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Canadian Actor Donald Sutherland Dies Aged 88

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Donald Sutherland: CTV Image

Canadian actor  Donald Sutherland, who starred the Hollywood movies The Hunger Games M*A*S*H and Don’t Look Now, died at the age of 88 after a protracted illness. The actors lengthy career spanned from the 1960s into the 2020s

His son, the actor Kiefer Sutherland, said: “With a heavy heart, I tell you that my father, Donald Sutherland, has passed away. I personally think one of the most important actors in the history of film.

“Never daunted by a role, good, bad or ugly. He loved what he did and did what he loved, and one can never ask for more than that. A life well lived.”

Donald Sutherland had almost 200 credits to his name.

The news was met with an outpouring of support and tributes.

Cary Elwes, a co-star in the 2001 television film Uprising, said he was “devastated” by Sutherland’s death.

“Our hearts are breaking for you,” he told Kiefer in an Instagram message. “So grateful to have known [and] worked with him. Sending our love.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau recalled feeling “deeply, deeply star-struck” when he first met Sutherland.

“My thoughts go out to Kiefer and the entire Sutherland family, as well as all Canadians who are no doubt saddened to learn, as I am right now,” he said.

“He was a man with a strong presence, a brilliance in his craft and truly, truly a great Canadian artist,” he added.

Ron Howard, who directed Sutherland in the 1991 film Backdraft, said that he was “one of the most intelligent, interesting [and] engrossing film actors of all time”.

Donald Sutherland Career

Born in New Brunswick, Canada, Sutherland started as a radio news reporter before travelling to London in 1957 to study at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art. He then took on small roles in British film and television.

His earliest high-profile roles were in war films including 1967’s The Dirty Dozen, and Kelly’s Heroes and M*A*S*H from 1970.

Jane Fonda was Sutherland’s co-star in Alan J Pakula’s 1971 thriller, Klute, about a detective whose hunt for a missing person is assisted by a high-priced call girl.

Donald Sutherland was born on July 17, 1935, in Canada’s New Brunswick province, and was raised in Nova Scotia. He performed in school productions in college, moved to Britain to hone his craft, then moved to the United States, where his first big break came as a member of a top-notch ensemble cast in the war film “The Dirty Dozen” (1967).

He rocketed to fame three years later playing nonconformist surgeon Hawkeye Pierce in director Robert Altman’s Korean War satire “M*A*S*H” (1970). The film – later spun off into a TV series – depicted hijinks at a Mobile Army Surgical Hospital, tapping into the anti-war sentiment among many Americans during the Vietnam War era.

Also in 1970, Sutherland starred alongside Telly Savalas and Clint Eastwood in “Kelly’s Heroes” as Sergeant Oddball on a mission to steal gold from the Nazis.

The following year, he was paired with Fonda, one of Hollywood’s luminaries, in “Klute,” and then in 1973 played a grieving father in “Don’t Look Now” that included a sizzling sex scene with Christie. “Klute” sparked a romance with Fonda, with whom he was active in the anti-Vietnam War movement.

His 1978 films could not have been more different. In the uproarious comedy “Animal House,” Sutherland played a professor who sleeps with the girlfriend of a fraternity member. “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” was a successful sci-fi remake of a classic 1956 original, telling the story of alien pods that take over human beings.

Sutherland’s performance in “Ordinary People,” Hollywood superstar Robert Redford’s directorial debut, helped the 1980 film win four Academy Awards, including best picture. Sutherland starred alongside Mary Tyler Moore and Timothy Hutton in this exploration of the splintering of a Midwestern family.

In the 1990s he appeared in films including “JFK” (1991), “Backdraft” (1991), “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” (1992), “Outbreak” (1995), “A Time To Kill” (1996) and “Instinct” (1999) and won an Emmy Award for his performance in the 1995 HBO TV movie “Citizen X.” In the 2000s, he appeared in the acclaimed “Cold Mountain” (2003) and “Pride & Prejudice” (2005).

In the “Hunger Games” films in the 2010s about a dystopian future in which teenagers are sent into a deadly competition as mass entertainment, he reveled in playing the villainous President Coriolanus Snow.

“The reality was he had a country to run. At least he was running it, which is more than you can say for some people,” Sutherland told the Los Angeles Times in 2017.

“It was funny at the beginning with ‘The Hunger Games’ to walk through an airport and suddenly you feel this tug and you look down and it’s some young person – always a girl, never a boy,” Sutherland said. “And her mother is standing there and they say, ‘Could you take a photograph with my daughter?’ And we’d be standing beside each other and I’d be looking at the camera and the girl would say, ‘Could you look mean?'”

