Talk of the Town

- THE AMITABH Bachchan-Manoj Bajpai-Raveena Tandon-Nandita Das thriller is coming to town. On Friday, the 13th, yet another battle between good and evil will be unleashed.

The buzz is that the Rakesh Mehra directed flick, is inspired from `Face Off' and `Fallen'. Guess what? It's about transmigration of souls. Good Bachchan's soul gets into the body of Evil Bajpai and vice-versa after a fateful encounter.

Pepsi, has found enough fizz in this chiller of a thriller, that it has launched a promotion `Scene with the Stars' - a contest that would give cola-drinkers a chance to meet, interact and act out scenes from the film. All you need to do is pick up a contest form available at FP counters. Complete a slogan, ``Yeh Dil AKS for more because....'' and answer how many time Amitabh utters the word `Aks' in the film.

Promos apart, it might be a good idea to check out the movie 'cos it is of a genre not explored in Bollywood before. At least, that's what the makers say. If the trailers and songs are any indication, it's definitely one slick flick.

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- IN-CHARGE. SEEMS to be the flavour of the month at Madras University. At the moment, four key posts at the varsity are now under temporary headship - including the Registrar, Chairman of the College Development Council, Controller of Examinations and Director of the Institute of Correspondence Education (ICE). The Vice Chancellor seems to be the only `regular' appointee, serving his second year in office.

Even as the situation remains so, the varsity in a bid to set the score right, has called for applications to the posts of Registrar, Controller of Examinations and Director of ICE.

While applications have already started pouring in for the post of Registrar, advertisements for the other two posts have appeared recently. With reference to the post of the chairman of the College Development Council, there have been orders to appoint a `permanent' officer. Academic staff hope that the posts will be filled up soon, in the `best interests' of the varsity.

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- Media personnel are literally in the midst of violence.After courting arrest in support of their colleague in Villupuram now there seems to be a hostile attitude prevailing within the journalistic fraternity themselves.

There are feuds and incidents of some journalists threatening to come to blows. Even as journalist unions are trying some damage control exercises, the issue has already gone to the police. However, the police have not taken any hasty action.

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- IN THE midst of the sensational events that followed the arrest of the DMK president, Mr. M. Karunanidhi and the Union Ministers, Mr. Murasoli Maran and Mr. T.R. Baalu, the Director of the Intelligence Bureau paid a quiet visit to the city.

The grapevine has it that the country's top spymaster accompanied the Central team which came to Chennai on July 1 to make an assessment of the situation and report back to the Union Government. Intelligence officials were on their toes to get a feel of the people's pulse. Whether the IB director gave a separate report to the Centre is anybody's guess.

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- GOING KOLLYWOOD, speaking English. Quite accepted in the case of Tamil blockbusters. But, how about a compilation of `Tanglish' songs? No, not songs specially composed in Tamilised English. It is actually HMV Saregama's latest release, a collection of Tamil songs with English words in the lyrics.

Drawn from recent releases and new movies, the pack has songs with music by A.R. Rehman, Karthik Raja, Deva, Ilayaraja, Harris Jayaraj, S.A. Rajkumar, Yuvan Shankar Raja, Ranjit Barot, Vidya Sagar and Pravinmani.

The list of films includes Minnale, Little John, Piriyamanavalae, Love Birds, Gentleman, Pudhiya Mugam, Alaipayuthey, Kadhala Kadhala, Valli, Indian, Aasai, Poovellam Kettuppaar, VIP, Minsara Kanavu.

The two-cassette `Tanglish' pack - an attractive gift option - captures a new trend in Tamil music, explains Mr. K. Sujith Kumar, Product Manager-New Labels at Saregama India. The two- language formula collection comes at Rs. 90.

By Sudhish Kamath, Ramya Kannan, S.Shivakumar, K.T. Sangameswaran and N. Ravi Kumar

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