Malayalam Cinema Shines as Bollywood Recalibrates in 2024, Says Producer Siddharth Roy Kapur in Indian Industry Analysis (EXCLUSIVE)

Naman Ramachandran Indian sci-fi epic “Kalki 2898 AD” made a third place debut at the worldwide box office in a weekend led by “Inside Out 2” and “A Quiet Place: Day One.” Disney’s “Inside Out 2” collected $165 million worldwide, including $57.4 million in North America, in its third weekend of release and now has crossed a $1 billion gross, according to numbers from Comscore. Paramount’s “A Quiet Place: Day One” debuted with $98.5 million, including $53 million in North America, releasing across 60 territories.

Naman Ramachandran Series “Barzakh,” starring top Pakistani actors Fawad Khan and Sanam Saeed, has unveiled a trailer. Set in the Hunza Valley, “Barzakh” centers on a 76-year-old man who surprises his estranged children and grandchildren by announcing his engagement to the ghost of his first love. This revelation triggers a series of emotional confrontations as the family gathers, unsure how to respond to the situation.

Two Indian films flexed at the domestic box office — and when they hit they really do hit, buoying exhibitors through good times and bad — with Kinds Of Kindness hitting no. 10 in a major expansion and Thelma not far behind.

Naman Ramachandran From accountant to acting powerhouse, Indian actor Vijay Sethupathi‘s 50-film journey has been anything but ordinary. The actor’s 50th film, the Tamil-language “Maharaja,” written and directed by Nithilan Saminathan (“Kurangu Bommai”), is an action-packed saga that blends thriller elements with family drama and has a father-daughter relationship at its core. It has emerged as one of the biggest Tamil hits of the year.

The indie market is feeling pretty good. A big film from India Kalki 2898 AD may unseat RRR’s North American opening weekend. June Squibb-starrer Thelma is blowing through midweek shows and stands at $3.75 million heading into week 2 steady at 1,280 theaters. Searchlight Pictures Kinds Of Kindness by Yorgos Lanthimos (Poor Things) starring Emma Stone and Jesse Plemons jumps to 500 screens from five after the best limited opening of the year last weekend.

Naman Ramachandran “Second Chance,” the directorial debut of Indian filmmaker Subhadra Mahajan, has been picked up for international sales by Thailand-based Diversion ahead of its world premiere at the 2024 Karlovy Vary International Film Festival. The film is set to debut on July 2 in the festival’s Proxima Competition section. The film tells the story of Nia, a young woman from the city who returns to her family home in the western Himalayas after a decade-long absence.

EXCLUSIVE: Fresh off of Netflix’s noisy Indian series Heeramandi: The Diamond Bazaar, Taha Shah Badussha has set his sights on Hollywood — and he has a specific, seismic role in mind.

Naman Ramachandran Creativeland Studios has tapped industry veteran Shobha Sant as its new CEO, Variety can reveal. Sant brings over 30 years of experience to the role, most recently serving as head of content alliances – films, at billionaire Mukesh Ambani’s Jio Studios. In her new position, Sant will lead Creativeland’s filmed entertainment division and oversee the talent business of AIG-India, the joint venture between Creativeland Studios and Artist International Group.

Naman Ramachandran “Devi Chowdhurani,” helmed by Subhrajit Mitra, has become the first Bengali-language film to secure official Indo-U.K. co-production status. The period drama, starring Prosenjit Chatterjee and Srabanti Chatterjee alongside Sabyasachi Chakraborty, Arjun Chakraborty, Darshana Banik, Bibriti Chatterjee and Kinjal Nanda, is produced by Adited Motion Pictures (U.S./India) and LOK Arts Collective (India/U.K.), with the U.K.’s HC Films and Moringa Studios serving as co-producers.

Selome Hailu Season 4 of “The Boys” has made a strong debut, according to Amazon. The studio says that the new episodes achieved 21% more viewers in its first four days of streaming than Season 3’s launch reached in the same amount of time, though exact figures were not provided. Amazon also notes that this the series’ fourth consecutive season of growth, putting it among the streamer’s five biggest TV seasons ever when measuring four days of premiere viewership.