Sutherland was considered among the best actors to never receive an Academy Award nomination for any of his roles. He was married three times and had five children, including Kiefer.

Source: BBC, XM

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Cobra Kai on Netflix takes no chances in Season 6, Part 1.

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(CTN News) – The Invincible Cobra Kai!

Long-running Netflix series’ rallying cry. As the Karate Kid continuation reaches its sixth and final season, I, a fan since YouTube Red, began to wonder if it should be continued.

As the series progresses, the plots repeat. How often can Johnny Lawrence (William Zabka) and Daniel LaRusso (Ralph Macchio) fight? The number of times Kreese (Martin Kove) can return, inhaling his distinctive cigar with a frightening grimace?

Can young characters often discuss whether they are Eagle Fang, Miyagi-Do, or both? How many lengthy battle scenes is too many?

Cobra Kai wins, mirroring the series’ underdog story.

The first five episodes of the sixth season end with a huge cliffhanger. Season premiere: Peacetime in the Valley. The episode begins with Daniel telling his wife Amanda (Courtney Henggeler), “That is the sweet, sweet sound of no more karate wars.”

Kreese (Martin Kove) is on the run after escaping prison, while Terry Silver (Thomas Ian Griffith), the season’s villain, is in prison. No Karate battles meant no spectacle; the valley’s tranquility couldn’t last forever.

As children prepare for Sekai Taikai, the world championship karate competition held every two years for over a century, this season is all about it.

“This is a fusion of the Olympics, the Gladiator Games, and the Kumite from Bloodsport,” Hawk (Jacob Bertrand) says. Cobra Kai treats the Sekai Taikai so seriously that I wonder if it’s a competition.

Warning: not. However, it is a great instrument for globalizing karate competition and improving performance beyond the All-Valley Karate Tournament.

Season 6 offers much of the series’ secret weapon, humor. She adds, “Guy flies in for the weekend to kill Terry Silver and stays for another three months.” In his robe, Chozen (Yuji Okumoto) walks about the Larusso home and eats all the cannolis.

Typical, right? Paul Walter Hauser, who has subsequently appeared in Inside Out 2 and Black Bird, plays karate obsessed Raymond again.

The show’s biggest impact is Johnny’s universe view. Highlights include his thoughts on an adolescent girls’ slumber party, starting a new career, and his unborn child (“I am an expert on boys and girls are easy,” he tells Daniel). The program always shows playful self-awareness and a willingness to joke.

Famous quote shout-outs, amazing hair band soundtrack (at one point, Daniel exclaims that he is “Too old for this shit,” a la Danny Glover in Lethal Weapon), and all things Johnny keep Cobra Kai deliciously steeped in its ‘80s culture roots.

He still views the Soviet Union as their main foe and shows his students martial arts films like Best of the Best to help them train. His political incorrectness persists. To Daniel, “Women are fond of me.”

His favorite answer is “Don’t be a pussy”. Johnny’s 2024 elimination is justified, but Zabka’s portrayal of him as charmingly ignorant of his flaws belies this. Zabka turned his teenage rival into a funny, non-caricature persona. The series cannot outlast time. The fifth season aired approximately two years ago.

Only a few months have passed since Cobra Kai debuted.

This is troublesome because many of the young actors look older than when the show began. Their senior year of high school is filled with worries about grades, extracurriculars, and college applications.

Since they haven’t been attending school, their transcripts should worry them. I don’t know how much Stanford values Karate.

Unfortunately, the show continues to focus on Kreese’s past from the third season. Kreese’s story seems the most repetitive. There’s evidence in the show that Kreese is evil.

Daniel will also study Mr. Miyagi’s (Pat Morita) background this season while the series focuses on its antagonist. The show’s tribute to Morita is admirable, but this latest plot twist seems to be Cobra Kai urgently seeking storylines.

The show’s adolescent characters are all well-acted, but Peyton List’s Tory is the MVP in the first few episodes. List, like Zabka, defies bad-girl stereotypes. List is up to the task of her dramatic storyline this season.

Thank goodness showrunners and writers Josh Heald, Jon Hurwitz, and Hayden Schlossberg don’t always steer their characters in predictable ways.

Will the series exceed our Cobra Kai finale expectations? Netflix is delaying Cobra Kai’s finale and punishing fans who want to see it. Next season premieres on November 15th, with the last episode released in 2025 at an unknown date.

The Cobra Kai isn’t ready to die.

SOURCE: PN

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Experience The Chills: ‘Kakuda’ Takes Horror Movies to the Next Level on ZEE5

Ankita Lokhande Shines in ‘Swatantrya Veer Savarkar’: A Historical Epic on ZEE5

House of the Dragon Season 2 Premiere: Date, Time, and What to Expect

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Experience The Chills: ‘Kakuda’ Takes Horror Movies to the Next Level on ZEE5

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Experience The Chills: 'Kakuda' Takes Horror Movies to the Next Level on ZEE5

ZEE5 is changing the game in horror category and ‘Kakuda’ showcases this change. This ZEE5 original movie reimagines classic spooky stories by blending horror with humor.

