hanging out with friends we said “oh, we could do a flashmob video” and then we said “nah, we don’t really want to”). It’s not exactly newsworthy nor does it mean anything will come of it.
dontcallitbollywood 
Hey! I will be coming through Union Station in March (twice) so maybe we could do a two person flash mob. At any rate, I am thinking about it!
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Quick, call up bollywoodhungama and let them know we are in talks!
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YRF, I also want to stress my interest in a War sequel with a nubile young man, Tiger or otherwise. I think Margaret speaks for us all on that point.
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So long as we are sending YRF messages “YRF, I have no interest in seeing Ranveer do a bad Gujurati accent for 3 hours. That does not excite me”.
On Mon, Oct 14, 2019 at 9:51 AM dontcallitbollywood wrote:
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Speaking of new films, Varun announced his next with Sriram Raghavan! This movie has been rumored for months but I didn’t want to say anything about it because Varun has been rumored to be working with Sriram again multiple times since Badlapur came out. They didn’t mention a release date but I hope that this movie comes out next year as well. Both Street Dancer and Coolie No.1 are supposed to come out in the beginning of the year so there will be time for this movie towards the end of the year.
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Thank goodness Varun is working! Him and Ranveer, they have both had this loooooooooooooooong gap, and finally they will have a bunch of films next year.
On Mon, Oct 14, 2019 at 11:35 AM dontcallitbollywood wrote:
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I mean, he has been working all along but it was just that Street Dancer got pushed back and he didn’t announce any other movies after Coolie which made it seem like he was slowing down.
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And Kalank was a disaster. I feel like if that had been a hit, so it ran longer, and it was a big deal when it hit streaming, and so on, it would have FELT like he was around more.
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Oh yeah, that’s true! Things would have felt different if Kalank was a hit.
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Can I confess something?
After being Sunil Shetty supporter for more than 10 years I officialy dissociate from him. I can’t be a fan of a guy who supports Thackerays. đŸ˜¦ The list of my crushes becomes shorter and shorter everyday.
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But he’s so hot now! This is indeed sad.
Add on Prithviraj and Prakash from the south? Perfect ethical standards, and natural bodies. Tovino ditto of course.
On Mon, Oct 14, 2019 at 11:42 AM dontcallitbollywood wrote:
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Tovino, Prithviraj, Prakash Raj, southern Siddharth, all women from Women in Cinema Collective…But is there any nice, guy in hindi industry I can love? I can think only about Naseeruddin Shah, but he is too old.
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Shahrukh. This is why we all love him. Stirling ethics, just gorgeous. Has remained apolitical, even in the face of death threats.
On Mon, Oct 14, 2019 at 11:58 AM dontcallitbollywood wrote:
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True!
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Ah! Angie you need more tollywood in your internet ; they are , almost all of the actors/actresses are non-political and more businessy than other industry folks. Only thing matters in entertinement đŸ™‚
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I’ve been following IPL for the last three years and even though I don’t watch the games or anything I’ve seen/read enough scores and stories to know that Preity’s IPL team is not good. If she’s really focusing her energy on that team, then the results are actually quite sad.
“Rumor has it that Chaturvedi Singh will be the lead (the guy who stole Gully Boy from Ranveer).” His name is Siddhant Chaturvedi, I’m not sure where you got the Singh from.
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From my sleep deprived brain. I was trying to write this by memory at 6am before I left for work. Thanks for the proofreading, I’ll update.
On Mon, Oct 14, 2019 at 11:43 AM dontcallitbollywood wrote:
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Poor Priety. She always floats rumors of a comeback every once in a while and nothing happens. I think she’s hoping by showing that she’s available, some offers will come to her but BW has moved on. She stopped getting work after she botched her face with plastic surgery – she looked horrible in KANK and Jhoom Barabar Jhoom so it’s not surprising how fast she disappeared after such big movies.
Saying she’s busy with her cricket team is just a way to maintain dignity that she left BW and not that BW left her. Even when the cricket team was new, she used to keep saying she has 1 or 2 movies coming up but nothing ever came.
The Gowariker rumor was actually really good PR because it’s at the level that it’s believable. He isn’t very important anymore but still has some respect because of his old work. He works with people like Arjun Kapoor so it’s not that hard to believe that he might work with Priety. Making false stories about Karan Johar or YRF or something would just make people laugh.
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She needs to suck it up and take a mother role. Or at least a mature role. Which sounds terrible, but she is doing the plastic surgery and presenting herself in public as this bright young thing, and there are so many other bright young things out there. But the roles that Juhi is taking, or Rani, those have to go to someone more mature and Preity has a better shot at those.
I had the same thought about Gowariker! Poor Ashutosh, dropped so low that he can be used for fake rumors.
