A still from the movie Midnight's Children
New Delhi:
Deepa Mehta's film adaptation ofSalman Rushdie's novel 'Midnight's Children' is slated for aFebruary release in India.
The film has been doing the festival rounds already andwill be released in India by PVR."'Midnight's Children' will most likely be released inIndia in February because we are trying to coincide with theinternational release of the film," Sanjeev Kumar Bijli, JMD,PVR Ltd, told PTI.
Despite the controversial author Rushdie being involvedwith the project and Mehta's earlier run-ins withfundamentalists, Bijli is not treating this release as aspecial case.
"We don't see any problems as such. It's not something weare very concerned about. We'd be going about it the same wayas any other product. This one is very special to us as wehave an Indian director involved. It has got a great Indiancast as well. Such films are rare to come by. I'm thinking ofthe positives, not negatives, as of now," he said.
With an ensemble cast of Shriya Saran, Rahul Bose, SohaAli Khan, Siddharth Narayan, Anupam Kher, Shabana Azmi, SeemaBiswas and Shahana Goswami, the film has been generating quitea buzz internationally.
Another big film which PVR is set to distribute in Indiais Mira Nair's 'The Reluctant Fundamentalist', an adaptationof Pakistani author Mohsin Hamid's novel of the same name. Thefilm will release here in April.
"We've been acquiring independent English films for thepast 10 years. We were tracking Mira Nair's film for a whileand finalised the deal in Cannes. We are planning to releasethe film both in Hindi and English across 200 screens, ormaybe more depending on the time of the release," said Bijli.
"It's a great thing having these two Indian filmmakersadapting these celebrated novels into films and then trustingus with their product. It is a responsibility and a hugehonour as well," he said.
Bijli said that even though such films may have a nicheaudience, PVR is striving to screen all kinds of movies inIndia."We are in the business of showing movies, we need toshow all kinds of films. Some will cut across all segments ofthe society, but we do have multiplexes at locations where theaudiences are very discerning," he said.
PVR has distributed some major Hollywood films in Indiaand Bijli said they have long-standing relationships with someof the major studios which enable them to bring overseascontent to Indian shores."Our criteria is to look at films which have an appeal inIndia, latest being the Twilight series which justconcluded. The five films were a huge success. Then we alsohad Brad Pitt's Killing Them Softly," said Bijli.
In January, PVR is set to release Mark Wahlberg's TheLone Survivor, Katheryn Bigelow's portrayal of the hunt forOsama bin Laden in Zero Dark Thirty and EwanMcGregor-starrer The Impossible, based on the true story ofa Spanish family's experience of the 2004 Indian Oceantsunami.
The film has been doing the festival rounds already andwill be released in India by PVR."'Midnight's Children' will most likely be released inIndia in February because we are trying to coincide with theinternational release of the film," Sanjeev Kumar Bijli, JMD,PVR Ltd, told PTI.
Despite the controversial author Rushdie being involvedwith the project and Mehta's earlier run-ins withfundamentalists, Bijli is not treating this release as aspecial case.
"We don't see any problems as such. It's not something weare very concerned about. We'd be going about it the same wayas any other product. This one is very special to us as wehave an Indian director involved. It has got a great Indiancast as well. Such films are rare to come by. I'm thinking ofthe positives, not negatives, as of now," he said.
With an ensemble cast of Shriya Saran, Rahul Bose, SohaAli Khan, Siddharth Narayan, Anupam Kher, Shabana Azmi, SeemaBiswas and Shahana Goswami, the film has been generating quitea buzz internationally.
Another big film which PVR is set to distribute in Indiais Mira Nair's 'The Reluctant Fundamentalist', an adaptationof Pakistani author Mohsin Hamid's novel of the same name. Thefilm will release here in April.
"We've been acquiring independent English films for thepast 10 years. We were tracking Mira Nair's film for a whileand finalised the deal in Cannes. We are planning to releasethe film both in Hindi and English across 200 screens, ormaybe more depending on the time of the release," said Bijli.
"It's a great thing having these two Indian filmmakersadapting these celebrated novels into films and then trustingus with their product. It is a responsibility and a hugehonour as well," he said.
Bijli said that even though such films may have a nicheaudience, PVR is striving to screen all kinds of movies inIndia."We are in the business of showing movies, we need toshow all kinds of films. Some will cut across all segments ofthe society, but we do have multiplexes at locations where theaudiences are very discerning," he said.
PVR has distributed some major Hollywood films in Indiaand Bijli said they have long-standing relationships with someof the major studios which enable them to bring overseascontent to Indian shores."Our criteria is to look at films which have an appeal inIndia, latest being the Twilight series which justconcluded. The five films were a huge success. Then we alsohad Brad Pitt's Killing Them Softly," said Bijli.
In January, PVR is set to release Mark Wahlberg's TheLone Survivor, Katheryn Bigelow's portrayal of the hunt forOsama bin Laden in Zero Dark Thirty and EwanMcGregor-starrer The Impossible, based on the true story ofa Spanish family's experience of the 2004 Indian Oceantsunami.
