SRK… down but not under

Shah Rukh Khan was mobbed repeatedly by fans at the shooting of Chak De India in Australia. SRK is acting in this film with Vidya Malavade (the girl in the Santro commercial) and 15 other girls. The film is about a low-on-morale women’s hockey team which gets energised after a sponsor steps in, believing in the abilities of coach SRK and the players. The girls, who have lost some of their league matches, go on to win the hockey world cup. Judging by the crowds at the shooting, King Khan seems to have a lot of followers in Kangarooland.

Media blog

Journalists in Mumbai and Delhi must be heaving a sigh of relief —mediamamu, a blog on the media, has shut shop. The blog, written by an unknown journalist, hit out at all and sundry in the media, focusing primarily (though not exclusively) on journalists at Business Standard and The Hindustan Times — something that lent suspicion that the blogger had worked at both newspapers. The blog (mediamamu.blogspot.com) wrote all sorts of scurrilous (and often inaccurate) stuff about journalists, accusing one financial journalist of junketing and planting stories in his newspaper and another of being a sloth. In the process, it raised quite a stir.

A notice posted on the blog says: “At 3.00 AM early morning on Friday, November 17, Media Mamu passed away in his sleep. Mamu’s wife found the body cold, when she brought him the mandatory morning Nescafe. Even in death, Mamu bore a smile on his lips and appeared to be at peace with the media world with which he fought a losing battle in the last years of his life.” So did someone discover the blogger’s identity and threaten to sue him' Perhaps.

Going on 70

Priyadarshan may seem like a new name in Hindi comedies but in reality, the man has already made around 69 films in his 25-year-old film career. Apart from outrageous comedies like Hera Pheri, Malamaal Weekly, Hungama, Hulchul and Garam Masala, he has also made films like Viraasat and Sazaa-E-Kalapaani. And now his 70th film, Bhagam Bhag, will release on December 22. It stars Akshay Kumar and Govinda along with Paresh Rawal, Lara Dutta, Tanushree Dutta, Arbaaz Khan, Rajpal Yadav, and Jackie Shroff.

Back from hell

Director Ajay Phansekar is busy with his Marathi film Ramchandra Purshottam Joshi, the story of a dead man who is permitted to come out of hell and visit his family for eight hours. Phansekar has also been chosen by K Sera Sera to direct its next venture. Suniel Shetty and Jaya Bachchan have already been signed on for that film. Phansekar had earlier made two flop films, Encounter — The Killing starring Naseeruddin Shah and Yeh Hai Zindagi starring Gracy Singh. After getting a second shot at success, is Phansekar feeling like the character from his Marathi film'