Brad Pitt ‘Smiling & Laughing’ At Charity Bash In Malibu Amid Angelina Jolie Custody Battle

Awww! Brad Pitt got a warm welcome back from his Hollywood pals at a Malibu charity event Jan. 15, laughing a smiling up a storm. Hollywood has EXCLUSIVE details on how the event totally brought cheer to the actor in the midst of his ugly divorce from Angelina Jolie.

Brad Pitt, 53, has always been a popular and well-loved guy in Hollywood as evidenced by his warm welcome at the 2017 Golden Globes, and that was totally obvious when he attended a charity concert among his A-list celebrity pals. After spending the past few months practically a recluse during his bitter divorce and custody battle with Angelina Jolie, 41, he played host to an all-star concert to benefit the Epidermolysis Bullosa Medical Research Foundation.

“Brad Pitt looked relieved to be out mixing with people and other celebrities at the Rock4EB! Concert in Malibu. His face looked a little drawn, but he was smiling and laughing as well. He had obviously made an effort because he wore a rocker chic outfit that looked like it had been pieced together by a stylist,” a source tells Hollywood EXCLUSIVELY.

“During the event he spoke with Sting, David Spade and Chris Cornell, while Zach Galifianakis made him laugh a few times. Courtney Cox was also at the concert, so it would have been interesting if she had spoken to him because she used to hang-out with him back in the day along with Jennifer Aniston and David Arquette. Brad has obviously been through a lot recently, but he looked like he was having a good time at the event,” our insider adds.

Video from the event showed Brad goofing off onstage, having a blast making jokes alongside pal Sting, 67. He started reading an introduction for Chris, 52, and hilariously crumpled up the script he’d been given and went with the heartfelt message, “I get to introduce a very, very good friend of mine and someone I’ve known for quite a while and I’m a huge fan,.” He also told the crowd how much of a blast he had hosting the event, as he’s on the board of directors for the EB Medical Research Foundation. “Thank you so much for having me out here tonight, this is so much fun I really appreciate it,” he said as the crowd went wild with applause. It’s so great to see Brad out and about again, and especially getting so much love from his friends.

http://www.epaperindia.in/2017/01/brad-pitt-smiling-laughing-charity-bash-malibu-amid-angelina-jolie-custody-battle/
#Angelina_Jolie, #Brad_Pitt, #Charity_Bash, #Custody_Battle, #Malibu_Amid, #Smiling__Laughing

Rishi Kapoor’s meeting with Dawood Ibrahim was really interesting

Rishi Kapoor is surely one of those celebs who are motor mouthed. The actor has come up with his autobiography ‘Khullam Khulla: Rishi Kapoor Uncensored’. He has written some many interesting unknown facts about it, and one of the incidents that he has shared in his book is about his meeting with underworld don Dawood Ibrahim.

It so happened that Rishi went to Dubai for a vacation with his friend Bitto Anand. As they landed there and were about to exit the airport, a man approached them and handed over a phone. It was Dawood Ibrahim on the other side, and he invited them for tea. Rishi has written in his book, “That evening, Bittu and I were picked up from our hotel in a gleaming Rolls Royce. While we were being driven to his home, a conversation went on around us, in Kutchi. I don’t understand Kutchi but my friend did, and he realized that we were being driven around in circles, so we wouldn’t know the exact location of his house. Dawood, immaculately dressed in an Italian ensemble that wasn’t exactly a suit, greeted us warmly and apologetically explained, ‘I called you to tea because I don’t drink or serve alcohol.”

They spoke about many things that evening. The don and the actor spoke about films, songs and crime. “I have carried out petty thefts but I have never killed anyone, though I have got someone killed,’ he revealed. He claimed to have had someone shot in a Mumbai court for lying,” Dawood had told Rishi.

The actor has further written that while he was shopping with his wife Neetu Kapoor at a shoe shop in Dubai in 1989, he met ‘D’ again. The don was surrounded by eight to 10 bodyguards and he offered to buy whatever he wanted. In both his meetings, Dawood had assured Rishi that he can contact him for anything he wants.