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The problem is that Priety was never a great actor. She survived based on cuteness, which is something that ages very badly. A 45 year old saying Ting! and flashing a dimple just makes people roll their eyes. She started messing with her face to maintain that youth and instead her face started looking bloated and scary and even older than her real age.
Juhi was able to drop the cuteness and move to more mature roles. Priety was in her own la la land. She even produced a tacky movie for herself as a romantic lead traipsing around Paris.
Priyanka is much younger and just played a mother to a teenager and the film has had a disastrous opening in spite of great reviews. When the audience is done with you, they are done with you. When you’re used to playing the lead, it’s very hard to move to supporting roles in other star’s movies. PC at least is lucky and can go play those supporting roles in HW instead so she can keep her ego in tact by calling herself a HW star. Doing the same 5 minute roles in BW movies now would be humiliating.
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I always found Preity charming onscreen, with a kind of strong confidence. Even without the acting ability, I think she could be really interesting as a spunky mother of the hero, or heroine’s mentor, or something. I was disappointed she wasn’t in Krrish (for example), I think she could have been really interesting as the confident modern mother of the hero versus Rekha’s sacrificing old-fashioned grandmother.
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Is that Ranveer movie the Javeshbhai Jordar thing he announced way back when? I’m probably royally screwing up the spelling, but I’m kind of interested in it, even if there’s no info about it, which is so frustrating, I just love Ranveer a lot.
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Yes, that’s it! I decided not even to attempt the spelling and thus didn’t repeat the title.
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I honestly don’t care much for the actors right now. Not that they’re bad or anything, but I barely feel pulled to watch their films. But if Rani or Preity made a big proper comeback film, I’d watch it. Rani needs to do bunty aur Babli!! And Abhishek, the first was so funny. And Preity really needs a film. I think she’s a competent actress, I’ve never found her to be bad. Even with simple roles like in koi mil Gaya, she was still memorable and charming. But I really liked her in kal Ho Na Ho, she was amazing. And KANK too. She’s confident so she makes her roles work. They don’t necessarily have to play mothers if Bollywood would make mature romances instead of dumb college stories all the time. Sick of seeing people in their 30s playing college students ughh eww. If they want to do that atleast get younger actors. But I’d love to see a mature romance with Preity and Saif for instance. Any kind of mature romance revolving around people in their 40s. Same goes for Rani. She still acts but she never really has costars, which is fine but I miss her other types of films. I think if director broke the “rule” and put Preity or Rani in a proper mainstream film, with a good storyline, then a new trend could slowly begin. With the exception of Rani cause of yrf, whenever an older actress comes back she does a shitty film like when Karishma did that movie dangerous ishq or something or Preity’s Paris film. They do such bad movies that no one wants to watch so then of course directors think they aren’t bankable. I’m curious to see how they’d do in a big film with a great storyline. I’m sure the audience would become super interested in them again. If I was a big director I’d take Preity in a film.
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Take the Hollywood film just go with it. Jennifer Aniston’s role was mature and I’m pretty sure her character was supposed to be in her 40s or late 30s. I could totally imagine Preity doing well in this type of role (and the other role of Adam Sandler’s gf could obviously be played by a younger actress). But if bollywood made a movie like this they would probably take two “current” actresses for both of the roles. Jennifer Aniston for instance still gets work. So do a lot of other older women in Hollywood. I’ve always hated how narrow minded bollywood is. Whenever they try to make more mature love stories like that horrible movie with Farhan Akhtar and Vidya Balan, its so cringy. They try to make them so youthful, jumping around and singing. It seemed that way with Dilwale too (didn’t see the film). I wish I could hypnotize yrf into casting who I want and the type of role too. Ugh
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HA! Just Go With It is a remake of a 1970s film Cactus Flower with Ingrid Bergman and Walter Mattheu and Goldie Hawn. Which was then remade in India as Maine Pyaar Kyun Kiya with Salman and Katrina and Sushmita. Your point stands, Sush was only 30 when she was playing the “old” one. I just find it funny that your example was one of the rare shared remakes between both industries.
Dilwale was strange, because the mature love story was actually great, but the filmmakers didn’t trust it and grafted on a lengthy youthful love story. If they had dumped the flashback and kept it the mature story, it could have been great.
On Tue, Oct 15, 2019 at 4:15 PM dontcallitbollywood wrote:
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Yes! That cycle you put your finger on at the end is so important! It’s the same with all female lead films. They don’t get the good script or director or budget, and then fail and it is shown as proof that women can’t bring in the box office. Or they actually get all that stuff (Aaje Nachle) and flop because of random chance and it is shown as proof that no one should bother. Or they end up being a blockbuster hit (Veere Di Wedding, Raazi, Neerja, etc. etc. etc.) and are consistently written off as a “fluke”.
On Tue, Oct 15, 2019 at 4:08 PM dontcallitbollywood wrote:
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