'Saturday Afternoon' (Shonibar Bikel), the 8th feature film of acclaimed director Mostofa Sarwar Farooki, has won the Kumamoto City Award at the Fukuoka International Film Festival in Japan.

Farooki and his wife Nusrat Imrose Tisha, also the lead actress in the film - shared the news of this achievement on their Facebook accounts on Tuesday. 

"Our film Saturday Afternoon (শনিবার বিকেল) has just won Kumamoto City Award from Fukuoka International Film Festival!! Congratulations to the team", Tisha expressed her joy regarding the achievement. 

Thanking the festival authority and the audiences who participated in the voting, director Farooki wrote - "I want to take this opportunity to thank Fukuoka for selecting our film alongside some beautiful films! I also want to thank the Fukuoka audience who have voted for our film. Lastly, thanks to my cast and crew who worked incredibly hard to make this film a reality."

The film is, however, still yet to receive its theatrical release due to the banishment from the Film Censor Board of Bangladesh, which Farooki hopes to see the daylight in the near future - "I only can hope that one day, the Bangladeshi audience will get to to see the film!".

With an ensemble cast of Nusrat Imrose Tisha, Zahid Hasan, Mamunur Rashid, Iresh Zaker, Nader Chowdhury, Gousul Alam Shaon, Indian-Bengali film actor-director Parambrata Chatterjee and Palestinian actor Eyad Hourani - Farooki's 'Saturday Afternoon' is one of the 12 films competed for two audience awards this year including much-hyped films like Jalikattu (India), The story of the three sisters (Joint production from Turkey, Germany, Netherlands, Greece) and Maryam (Kazakhstan), among other competing films.

The film has also received awards in various festivals around the world including the Kommersant Prize at Moscow International Film Festival (2019), Russian Federation of Film Critics Jury Prize at the Moscow International Film Festival (2019), NETPAC Award and High School Award at the Vesoul International Film Festival for Asian Cinema (2020), to name a few.

Hollywood's unions announced Monday that they have reached an agreement on pandemic protocols with major studios that will allow the broad resumption of production of films and television after six months of stagnant sets and widespread unemployment, reports AP.

The Directors Guild of America, the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees, the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, the Basic Crafts unions and the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists jointly announced the deal reached with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers after months of planning and negotiating.

The deal includes mandatory and comprehensive use of personal protective gear and testing of cast and crew members, and a dedicated coronavirus supervisor to oversee it all.

It requires the use of a "zone system" that strictly limits interactions between people on sets based on their job's requirements. Those who must deal with more people will be tested more frequently and have more strict protective equipment and spacing requirements. Actors will be tested especially often because their on-camera work won't allow for many protective measures.

The agreement also gives 10 days of paid COVID-19 sick leave per employee, which can be used after positive tests or when quarantine is necessary, and says that employees who use the leave must be reinstated so long as their jobs still exist.

"The protocols pave the way for creative workers, who have been hard hit by the pandemic, to resume their crafts and livelihoods in workplaces redesigned around their health," the unions said in a joint statement.
Some film and television productions have already resumed based on smaller separate agreements, but most of the largest and most elaborately produced films and television shows have been repeatedly delaying going back to work as they waited for the pandemic to subside and for this deal to be reached.

ABC is airing the 72nd Emmy Awards on Sunday. But this year the Emmy will come up with something new as each Emmy Award passed out on the evening will include an additional $100,000 donation to combat child hunger, reports AP.

Each network and streaming service competing on the telecast has pledged the donation for every Emmy they win. The Television Academy announced the agreement on Friday.

With 23 Emmys being handed out and the academy committing $500,000, that will mean a donation of $2.8 million to No Kid Hungry, a group working to relieve child hunger brought on by the coronavirus crisis.

Jimmy Kimmel is hosting from Staples Center in Los Angeles and winners will settle for their awards from far-off places. Guests set to appear include Anthony Anderson, Mindy Kaling, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Patrick Stuart, RuPaul and Oprah Winfrey. The HBO limited series “Watchmen” is the night’s top nominee.

