FilmIndia (1945)

December, 1945 FILMINDI A Hindustan Chitra for himself, his wife and little Kishore. That Gujrati, Sir Chinubhai Madhavlal, is reported to have been paid off. USUAL SALE As is usual with all the pictures with which Rai Bahadur Chuni Lall is associated, "Mazdoor", the next one of "Filmistan" is also reported to have been sold. As the sale harms no one, let us believe the story. NEW FACE Lila Bhagat, a girl from the Punjab, is a new recruit being tried in "Talash", a Rajkamal picture, directed by Winayak. RISKY JOB Dcwan Sharar, the well-known writer, plays the role of a mandarin in "The Story of Dr. Kotnis" without his terms for acting being fixed up previously. It is a grave risk as any one would give Dewan Saheb a lakh of rupees for a role like that with so much opium around and no whisky. MARRIED AGAIN Mr. Mohsin Abdulla, till recently husband of Neena, the popular film star of Shalimar, is reported to have married Miss Vera Anklesaria, a Recruit Jan Mahomed of 34 Seppiugs Road, Bangalore, seems to be an attractive proposition in 5'-6". He sings in addition and they call him the "Pankaj Mullick" of the South. That is good going in any case. He is better than our present boys. Parsi girl of Indore, now working m a picture of "Filmistan". That calls for another retaliatory marriage. FRIENDS NO MORE Film-actress Suvarnalata is reported of have sued Capt. Pessi Billimoria to obtain a divorce and settle other accounts. Hubby Pessi is a much worried man these days, wondering through which window love flew out. POWER OF FILMS The Arab Office in London has protested to the United States Ambassador against a "March of Time" him on Palestine, which has been released in England, pointing out that the Arabs and their case are grossly misrepresented in a manner to arouse contempt and antipathy for them. The Arab Office has also drawn the attention of the British Government to the matter with special reference to the likely repercussions in Palestine if the film is shown there. The "Time" owned by Henry Luce, a Jew, owns the "March of Time" documentaries. You can't expect a Jew to fall in love with Arabs. YANKEE BAITING The British film industry, realising too well that the average Britisher has neither brains nor imagination enough to master the difficult art of motion picture making, is anxiously trying to induce American craftsmen to come to Great Britain. A recent "capture" by the J. Arthur Rank organization is Mr. David Hand, till recently Walt Disney's right-hand man, who will be making cartoons in England in future if he gets an English mouse with imagination enough to race with "Mickey Mouse." David Hand has been in the cartoon trade for 26 years, having begun with Max Fleischer and later on supervised "Snow White etc." and "Bambi" for Walt Disney. BUDDHISTS' BAN A meeting of the Indo-Lanka Buddhist Association recently held in Bombay adopted a resolution protesting against the filming of the life of Lord Buddha stating that doing so was against the tenets of the Buddhist religion. The resolution which was unanimously carried was proposed by N. A. F. Memanage and seconded by Maung Sein Htun, a Puimese scholar. THREE DIMENSIONS FILMS The Soviet film industry claims that it would be first in the field with three dimension films. First production on the new stereoscopic screen would be "Robinson Crusoe. ' Inventor Semeon Pavlovich Ivanov said that the screen created such a perfect dlusion that people unconsciously dodged when pictures of birds and aeroplanes were shown. Said Ivanov: "I saw reople reach out their hands to catch flowers that were thrown. In a scene in which confetti streamers were trailing over the screen, I saw an old man in the audience get up and whip his cane in the air to see if anything was really there." ' These effects are achieved by projecting film with a double row of images side by side on to the screen made from 2,000 matched pieces of mirror glass. LEARNING COMPROMISE November proved a bad month for Baburao Patel. It all started with a day-old infant he required for a sequence in his new picture "Gvalan" Not used to being denied anything Baburao Patel was shocked to discover that a day-old baby was the rarest thing m the world to get and after searching all the maternity hospitals in the city, the usually go-getting editor realized that even the poorest parents did not like to risk their little ones for film sets. So Baburao Patel had to compromise with a "three-month-old brat" ?* .he Puts it a day-old bain ' Making motion pictures is a compromising job. R. I. P. Mr P. F. Pithawalla, an artiste of the Bombay Talkies Ltd., died suddenly at the age of 53 in the first week of last month. He had worked in 24 out of 27 pictures produced by the Bombay Talkies Ltd., not to mention the soapy" stories of Sun Light Soap. Modest and loveable, the late M; Pithawalla had begun life as a stage actor 45 years ago on the Urdu stage. ■13