Kolkata: Few people know that legendary playback singer Kishore Kumar had offered financial help to his maternal uncle Satyajit Ray, who was facing a financial crunch while shooting Pather Panchali in 1955.
The singer, who ruled the Hindi film music in the 70s and 80s, had also refused to accept fees for singing in another Ray classic Charulata on the ground that he had already been honoured to be a part of the film.
This and other interesting nuggets from Kishore’s life have adorned a documentary by Satyajit Ray’s son Sandip Ray, an ace film-maker himself, on the singer whose songs are still loved by millions of music lovers.
The video documentary Zindagi Ek Safar (Life: A Long Journey) is replete with hitherto-unknown facts about the singer and his life. For instance, Kishore’s love for collecting films from all over the world. He had over 3,500 video cassettes of the films in his possession at that time.
There is a free-wheeling interview of Ray about Kishore in the documentary, rare photographs acquired by Sandip Ray and tributes by Lata Mangeshkar, Asha Bhonsle, R.D. Burman, Amitabh Bachchan, Shah Rukh Khan and singer Shaan.
The interview section has clips of a rare interview of the singer, taken by Lata Mangeshkar during their visit to Washington and some live action by the mercurial singer in India and abroad, Sandip informs.
Sandip said that he could complete the documentary only through the help of Kishore’s singer son Amit Kumar and Doordarshan for making available valuable archival material on the singing legend to make the two-hour-20-minute film, which is set to hit music stores soon.
The documentary was completed way back in 1989, one year after Kishore’s death for the video cassette edition, but in the present DVD format its four-hour length was pruned by editing out some old parts and inserting interviews of Khan and Shaan, he said. —PTI
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Eva in ad: Some don’t like it hot
New York: Hollywood bombshell Eva Mendes’ new traffic-stopping billboard ad has angered some residents in the city, whereas others are finding it incredibly "sexy".
Calvin Klein’s latest underwear ad shows the Hitch star sprawled on a bed with male model, dressed in skimpy lingerie, reported New York Daily News. The billboard spans an entire block in Soho and has split Manhattanites between admirers and angry residents who have dubbed it "pornography." "Some of us don’t want to expose our kids to something like this — it’s borderline pornography," said Carl Wilson, 55, an MTA worker from Queens.
But there are others who are definitely pleased with the new ad and are looking forward to buy the product. "I think it’s sexy as hell. It makes me want to buy some drawers like that," said Carlos Gamez. —PTI