Screen Siren Pictures, the Canadian-based independent production company behind such recent titles as French Exit, Bones of Crows and Indian Horse, on Thursday announced the launch of Scream Siren, a new arm at the company focusing on original, genre-driven storytelling with a spotlight on female protagonists.

Leo Barraclough International Features Editor Leading Danish actor Trine Dyrholm, who headlined Oscar winner “In a Better World” and Sundance Audience Award winner “Queen of Hearts,” is to star in four-part miniseries “Dependency.” Maren-Louise Käehne, whose credits include “Queen of Hearts,” “Blackwater” and “The Legacy,” has written the screenplay, which is adapted from the autobiographical novel of the same name by Danish poet and author Tove Ditlevsen. Apple Tree Productions, the Danish company headed by “The Killing” producer Piv Bernth and Lars Hermann, is producing the show, and Danish broadcaster TV2 is on board, Bernth told Variety at the Monte-Carlo Television Festival.

Naman Ramachandran Ketan Mehta, the revered Indian filmmaker who also serves as founder and chair of animation house Cosmos-Maya, known for long-running animated Nickelodeon show “Motu Patlu,” says that the global companies who operate TV channels in India create content that is local-specific and fails to resonate with international audiences. Mehta was speaking at the ongoing Mumbai International Film Festival which hosted a lively panel debate on animation. The discussion featured some of the top Iranian and Indian names in the business.

Sony sat out CinemaCon in April this year, but was the first major studio to present at CineEurope in Barcelona today, culminating in a screening of Apple Original Films’ Scarlett Johansson/Channing Tatum-starrer Fly Me to the Moon which Sony is releasing theatrically.

Naman Ramachandran Mohaan Nadaar’s The Production Headquarters Limited, one of the producers of Cannes-prizewinning film “The Shameless,” has boarded Indian documentary “Legend of Abbakka.” “The Shameless” was directed by Bulgarian-American filmmaker Konstantin Bojanov and appeared in the Un Certain Regard section of the Cannes Film Festival this year. There, Anasuya Sengupta won the best actress award. Rani Abbakka of Ullal, southern India, a 16th-century warrior-queen, defied the Portuguese Empire, a feat often overlooked in history books.

Naman Ramachandran Series “Barzakh,” starring top Pakistani actors Fawad Khan and Sanam Saeed, has set a streaming date. The six-episode series is produced by Waqas Hassan and Shailja Kejriwal for Zindagi, the Indian subcontinent focused programming block on streamer ZEE5 Global. It is helmed by critically acclaimed director Asim Abbasi who also directed Zindagi’s first Pakistani original “Churails” and the feature film “Cake,” which was Pakistan’s entry for the 2019 Oscars.

Naman Ramachandran Far from the bright lights of Bollywood, the indomitable Indian documentary filmmaking industry has been making waves globally. The recent past has several examples of India‘s international success.

What happens when long-distance lovers who've only ever met online actually get to meet in person? That's the premise of Channel 4's five-part reality series, The Nevermets, which has been following five couples separated not only by vast distances but, sometimes, differing cultures. The six-part Channel 4 series has introduced us to people like British catering assistant Sarah, 38, who travelled to the Phillipines to meet a 27 year old Filipino virtual assistant, called Jgoy.There were tears when Sarah had to travel home, with both admitting they had deep feelings for each other. Also on the show is 17 year old A-level student Jay, aged just 15 when he met now-26 year old Veena in a Game Of Thrones chatroom, but who travelled around 5,000 miles to meet her at home in India.

The Nevermets is gripping TV viewers, following the ups and downs of the love lives of five couples who've only ever met online... until now.The six-part Channel 4 series has introduced us to people like British catering assistant Sarah, 38, who's been living with a 27 year old Filipino virtual assistant called Jgoy. And floppy-fringed 17 year old A-level student Jay, who was only 15 when he met now-26 year old Veena in a Game Of Thrones chatroom but who travelled around 5,000 miles to meet her at home in India.

Holly Jones David Baute’s searing animated climate crisis drama “Black Butterflies” (“Mariposas Negras”) bows to audiences at Annecy this week, competing in its Contrechamp strand alongside Isabel Herguera title “Sultana’s Dream,” . Based on Baute’s live-action inquiry, “Climate Exodus,” the film merges highly intimate and personal narratives from women across the globe forced to leave their homelands when natural forces render them uninhabitable.