Over the past year, more than half a dozen villagers have lost their lives in Tiger attacks in villages adjacent to the Mala range of Pilibhit Tiger Reserve. Efforts to capture the tiger intensified following the death of a farmer in the attack on September 9, and it was finally rescued on September 23.
Days after Kiran Rao’s Laapataa Ladies was selected as India’s official entry for the 97th Academy Awards, another Hindi-lingual film has made its way to the Oscars 2025. Sandhya Suri’s critically acclaimed police procedural drama titled Santosh has been chosen by the United Kingdom as their official submission for the Best International Feature Film category at the global award show.
Santosh, starring Shahana Goswami and Sunita Rajwar, was selected by BAFTA, an organisation appointed by the American Academy specifically to choose the UK’s submission. Variety opines that this move might add some pressure on team Santosh as the U.K. won their first international feature Oscar earlier this year with Jonathan Glazer’s The Zone of Interest.
The eligibility criteria for this category was that a British film must be predominantly non-English language and released theatrically outside of the US between 1 November 2023 and 30 September 2024. Santosh recently also had its debut world premiere in the Un Certain Regard section at this year’s Cannes Film Festival. It is the directorial feature debut of Suri, who previously made documentaries like I for India and Around India with a Movie Camera.
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Set in rural northern India, the tale revolves around newly-widowed Santosh, who gets to inherit her late husband’s job as a police constable. A case appears when an underage girl from a lower caste is brutally murdered. Santosh is roped into the investigation by a charismatic feminist inspector. The investigative thriller also stars Sanjay Bishnoi, Kushal Dubey, Nawal Shukla, and Pratibha Awasthi in key roles.
For those who are still wondering how Santosh became eligible for selection in the UK, it is because the movie had a wide release in that country and is an international co-production of the United Kingdom (predominantly), India, Germany, and France. The film is bankrolled by Mike Goodridge, James Bowsher, Balthazar de Ganay, and Alan McAlex. Its executive producers include Ama Ampadu, Eva Yates, Diarmid Scrimshaw, Lucia Haslauer, and Martin Gerhard.
Santosh was co-financed by Good Chaos, Razor Film Produktion, Haut et Court, BBC Film, and BFI. The background score has been given by Luisa Gerstein, with Lennert Hillege as the cinematographer and Maxime Pozzi-Garcia as editing.
ALSO READ: OPINION: Laapataa Ladies’ entry in Oscars 2025 is a revolution— of rural tales, feminism in cinema, agency and independence
Reese Witherspoon is sharing an exciting update about the upcoming Legally Blonde project in development at Amazon Prime. On September 25, the actress dropped an Instagram post announcing that she is looking for a fresh face to play the younger version of Elle Woods, the character she portrayed in the original early 2000s films.
“Our search for the high school version of Elle Woods is officially ON!” Witherspoon wrote on the aforementioned social media platform. “With our friends at @primevideo, we’re making the casting process totally OPEN, so you can submit your auditions at the link in my bio. I’m SO excited to see all your fabulous takes on everyone’s favorite Gemini vegetarian.”
The prequel to Legally Blonde was officially ordered at Prime Video in May and is currently titled Elle. The logline for the series details that it will follow “Elle Woods in high school as we learn about the life experiences that shaped her into the iconic young woman we came to know and love in the first Legally Blonde film.”
The series comes from creator Laura Kittrell, who will serve as showrunner and executive producer. Witherspoon will also executive produce alongside Lauren Neustadter via Hello Sunshine. Lauren Kisilevsky and Marc Platt will also serve as EPs, while Amazon MGM Studios will produce.
Witherspoon starred in the original Legally Blonde, released in 2001, which was a smash hit, grossing $140 million at the global box office. The sequel was released in 2003, followed by the straight-to-video film Legally Blondes in 2009, where Witherspoon acted as a producer rather than a star. A musical adaptation premiered on Broadway in 2007.
While discussing the return of Elle Woods on screen, fans are suggesting that someone close to Witherspoon should be cast for the open role. “Just give your daughter the role. She’s your younger version,” one fan commented on Witherspoon’s Instagram post. Another user echoed similar sentiments, writing, “I mean… I feel like it has to be your daughter.” A third person went a step further, assuring the actress and producer that they’d make an exception to nepotism just this once.
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For those who may not know, Witherspoon’s daughter, Ava Phillippe, 25, is not an actress but a model. However, we’re sure she has abundant acting talent, given that both her parents are screen personalities. She also eerily resembles her mom.
Only time will tell if Ava decides to step into her mom’s shoes to play this iconic character.
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