cinema

Whenever a new James Bond film is released it is always causes quite a stir. The quintessential British spy always manages to capture the world's attention in a way that few others can. However, even by Bond's standards, the latest film- Skyfall, has been HUGE.

Starring Daniel Craig as the lead role for the third time, and directed by Sam Mendes (of American Beauty fame), the film has been getting high praise from critics. This praise has translated in to cold, hard cash, with Skyfall taking £20.1m in its opening weekend in the UK alone.

This it the biggest opening of any film in 2012 so far, and the second largest ever after the final Harry Potter film. It is also the biggest ever opening for a 2D film and broke the record for highest ever Saturday attendance figures. All that is pretty impressive in anyone's book.

However, there is more. By the end of the weekend, the film was at the number 1 spot in 25 countries around the world, and is easily on course to become the most successful Bond film of all time. All this, and it isn't even due to open in the US for another two weeks.

If you haven't seen Skyfall yet, watch the trailer below to whet your appetite:

For India Week we are focusing on Indian Entertainment, Music and Film today. It is impossible to look at such a topic without looking at Bollywood. Bollywood IS Indian entertainment in many aspects. So if you don't know too much about India's Hollywood, then here is a short introduction for you.

History and Style

Bollywood is basically the informal name for the Hindi Film Industry based in Mumbai, which is one of the largest centres of film production in the world. Although it is the largest in India, it is only part of the total Indian film industry, despite the term Bollywood often incorrectly referring to the whole of Indian cinema.

It all started way back in 1913 with the first silent feature film made in India, called Raja Harishchandra. Over the next twenty years the Indian film industry grew so quickly that by the 1930s, the country was producing over 200 films a year. It was in 1931 when Alam Ara became the first Indian film with sound, but not until the late 1950s when films started to regularly be made in colour.

With Stephen Fry hosting, the Baftas promised to be a charming, light-hearted and very British night of entertainment, and did not disappoint. The annual film and television awards were held last night at Covent Garden's Royal Opera House, and attracted some of the biggest names in cinema. Whilst the audience was littered with such stars as Brad Pitt, George Clooney and Meryl Streep, it was a silent, black and white French film which swept the awards.

The Unexpected Film of the Year

The film that is so surprisingly dominating the awards season is The Artist. Set in 1927, it tells the story of a silent movie actor whose career begins to wane just as his lover's career takes off in the ‘talkies'. After already winning big at the Golden Globes and gaining ten Oscar nominations, the movie won a massive seven awards last night. In total it won (deep breath): Best Film, Director, Original Screenplay, Leading Actor, Original Music, Cinematography and Costume Design.

The overjoyed (but slightly embarrassed) director and writer Michel Hazanavicius (pictured on the right above) had to come up on stage and make several different speeches, revealing "I know that I will have some bad days because I'm a director but I will remember this day, today, as a good day".