Powered by the success of two movies featuring the two leading Khans -- Shah Rukh and Aamir -- at the fag end of the year 2008, Bollywood has stepped into the New Year with lots of hopes on an array of big-budget movies to set the box office on fire.
Three Bengali films by internationally acclaimed directors Buddhadeb Dasgupta and Rituparno Ghosh are also slated for release in 2009. While Dasgupta comes up with "Janala", Ghosh will give us "Kalponik" and "Abohoman".
The strong ticket collection of Shah Rukh-starrer "Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi" and "Ghajini", which sees Aamir in the lead role, in the last two months of the previous year has ushered in strong optimism in the industry which hopes to be back on its feet soon after liquidity crunch hit the Bollywood in the second half of 2008.
The first six months of the New Year will have nearly a dozen big-budget multi-starrer movies lining up Shah Rukh, Aamir, Salman Khan, Akshay Kumar, Abhishek Bachchan and Hrithik Roshan.
The year begins with Akshay Kumar and Deepika Padukone's "Chandni Chowk to China" which is an action comedy about a naive cook from Delhi's Chandni Chowk locality who is mistaken for a reincarnation of an ancient peasant warrior by residents of a village in China.
Akshay Kumar's recent releases are estimated to have earned more than Rs 500 crore at the box office and also plays lead roles in two more movies to be released this year -- "Kambakth Ishq" opposite Kareena Kapoor and "Blue".
One of the most anticipated Bollywood films of 2009 will be Shah Rukh's home production "Billu Barber", a remake of a hit Malayalam movie, and Karan Johar's "My Name is Khan". Both films will star Shah Rukh.
Directed by Priyadarshan, "Billu Barber", which also stars Irrfan Khan and Lara Dutta, will be seen with keen interest by Shah Rukh's fans to find out if the actor's magic works as Tamil film industry super star Rajnikanth's remake of the same film last year failed to click at the box office.
"Billu Barber" is the story of friendship between a top film star played by Shah Rukh, and a common man played by Irrfan, and is set for release in the first quarter of 2009.
Aamir Khan too will be in spotlight with Rajkumar Hirani's "3 Idiots", which is based on writer Chetan Bhagat's bestseller English novel "Five Point Someone", and "Dhobi Ghat". In "Dhobi Ghat" that marks the directorial debut of the actor's wife Kiran Rao, Aamir plays the role of a painter. Hirani's film sees Kareena as the heroine.
Besides, Aamir has his home production "Delhi Belly" featuring his nephew Imran who had made his debut last year with successful "Jaane Tu Ya Jaaney Na".
Salman, who had a bad spell in 2008 at the box office, will try his luck this year in "Main Aur Mrs Khanna" opposited Kareena and in "London Dreams" with Ajay Devgan and newcomer Telugu actress Asin who shot into limelight with her Hindi film debut in Aamir-starrer "Ghajini".
Abshishek, whose performance in "Dostana" last year earned good reviews, features in Rakyesh Om Prakash Mehra's "Delhi 6" and Hrithik appears in his home production "Kites" and Zoya Akhtar's directorial debut "Luck by Chance".
Besides the big budget movies, there is this year Ashutosh Gowariker's "What's Your Rashee" in which actress Priyanka Chopra is reportedly playing 12 roles depicting as many star signs.
Buoyed by the success of his debut as an actor in "Rock On" last year, filmmaker Farhan Akhtar is appearing again on the screen in his sister Zoya-directed "Luck By Chance" which is expected to hit the screens on January 30.
The plot of the film is centred on Bollywood and how people from different walks of life go to Mumbai to make it big in an industry where luck often plays a bigger role than hard work. Produced and distributed by Big Pictures, the movie also features Juhi Chawla, Konkona Sen Sharma, Rishi Kapoor and Dimple Kapadia.
Source: http://www.thedailystar.net/newDesign/news-details.php?nid=70009
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