‘Kakuda,’ available only on ZEE5, introduces some kind of eccentric amalgam that could strike an instant emotional chord with the viewers who never lose their fascination for thrills and chills. We believe this unique mix will enhance the horror content library on ZEE5, a destination of choice for those who seek an all-encompassing cinematic experience that thrills and entertains.

The Spooky Plot of ‘Kakuda’

The story of ‘Kakuda’ unfolds in the terrifying village Ratodi, with supernatural phenomena dwelling there for centuries and every household living under a curse that forces them to keep one door open each Tuesday night for an unseen spirit they refer to as Kakuda. This odd practice, however, precedes a group of supernatural incidents the village will have to face with some comedic behavior.

Humor and horror are blended seamlessly in the movie as it gives a funny twist to ghostly folklore. As mysteries unravel and villagers come face to face with their fears, ‘Kakuda’ becomes an entertaining roller-coaster ride of laughter combined with horror, making the show together a distinctive addition to the realm of ZEE5 horror.

Meet the Stars of This Horror Movie

‘Kakuda’ stars an acclaimed cast comprising Riteish Deshmukh as the reluctant hero, Sonakshi Sinha playing a spirited town skeptic & Saqib Saleem, who stepped into the role of eager young investigator along with versatile actor Aasif Khan playing the role of Kilvish. Together, all of them personify the film’s eccentric ensemble.

They all walked the knife edge of comedy-horror very successfully, maintaining a sense of unease that often flitted in and out with their misadventures. On the flip side, their dynamic back-and-forth and impeccable comic timing add to the entertainment factor but also heighten our connection with Kakuda as a tale — making it one of the most exciting horror movies on ZEE5.

The Unique Storytelling Style of ‘Kakuda’

‘Kakuda’ smoothly blends its horror with humor, conjuring up creepy scenarios that turn to laughter in a split second. Due to this unique style of telling the story, the film becomes differently appealing than most horror films by not relying entirely on suspense and scares.

Very light comedic moments in the middle of some tense scenes keep you engaged further and even use a deceptively clever plot twist to catch you completely off guard. This storytelling will not only expand the appeal of the film but also reimagine that horror-comedy category, making ‘Kakuda’ unique viewing expertise over ZEE5.

Visionary Direction and Script Writing

Avinash Dwivedi and Chirag Garg have scripted the coming-of-age horror-comedy ‘Kakuda,’ which seeks to offer a novel form of content in this genre, directed by Aditya Sarpotdar. It really mixes the suspense aspects with comedic drama, and sometimes, you feel your heart racing while you laugh at other times.

The direction and writing are both personable and playful, with the ability to nakedly subvert horror tropes; there’s a stack of giggles, sure, but it never undermines any suspense. This sort of originality, which not only grasps the audience’s attention but also redefines how to tell a story in ZEE5’s diverse content library, is proof of what an intelligent approach can deliver within horror.

The New Era of Horror Genre with ‘Kakuda’

Kakuda is a breath of fresh air in the horror cinema domain. This ZEE5 original might just pave the way for filmmakers to explore a possible blend of horror, romance, drama, and comedy, eventually starting off that trend in B-town. Kakuda creates new standards and competes with the industry in switching to a more non-conventional horror space.

And with that success comes the possibility of altering what has become standard horror fare, leading us into a new world where mixing such genres becomes far more common. This could signal a change in how horror movies should be presented and consumed, paving the way for an era where hybrids of this type dominate the cinema.

Who Should Watch ‘Kakuda’ on ZEE5

Fortunately, for horror fans who also need a good laugh to complete their movie viewing experience, ‘Kakuda’ is the right choice. It is a horror comedy directed at people who like their menacing scares to be more fun and silly than serious, have-to-leave-the-lights-on terror-filled spookables.

The movie is also a good one for rom-com fans, with simple gags that bring in humor but put it to work within a thrilling framework. Whether it is a movie night with friends or an evening alone, ‘Kakuda’ will cater to all types of audiences’ range through its unique storytelling platform on ZEE5.

If you are a fan of this horror-comedy concoction, then here’s the good news for you—ZEE5 boasts an exciting line-up of movies that disrupt traditional genre boundaries and compel you to discover new examples of storytelling like ‘Kakuda.’