He has written, “Finally Dawood said, ‘I am a fugitive because I will not get justice in India. There are a lot of people there who are against me. There are also many in India I have bought. I pay several politicians who are in my pocket.’ I said to him, ‘Dawood, please leave me out of all this, yaar. I am an actor and I really don’t wish to get involved.’ He understood. He was always extremely nice to me and showed me a lot of warmth.”

The actor has revealed after that hehas never met Dawood, but there have been many meetings with his family members. The actor has written, “I made a film called ‘Shreemaan Aashique’ which had music composed by Nadeem-Shravan and lyrics by Noora, Dawood’s brother, who had a flair for writing.”

Well, for the uninitiated, Rishi had played the role of Dawood Ibrahim in Nikhil Advani’s 2013 release ‘D-Day’.

We are sure these interesting revelations of Rishi Kapoor will make his book bestseller.

http://www.epaperindia.in/2017/01/rishi-kapoors-meeting-dawood-ibrahim-really-interesting/
#Dawood_Ibrahim, #Featured, #Rishi_Kapoor

SWAMP AND THE CITY: UNUSUAL NEW ORLEANS

Just outside New Orleans…

Honey Island Swamp. It’s a curious name. Part sweet syrup, part fetid bog. Part desert island discs, perhaps.

But whatever it was supposed to represent, I had a hard time picturing it in my mind from the colour and character of old New Orleans.

The wrought-iron balconies, rainbow paint and voodoo vibe of central New Orleans make it clear exactly where you are in this world: at the heart of one of America’s most iconic cities. But walk just a few blocks away and the cityscape looks far more familiar.

Concrete high rise. Gleaming glass. Piercingly cool air conditioning and the reminder that only foreigners use the sidewalk rather than the automobile.

Stand on a certain crossroad and you could be in any number of Stateside places, from Seattle to New York to snow-surrounded Salt Lake City.

Drive a short while further into Louisiana and it’s a completely different story.

Here, glaring green is the name of the game, from the fronds that hang from the trees to the clover-like aquatic vegetation that drifts along the surface of the swamp. Green moss clings to the bark-crusted branches and the bobbly backs of the gators that glide by.

Ah, yes. That’s right. The gators.

Much as the presence of sharks shocked me in the waters around Sydney and Darwin, so the close proximity to flesh-tearing teeth came as a surprise on a day trip from New Orleans.

Gators. Alligators. Big ones. Giant ones.

All around.

And, my. Like crocodiles, they can jump.

Jumping Jimminy

As the Louisianans and fellow passengers mocked my shock, I realised the innocence of growing up in Europe: the starling absence of animals ready to rip you to shreds.

Not that every swamp beast is a menace.

There were snuffling, gruffling black-skinned hogs. And furry racoons that impressed only me.

And, of course, this being New Orleans, there were stories of Katrina.

Striding through the soulful streets of the French Quarter, sugar-dusted beignet in hand, it took a flight of imagination to conjure up the threat of water.

On a flat-bottomed boat on Honey Island Swamp, hemmed in by green, the vulnerability became clear.

So, too, did other characteristics that have built up the flavour of the city.

How the Swamp Led to It All

Swamps make it impossible to grow and store ingredients for traditional French cooking: a key step in the development of Creole cuisine.

Difficult vegetation fuelled the drive for manual labour, which fuelled the original import of slaves from Africa and across the Caribbean.

And, of course, swamps lead to mosquitoes and the diseases that they bear: a fact that led to the death of over 8000 poor Irish immigrants contracted to dig the New Basin Canal when the wealthy calculated their lives to be worth less than a well-trained slave.

And how all these different cultures and snippets of history mixed together to produce the music, the meals, and the modern multicultural blend of the nearby city of New Orleans.

And, although while less profound, the reality of the swamp illustrated the great need and desire for that piercingly cool air conditioning after all.