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Indian on-demand video streaming OTT (Over The Top)  media platform Hoichoi announced a handful of its upcoming contents on Friday, which includes a popular Bangladeshi thriller's web series adaptation by popular Indian-Bengali director Srijit Mukherji.

However, it will be not casting any actors from Bangladesh, according to the director.

The web series is based on popular Bangladeshi writer Mohammad Nazim Uddin's widely acclaimed 2015 thriller 'Rabindranath Ekhane Kokhono Khete Ashen Ni', a book that has been coined by the readers as one of the best Bengali thriller books in recent times.       

Upon Hoichoi's official announcement regarding this adaptation on Friday night, Bangladeshi audiences expressed and shared their excitement and joy in social media platforms - as the on-screen adaptation of this book has been a long-awaited one.

However, Srijit shared the news regarding not being able to cast any Bangladeshi actors in this Bangladeshi thriller-adaptation on his social media accounts on Friday night after Hoichoi's official announcement of the original series.

"My first with @hoichoitv. Really wanted to shoot it in Bangladesh with the cast from there as well. Unfortunately due to COVID, that will not be possible. However will try my best to adapt Mohd. Nazim Uddin's mindboggling brilliance in a new setting keeping the flavour intact", Srijit posted on his official Facebook and Twitter.

Mohammad Nazim Uddin is a Bangladeshi thriller writer as well as a Translator of more than 26 novels. He started his career as a publisher & translator in 2006 after completing B.A. & M.A. in Mass Communication & Journalism from University of Dhaka.

Also known as the founder of "Batighar Prokashoni" which is one of the most renowned publishers of Bangladesh. Nazim made his debut as a thriller writer in 2010. His 1st original work is “Nemesis” through which he has introduced a new series in Bengali literature called the 'Jefri & Bastard series' including five original books - 'Nemesis', 'Contract', 'Nexus', 'Confession' and 'Karachi'.

His other original works are 'Jaal', '1952: Not Just Numbers', 'Keu Keu Kotha Rakhe', 'Rabindranath Ekhane Kokhono Khete Asen Ni' and its sequel 'Rabindranath Ekhane Kokhono Ashen Ni'. 

As a translator, Nazim translated a handful of widely popular and acclaimed English books including Dan Brown's classics ('The Vinci Code', 'Deception Point', 'Origin', 'The Lost Symbol', 'Angels and Demons'); Mario Pujo's 'The Godfather', Robert Ludlum's popular detective trilogy on the Bourne series ('Bourne Identity', 'Bourne Supremacy', 'Bourne Ultimatum' and 'Bourne Legacy'), 2009 OSCAR winner for Best Picture 'Slumdog Millionaire's original book written by Indian author Vikas Swarup, Stephen King's widely acclaimed 'Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption', Frederick Forsyth's acclaimed novel 'Dogs of War' and more - for the Bengali readers.

Dhallywood superstar Ananta Jalil's much anticipated mega-project 'Din - the Day' is scheduled to resume its shooting in Turkey after being shelved for several months due to the ongoing pandemic of COVID-19.

The movie, which has been creating buzz from the movie-lovers ever since the release of its trailer on March 15, has only a few days of shooting left - which had to be stopped due to the global lockdown and flight restrictions.

Recently Ananta, the lead actor and co-producer of this Bangladesh-Iran joint venture film, informed media that the rest of the shooting will be resuming as soon as October in the cities of Istanbul and Antalya of Turkey.

"We only had 15 days of filming left, and the film would have been released if the shooting could have done before the lockdown. Now with the opportunity and permission to resume the shooting, we are hoping to release it at the beginning of the new year", Ananta informed media.

He added - "The month of November-December is going to be the winter season in Turkey and it would be very difficult for the filming, thus we must have to complete the shooting in October. We have been granted the permission and we will fly soon, just waiting for the visa for some of our local artist-crew members."

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'Din - the Day' is directed by Iranian director Murtuza Atash Jamjam. Apart from Bangladesh, the film has also been shot in Iran, Afghanistan and Turkey. 

On March 15, the trailer of the film was released on YouTube from Ananta Jalil's official YouTube channel and got critically acclaimed for the 'espionage-theme' based international standard oriented presentation. The trailer has been viewed for over one million times.