Source: Zee5

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Ankita Lokhande Shines in ‘Swatantrya Veer Savarkar’: A Historical Epic on ZEE5

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Ankita Lokhande Shines in 'Swatantrya Veer Savarkar': A Historical Epic on ZEE5

“Swatantrya Veer Savarkar,” available exclusively on ZEE5, is not just a film but a profound discussion of history through the powerful characters of the film. Among them, Ankita Lokhande has done a great job portraying the character of Yamunabai Savarkar, which captures the emotional aspect of this quite engrossing biography.

The movie captures the essential episodes from the life of Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, giving Lokhande ample opportunity to display her acting talent in full. Let’s discuss Ankita Lokhande’s role and the film’s impact, which is a bonus to her list of movies available on ZEE5.

Exploring “Swatantrya Veer Savarkar”: An Access to the Historical Holdings

The turbulent phases of Indian history of freedom fight are well depicted in the movie “Swatantrya Veer Savarkar,” which is available exclusively on ZEE5. The film has portrayed every detail of Vinayak Damodar Savarkar’s life with precision, giving the audiences a great opportunity to look at the significant events that led to the formation of revolutionary ideas.

In this sense, the movie not only describes Savarkar’s life, his activities, and his imprisonment but also shows him as a brilliant and knowledgeable person in the latter part of the movie. This historical journey enlightens and engulfs, thus making viewers understand and respect the forces that shaped one of the icons of the freedom fight in India.

Ankita Lokhande’s Brilliant Prortrayal of Yamunabai Savarkar

Ankita Lokhande is brilliant in her portrayal of Yamunabai Savarkar and how she depicted the strength of the woman who stood behind Savarkar in “Swatantrya Veer Savarkar.” This movie, now available among the list of Ankita Lokhande movies on ZEE5, is a perfect example of how she can develop her character’s emotional and historical backgrounds.

To give the portrayal of Yamunabai and her influence over Savarkar and the freedom struggle, Lokhande had to prepare by reading up facts and even their diary. This role proves her capability and dedication to the movie, bringing a lot of variation and giving her a powerful position in the Indian film industry.

Ankita with Randeep Hooda: A Captivating Partnership

The chemistry between the lead actors Ankita Lokhande and Randeep Hooda takes the emotional aspects of the film “Swatantrya Veer Savarkar” to the needed level. Lokhande’s portrayal of Yamunabai Savarkar feels more familiar and compelling because of the on-screen relationship between her and Hooda’s Vinayak Damodar Savarkar.

The way they interact on the screen portrays the kind of friendship and support system central to the movie’s plot, making the characters likable and relatable. The ensemble cast of this movie did incredible acting, which benefits the film’s storyline and allows the audience to focus on the life of Savarkar.

The Craft Behind the Scenes: Writing ‘Swatantrya Veer Savarkar’

The making of “Swatantrya Veer Savarkar” was not a child’s play; it required history and creativity. The contribution of the craftspeople, designers, and technical crew was also pivotal in creating a set that depicted the early twentieth-century setting.

The costume designers also did not spare time and effort to ensure they got apparel that fit the characters’ stations and personalities. Besides this, the technical team of cameramen and lightmen ensured they got the correct feel for the period by adequately lighting the scenes and choosing appropriate cameras that would give the right feel for the period, thus making the audience live the life of Savarkar.

What to Expect from “Swatantrya Veer Savarkar”: A Spellbinding Historical Tour

Through controversies and debates, the movie “Swatantrya Veer Savarkar” carries the audience to the time of the Indian freedom struggle and introduces them to the life of the man who actively participated in it. The audience will get to watch a movie with a lot of tension, emotions, and historical context.

The film effectively portrays Savarkar’s revolutionary actions, writings, and changes in his personality over time. Each scene aims to describe the feelings and the political atmosphere of the time and is backed up by a good cast.

It enlightens and amuses, providing a comprehensive and fair account of Savarkar’s multifaceted existence. It demands the audience to think about historical facts and personalities, making it a must-watch for history and true cinema lovers.

The Role of “Swatantrya Veer Savarkar” in Modern Film Industry

Being a movie that has taken a risk to depict a contentious historical character, ‘Swatantrya Veer Savarkar’ is poised to be a memorable film in modern cinema. Thus, the film contributes to the development of historical biopics by providing the audience with extensive and easily understandable information about Savarkar and his views.

It is not only limited to entertainment, as it sparked discussions on the portrayal of history and the role of the movie in raising awareness. The mixture of fact and fiction makes people aware of the unseen aspects of history and the difficulties faced by our freedom fighters.

SEE ALSO: Disney Releases First Teaser Trailer for “Mufasa: The Lion King”

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The above article is sponsored content any opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and not necessarily reflect the views of CTN News- Chiang Rai Times. For detailed information about sponsored content policy click here.

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