Shakeela, the woman who inspired genres without ever doing porn

It starts with a shrug in her voice. The 38-year-old's first directorial venture, Romantic Target, failed to get attention, leave alone draw reviews. A Telugu gossip site claims the film was released earlier this year in one screen. Regardless, she doesn't take it badly – at least on the surface: "It ran for a week ma. That's fine. Films now run for 2-3 days," she says over the phone from Chennai.


If she'd had her way, the Malayalam Neelakurinji Poothu, not Romantic Target, would've been her first stint as filmmaker. But the 2013 project was shelved on the initial day of the shoot, because producer Jaffar Kanjirappally had insisted that she also act in it. "I wanted Nandita Das, but he insisted. I wouldn't give in, so we dropped it."


Kanjirappally had produced 19 of her films when she was one of the most sought-after actresses in Malayalam cinema. Her films had made him tremendous money, he'd declared, so why not have similar hopes from this one. It wasn't to be.

Today, Shakeela bides her time on the PlayStation and TV. Her autobiography Shakeela: Atmakatha, published in Malayalam in 2013, is being translated into Telugu, Tamil and Kannada. There are no plans for an English version yet, but excerpts crept into a handful of English publications. The story of India's 'softcore superstar', whose repertoire spans 110 films in several languages, had people riveted.

It still does, even in these days of internet porn – which the government sought to ban, then unban after the outcry that came their way. Given the context, one asks her what she makes of the situation. "I didn't even know about this," she exclaims. "But now that you mention it, it's just silly."

Read More

The man sleeping his wife dead body @11 years

Everyone has a different way of dealing with the loss of a loved one, but there comes a time when you have to let go. This man, however, missed that time by about five years.

Le Van from the Quang Nam province, Vietnam, lost his wife in 2003. He believes, though, that she is still with him in many ways. (He means that literally.)

He dug up and dragged her corpse back to his house and dressed it up to look like a human-sized doll that shares a bed with him.

Grief turned into obsession when, for 20 months after his wife's death, Le Van slept upon the ground above her grave.

When he grew tired of the rain, Le Van planned to dig a tunnel from his home to her grave, so he may still lie with her every night but stay dry.

The graveyard tunnel honeymoon turned out to be a bad idea, presumably because of all of the other corpses he would be spending his nights with. In 2004, Le Van just went for it, digging up his wife and returning her to the home she once had with him and their children.

His wife's body is wrapped in flesh-colored paper. Her skull is covered with a clay mold decorated with a poorly drawn depiction of his beloved's face. As of now, nobody has told Le Van he should stop doing this, and he remains very, very single.

Read More

Ravi Teja's Bengal Tiger Nizam Rights Sold Out

Mass Maha Raja Ravi Teja's one more mass action entertainer film Bengal Tiger is in the last stage of its shooting and even before its completion movie business started with Nizam area rights getting sold out. 

As per official sources Global Cinemas group has acquired the distribution rights of Ravi Teja's Bengal Tiger for Nizam area for a whooping price and sources said this is highest price paid in Ravi Teja's filmy career.

Read More