“You will not see me breaking into song in this movie,” mega-god Amitabh Bachchan told a packed audience at the red carpet premiere of his latest film, The Last Lear, at the 51st Times BFI London Film Festival on Sunday. Dressed in a black-grey velvet outfit, the 65 year old waved to the crowds as he arrived in London’s West End.

Bachchan plays Harish (“Call me Harry”), an ageing homophobic theatre actor who is obsessed with the Bard. Fans are in for a shock: Bachchan mouths lines like ‘Bloody homosexual’ in his first English language role. What does Bachchan think of the bolly-word? “I never use the term Bollywood,” he stated.

UK fans of Bollywood’s biggest superstar will get a chance to relive his career highs and lows on Tuesday 30, October, as BBC1 television screens Imagine...Bollywood’s Big B. This 50 minute documentary features an interview with the man himself and his actor son, Abhishek Bachchan. New daughter in law, Aishwarya Rai does not make an appearance.

No Smoking

“It’s a John Abraham film, it has to be different and I know my target audience,” current hunk John Abraham explained when I asked him what was special about this week’s release, No Smoking. Abraham plays a chain smoker who checks into a stop smoking clinic in order to quit the killer weed. Does he smoke? “I used to smoke but I have quit, so smoking on film for this film was very difficult for me.”

Jab We Met

No Smoking faces stiff competition from this week’s other big release, the inanely titled Jab We Met. The frothy romance stars alleged on-off real life lovers Shahid Kapur and Kareena Kapoor. Tanuj Garg, UK Head of Studio 18 and distributor of the film is not worried. Garg says: “Both films cater to radically different audiences. My film has a PG certificate whilst No Smoking is rated 15.”

Shilpa and the Backstreet Boys

Shilpa Shetty is currently touring Germany with her stage musical Miss Bollywood. She plays Maya, a classically trained Indian dancer who dreams of starting a dance academy in London. Shetty was surprised this week when she appeared on a German television chat show to realise that her co-guests were the American pop band the Backstreet Boys. The lads sang their hit ‘I want it that way’, Shilpa’s favourite track. Miss Bollywood opens in the UK in mid-November.

Om Shanti Om reincarnated

Even though the recent Sholay remake crashed, Bollywood is still churning out remakes of classic Bollywood hits. The latest to get the makeover treatment is Subhash Ghai’s Karz (1980), which was a copy of a Hollywood original. Director Satish Kaushik maintains that his film “will be different” with less focus on the original’s reincarnation theme. Om Shanti Om, the hit number from Ghai’s film, which itself was a copy of a Trinidadian calypso, will be given a 2007 remix by the nasal genius, Himesh Reshammiya.

Do they know it’s not Diwali?

Diwali comes early to London’s Trafalgar Square on Sunday 28 October with Diwali on the Square, a celebration of the upcoming (November 9) Hindu festival of lights. B4U Music, the UK’s premier Asian music channel, will showcase its Band Aid-style Diwali anthem for the first time.

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