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| Saturday, 3 November 2001 |
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Features | |
| News Business Features Editorial Security Politics World Letters Sports Obituaries
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Freddie We'll miss you Freddie. The name said it all. The very name was enough to bring a smile on your face, as the brain shuffles through countless images of Freddie on celluloid and subconsciously plays back his hit songs.
Freddie who entered the local silver screen by acting in the film "Sohoyuro" rose to prominence in the late 1950s with a string of perennial hits that still resonate in the air from time to time. Freddie whose mere presence was enough to make the audience laugh, acted in more than 100 films. His one liners simply drove the audience delirious. Often paired with the film's hero or heroine, Freddie has turned many otherwise dull films into highly memorable and entertaining cinematic creations.
His songs, written by eminent lyricists, almost always had a message for society. For example, the song 'Aluth Kalawak' castigated the widespread habit of sending petitions against people who try to climb up the social ladder. 'Balla' described how the wealthy feed their dogs. 'Mottapala', 'Kundumani', 'Handa Mama' and 'Aron Mama' were among the hundreds of popular songs sung by Freddie. A number of songs stressed the importance of amity among different communities. Yet his talents were not much recognised, he received only a few awards. Freddie said in an interview several months before his death that he was hurt and shocked by the apparent callousness with which some music bands and new generation singers had pirated his songs. This is a bad omen for the performing arts, he said.
His humorous songs and comic stunts are etched deep in our memories. If laughter is the best medicine, Freddie was a doctor who wrote the best prescription for a complete cure for boredom and stress. ================================= Jet Li hopes The One is one to ignite star power LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Jet Li dangles like a marionette 40 feet (12 meters) above ground on a decrepit catwalk before a wire stunt that will make him look like a human tennis ball being smacked back and forth by invisible rackets. The scene is one of several mind-numbing special effects shots in Li's latest film "The One," which opens on Friday and pits Jet against his toughest opponent to date, himself. On the set of "The One," between shots of fighting himself, Li told Reuters he's always wanted to do a sci-fi film in Hollywood and admitted that shooting this movie, which tries to rival "The Matrix" (1999) in visual wizardry, has been tough. "Usually I play good guy and fight an actor. But here I play a good and bad guy, fight me, and must work double harder - learning both sides of all action movements and how to show their different personalities and fighting abilities," Li said. "But it's also the film's most interesting part - the CGI (computer generated images) done to make it work." Although Li has come a long way from earning about $0.20 a day in his first film, the mainland Chinese production "The Shaolin Temple" (1982) - for which actors were paid less than factory workers, but it is still unclear if he can carry a big budget Hollywood movie on his own. Since his American film debut in "Lethal Weapon 4" (1998), Li turned down roles in last year's Academy Award-winning "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" and the yet-to-be released "Matrix 2." Instead, he starred in films that have posted decreasing results at the U.S. box office, from $130.4 million for "Lethal Weapon 4" to $55.9 million for "Romeo Must Die" (2000) to $36.8 million for this year's "Kiss of the Dragon." However, behind the weight of Columbia Pictures, an estimated $40 million budget and the "X-Files" TV writing team of Glen Morgan and James Wang - who also directs the film - "The One" could be the one that takes Li over the top. "The One" presents a world where an infinite number of parallel universes exist, administered by a United Nations-like system the movie calls the "Multi-Verse." For evil travelers who move among the universes, there is a Multi-Verse police force out here, there and everywhere to make sure that all the forces stay in line. Li plays two characters, Gabe Law (good Li) and Yu Law (bad Li). Yu is a Multi-Verse agent who discovers that by killing off the other Laws in other parallel universes, he can become powerful. Gabe is the last good Law alive and must stop Yu. In many films, when an actor plays two characters, they rarely touch each other on screen because of the difficulty in making the shot, but in "The One", one Li character is almost constantly bashing the other Li character throughout elaborate fight scenes on screen. ================================= Japan on celluloid Japanese Film Festival 2001 - organised by the Embassy of Japan in Sri Lanka for the 22nd consecutive year, will be held from November 10 to 17 in Kandy and Colombo.
" This time the film festival will include a number of contemporary Japanese films which have even gained international recognition, First Secretary of the Japanese Embassy Nagashima Shinji told a press conference last Thursday. Mr. Nagashima said the contemporary Japanese film industry is booming with new directors emerging in the scene despite Hollywood movies." It is now gaining its past popularity by reaching the high levels that prevailed in 1950 and 60s considered the golden era of the Japanese film industry." he added.
This year's festival includes six films namely; Sanjuro, Sayonara Fraulein, Bondage(adults only), Red Beard, Universal Laws and Bloom in the Moonlight.All these films will be screened with English sub-titles and admission will be free. "The festival will provide a good opportunity for the general public to view Japanese films as such films are not often screened here." added Mr. Nagashima. In Kandy, the embassy in collaboration with the Kandy Municipal Public Library has made arrangements to screen four films at the D.S. Senanayake Public Library Auditorium. The schedule in Kandy; |
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Produced by Lake House |
Freddie Silva (63), a popular actor and
singer passed away at the Kalubowila hospital last Monday evening after a brief illness.
Freddie, undoubtedly the best comedian that the Sinhala cinema produced was not in the
best of health for the last few months. Yet his resilience in the face of adversity is was
firm as ever. 
Amongst the films that cast his best
performance were such as Lasanda, Sunethra, Sukiri Kella and Sujeewa. Apart from his
acting, Freddie also had a splendid talent in singing. Many of his songs pointed out
shortcomings in society or people. 
"Freddie is still alive. That is my
message to countless fans. I would like to make a comeback with the help of fans and my
fellow artistes," he said in that interview. Although he is no more in the fold,
Freddie has made his mark. 