And why locals prefer to drive instead of walk.

http://www.epaperindia.in/2017/01/swamp-city-unusual-new-orleans/
#NEW_ORLEANS, #SWAMP, #THE_CITY, #UNUSUAL

Salman Khan Hangs Out With Preity Zinta and her Hubby Gene Goodenough!

The Filmfare Awards took place recently and the event was attended by who’s who of the industry. According to a report in BollywoodLife.com, Preity Zinta was spotted at the event with her hubby Gene Goodenough.

The actress looked lovely in yellow and it was her first appearance with her husband after their wedding reception last year.

The report added that Jacqueline Fernandez shared this pic of herself with Salman Khan, Preity-Gene and Sonakshi Sinha with the caption “The calm after the storm #filmfareawards2017.”

http://www.epaperindia.in/2017/01/salman-khan-hangs-preity-zinta-hubby-gene-goodenough/
#GENE_GOODENOUGH, #JACQUELINE_FERNANDEZ, #Preity_Zinta, #Salman_Khan

Karan Johar opens up on distancing with Shah Rukh Khan and how he later addressed it

Everyday, there’s one or another interesting bit of information extracted from Karan Johar‘s autobiography doing the rounds on internet. ‘An Unsuitable Boy’ as he has named it, his confessions too might be unsuitable for many. One such was he admitting that he was a homosexual but would never admit it as he could be jailed for that. Karan received considerable backlash from LGBT community for the same.

While his revelations on his fallout with Kajol apparently irked her hubby Ajay Devgn, he has now opened up on how the distance between him and close friend Shah Rukh Khan had once grown larger, and how he sorted it out.

“When two people are so close. When they have done six feature films together and then haven’t worked together on the set for a while there is bound to be a gap. That is the way the industry is. Shah Rukh is a very possessive person. He is a possessive friend. I think I may have hurt him when I made a film without him. And I think I got hurt because when I did, I felt he didn’t give me that paternal or fraternal feeling that I had from him otherwise. I think we were two hurt friends for no reason,” he wrote.

Not sure which film is he referring to here, but it took quite a few years for them to come back to old terms.

“When the origin of the friendship is so strong, it just cannot die. I’ve not allowed to either, and neither has he. It happened organically. We met at Deepika’s party celebrating Piku’s success at one point when we were talking, we looked at each other I hugged him instinctively and said, ‘I’ve missed you’. And he said, ‘You’ve no idea how much I’ve missed you.’ We had this moment,” Karan added, mentioning that after his fallout with Kajol, the first person to receive a phone call was SRK.

After all, it is a ‘big layer of love and respect’ that makes relationships work!

http://www.epaperindia.in/2017/01/karan-johar-opens-distancing-shah-rukh-khan-later-addressed/
#Featured, #Karan_Johar, #Shah_Rukh_Khan, #An_Unsuitable_Boy

MOVIE REVIEW: Ok Jaanu

Ameer ladka, gareeb ladki, love triangles, horrible parents, different backgrounds, different religions, different people, we have exhausted most possibilities, plots and premises for a decent love story. Hence filmmakers these days explore the challenges millennials face, one of them being the tough choice between career and love.

Ok Jaanu is an easy breezy watch without any major crisis. The characters have depth…that of my morning masala chai. The story has layers…that of my lachcha paratha. There’s hardly any dilemma, any major cross roads that lead to any soul stirring, damn-I-can’t-decide- moment!

Happy boy meets happy girl in a cute well written scene at the church. They exchange numbers and before we know they are already doing Humma Humma in a rather shady hotel in Ahmedabad.

Adi (Aditya-I-am-not-drinking-in-this-film-Kapoor) and Tara (Shradha-Did-anyone-watch-Rock-On-2-Kapoor) are ambitious people. They have American-French plans and mind you, they work very hard towards them, like take a random unplanned vacation sometimes or have multiple coffee dates every day. I like this world. There are no deadlines, no bosses to report to, no targets to meet. Aha, what a life!!

