UTV’s World Movies now on home video After bringing contemporary, entertaining box-office hits from around the world to Indian TV screens through its World Movies channel, UTV is now making it possible for Indian movie fans to own them on home video starting May 2008. UTV Motion Pictures has a wide and varied catalogue of titles whose telecast rights have been acquired directly from the sole distributors of these films. The company boasts of a strong home distribution network in the metros, mini metros and class 1towns in India, reaching close to 10 lakh towns across the country. The UTV home video division distributes their own movies – big Bollywood blockbusters, as well as Hollywood content.

Speaking on the concept of home video in India and availability of World Movies on home video, Mr. Shantonu Aditya, CEO, UTV Entertainment Television Ltd, said “As a strong company philosophy, we have always believed in retaining our intellectual property rights as this makes us valued content custodians. We are very positive on the tremendous scope and growth prospects of this business and we know that this business model would drive our revenues significantly. We are going to provide value for money to Indian viewers as they get to see original versions of some of the most entertaining and recent box office hits from around the world.”

World Movies has a library of over 500 titles including blockbuster hits and award winners across film festivals across the world including the Oscars. Almost 50% of these titles are available for DVD sell through. Some of these titles are - the Spanish film Buenos Aires 1977 that was nominated for the Golden Palm at Cannes in 2006, the new Carlos Saura musical Fados, La Zona – award winner at the Toronto International Film Festival and the Venice Film Festival and Pierre Salvadori’s comedy Priceless, a movie that ably demonstrates that if money can’t buy love, it sure can purchase lots of obsequious service from four-star hotel staffers and costly goodies from laughably pricey boutiques!

With several players in the markets fighting for larger mind share of audiences, Home Video is at a very significant stage in India with immense scope of penetration. Products are being offered at much lower costs to beat competition and exploitation is rampant after each theatrical release. The hardware costs of the DVDs is also getting lower thereby making it a very exciting time for UTV’s World Movies to make an appearance on home video.

Shahid Kapur’s Mercedes Benz was severely damaged when a mob of fans surrounded the actor for autographs and photographs. Shahid was in Pune to attend an event organized for the police.

When his fans saw Shahid leaving the venue, they all rushed towards him, eagerly looking forward to closely watching him. After all, it was once in a lifetime opportunity for them! However, things got out of hand when his fans wanted to touch the actor. In the minor stampede, Shahid’s Mercedes Benz was damaged.

Event: Ranbir & Deepika at Manish Malhotra party
Venue: Prive Lounge, Mumbai
When: Saturday (night), March 29th, 2008
Present: Ritesh Deshmukh, Dia Mirza, Ranbir, Deepika, Raima Sen, Manish Malhotra, Lucky Ali and lot more
Note: The post show party by Manish Malhotra at prive saw the young bollywood couple Ranbir and Deepika enter hand in hand to wish Manish Malhotra on his grand show. Ritesh and Dia Mirza also dropped in to party with Manish.