News

Special Ops 2 Review: A No-Nonsense Sequel That Doesn’t Fail! (Photo Credit – YouTube)

Special Ops 2 Review: Star Rating:

Cast: Kay Kay Menon, Prakash Raj, Tahir Raj Bhasin, Muzammil Ibrahim, Vikas Mankatla, Karan Tacker, and others

Creator: Neeraj Pandey

Director: Shivam Nair

Streaming On: JioHotstar

Language: Hindi

Runtime: 7 episodes of 50 minutes each

What is the biggest challenge while creating a sequel to a celebrated series? Not living up to the standard of its predecessor! In Neeraj Pandey’s case, the pressure was at an all-time high after winning big time with Special Ops and Special Ops 1.5. The man arrives with a vision in Special Ops 2, and you can clearly see him expanding his version of Spy Universe, led by one hero, Himmat Singh, played by Kay Kay Menon, along with his army.

This time, Himmat Singh fights AI, an enemy that is not visible! Although the web series has a clear enemy in Tahir Raj Bhasin,...

The logo of Bridge Media’s broadcast channel NewsNet.

Around 80 news anchors, reporters, editors, producers and other broadcast staff are out of work after Michigan-based news broadcaster NewsNet ceased operations over the weekend.

The decision to pull the plug on NewsNet came after owner Manoj Bhargava felt the channel had not drawn enough of an audience to continue operating efficiently, with Bhargava saying NewsNet had been losing cash every month since it launched two years ago. A companion channel called Sports News Highlights has also stopped broadcasting.

NewsNet and Sports News Highlights were distributed across the country on mostly low-power broadcast TV stations. The channels were also available on free streaming platforms like Xumo Play and The Roku Channel.

The intent behind NewsNet was to offer an unbiased source of facts-first news reports, with the tagline “News the way it used to be” anchoring its coverage. Sports News Highlights offered...

Authentic Brands Group, the company that licenses the Sports Illustrated brand, has warned the publisher that it may terminate its contract “absent a cure” after a fee payment was missed.

In a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Friday, publisher Arena Group said it did not make a quarterly payment of about $3.75 million. Arena has licensed the editorial operations of the venerable brand since 2019.

Authentic “issued the Company a notice of breach with the intent to exercise its right of termination,” Arena said in the filing, adding that they are “in discussion” with the licensor.

Authentic Brands Group said in a statement, “As the second largest brand owner and licensor in the world, a key to Authentic’s success has been and will continue to be the support of our nearly 2,000 best-in-class partners around the world. When they win; we win. In exchange for this trust and support,...

The Vaccine War

Directed by Vivek Agnihotri

Apart from Raima Sen’s over-the-top villain’s act as a journalist who has sold out to the American cause, the characters in The Vaccine War are tenable and almost uniformly restrained and believable.

Unlike the last time when many of Vivek Agnihtori’s critics felt he went overboard in demonizing Kashmir’s anti-Pandit drive, this time Agnihotri makes the arching endeavour to show the birth of India’s first Covid vaccine as a celebration of women’s empowerment.

Admittedly the women , excluding Raima Sen in her vamping avatar, are gracefully portrayed. Pallavi Joshi and Girija Oak are reasonably effective as scientists toiling at the Indian Council of Medical Research to bring out an Indian vaccine in a run against time that became headlined in a section of the press as a battle between over-ambition and efficacy.

Portions of the storytelling are admirably constructed,...

Some filmmakers do get carried away with adulation from a section of movie-watchers who are out and out rabid supporters of an ideology. For obvious reasons, their captive audience is charged up and won’t listen to any contrarian opinion from another group of followers. Vivek Agnihotri, who is hellbent upon proving his loyalty to the present ruling dispensation, has been making movies with a single-point agenda: to flag as biased an opinion that is contrary to the one he professes and rewrite history to suit his extreme right-wing beliefs.

Two of his earlier films, ‘The Kashmir Files’ and ‘The Tashkent Files’, tried to create the myth that he believes is nothing but the truth. Really?

I am all for political affiliation, but when it comes to the arts, such loyalties should not interfere with the body of your work to the extent that it degenerates into propaganda.

For obvious reasons,...

Some filmmakers do get carried away with adulation from a section of movie-watchers who are out and out rabid supporters of an ideology. For obvious reasons, their captive audience is charged up and won’t listen to any contrarian opinion from another group of followers. Vivek Agnihotri, who is hellbent upon proving his loyalty to the present ruling dispensation, has been making movies with a single-point agenda: to flag as biased an opinion that is contrary to the one he professes and rewrite history to suit his extreme right-wing beliefs.

Two of his earlier films, ‘The Kashmir Files’ and ‘The Tashkent Files’, tried to create the myth that he believes is nothing but the truth. Really?

I am all for political affiliation, but when it comes to the arts, such loyalties should not interfere with the body of your work to the extent that it degenerates into propaganda.

For obvious reasons,...

Pallavi Joshi who is three times National Award winner and will next be seen in ‘The Vaccine War’ portraying the role of a scientist, said that while the team was shooting for this film, everyone had a sense of pride in their minds.

Actress Pallavi Joshi is known to give depth to any character she plays on screen. The actress will now be seen in ‘The Vaccine War’, for which she is the producer as well. The trailer of the film was launched in Mumbai on Tuesday and here she spoke about her experience working on this film and also working with her husband Vivek Agnihotri who is the director of the film.

Pallavi said: “Vivek is always a good director. It was a wonderful experience as always working with him. It was our third film together and he is always fun to work with.”

“This film is a very special film.

Actress Alia Bhatt sent two bags full of goodies for star Ntr Jr’s children Abhay and Bhargava from her clothing brand. Ntr Jr took to his Instagram stories, where he shared a picture and thanked her for the presents.

He shared a picture of the two bags, which had “You are my favourite human ‘bean'” written on it.

The actor captioned it: “Thank you @aliabhatt and @edamamma always put a smile on Abhay and Bhargava’s faces… Hope to see a bag with my name soon.”

Ntr Jr and Alia have worked together in S S Rajamouli’s film ‘Rrr’. The song ‘Naatu Naatu’ picturised on Ntr Jr and Ram Charan was feted with the 95th Oscar Award this year. It also won a Golden Globe and a Critics Choice Award.

On the work front, the actor has started shooting for ‘Ntr 30’, which marks the Telugu debut of Bollywood actress Janhvi Kapoor.

Brahmāstra Part One: Shiva

Starring Ranbir Kapoor, Alia Bhatt, Amitabh Bachchan, Nagarjuna

Written & Directed by Ayan Mukerji

We meet Shiva a happy-go-lucky avatar(the gait in Ranbir’s steps just can’t wait , the ringing of the temple bells sounds like anklets worn by prancing belles) of Anil Kapoor’s Mr India who has a chance encounter with Isha(Alia Bhatt) and….well, Shiva’s life changes.

The nonstop adventure that takes Shiva on a Bharat Darshan starts in Kolkata and ends in never-never land with a stopovers in Pm Modiji’s Varanasi and Kangnaji’s Himachal Pradesh. There is a breathless anxious excitement to the storytelling, almost like a beat-based dance song by R D Burman whose picture Shiva has on his wall.

The actors go with the flamboyant mood of the proceedings. Ranbir Kapoor , always a portrait of restraint, lets himself go. He’s never been more over-the-top.