And sometimes the film gives us insights into Tara’s profession equating architecture with life and universe; architecture is like magic, it’s like passion, it’s like romance….yawwwwwnnn!!

One hopes for some real crisis to crop up in the second half but hope can take a walk in Safa Park because we are shown sequences that have hardly any meaning or relevance to the movie.

However there are a few things that work for the movie. Nasserudin Shah and Leela Samson’s love track does offer an interesting foil to the young love story. The dialogues by Gulzar are fun as well. “Bachcho ko hum padha padha kar gadhe se ghoda banate hain…aur phir bade hokar unhe ghodi pe bithate hain…” Sadly they are few and far in between.

Both Shradha and Aditya do full justice to their lazily written characters. Their chemistry is palpable and their efforts are earnest!

The film seems to have a huge Saathiya hangover; from the local train conversations to the way Ravi K Chandran captures Mumbai on his lens. And oh how beautifully it’s done. So delicious!

The climax also blends all elements from rains, confusion, chaos and crowd to create the required tension in the scene. But what’s with the forced Ok Jaanu every five minutes in the film. These two words are as pointlessly used as ‘A’ and ‘Y’ in Okay! Was it an attempt to remind us the title of the film? Imagine if the makers of Andheri Raat Mein Diya Tere Haath Mein took a cue from Ok Jaanu! Winks!

Ok Jaanu doesn’t convince you with the couple’s fear against marriage. Neither does it showcase real career problems. The parents and family are also such boring cardboard characters. You can see the climax well in advance but can hardly see any logic or reasoning in their change of hearts.

THE RATINGS MEAN:

5 stars: Loved it. (This could make to top ten movies you must watch before you die!)
4 stars: Liked it. Recommend it. (This will help you sound intellectual and give you stuff to add at water cooler conversations.)
3 stars: Didn’t hurt. Watch it once.
2 stars: It put me to sleep. Watch it if you are an insomniac or a newly wedded couple. Winks!
1 star: Do I even need to explain this?

http://www.epaperindia.in/2017/01/movie-review-ok-jaanu/
#Karan_Johar, #LOKESH_DHARMANI, #MOVIE_REVIEW, #OK_Jaanu, #Shaad_Ali, #Shraddha_Kapoor, #Aditya_Roy_Kapur

Nawazuddin Siddiqui: Sushant Singh Rajput has a vision and isn’t stuck in that typical star system

Nawazuddin Siddiqui, who will next be seen in Shah Rukh Khan-starrer ‘Raees’, claims that even though he loves getting awards for his performances, he doesn’t plan for them.

He says, “A film or a character might end up getting you awards, but you never work with any agenda in your mind. When you get an award, you feel good that whatever you did was honest and right; that you performed it minus corruption of any kind.”

Being a proficient actor that he is, Nawaz believes in getting into the skin of his character. “The thrill of getting into a new life and playing a new character is indescribable. To get into the mindset and thought process of a character like ‘Raman Raghav 2.0’ (2016) is enjoyable, interesting and fresh. That’s why every film gives a new dimension to the artiste inside you.”

The actor was also all praise for Sushant Singh Rajput and his choice of roles in Bollywood. He adds, “Youngsters are always ready to take risks. Their dedication is very good. Sushant Singh Rajput for instance, did a very good experiment with ‘Byomkesh Bakshy’. Then he worked in ‘M.S. Dhoni: The Untold Story’. And now Sushant has a variety of films, which is great. What I like the most about him is that he has a vision. He isn’t stuck in that typical, star system where he is like, ‘I need to do only a certain kind of cinema’ or ‘people like watching such films.’ It’s great that he at least isn’t stuck in such a clique…”

http://www.epaperindia.in/2017/01/nawazuddin-siddiqui-sushant-singh-rajput-vision-isnt-stuck-typical-star-system/
#Featured, #Nawazuddin_Siddiqui, #Raees, #Sushant_Singh_Rajput