Provoked Premiere

I was invited to the Premiere at The Empire, Leicester Square on 3rd April... The newlywed Bollywood 'IT' couple Aishwaraya Rai and Abhishek Bachchan (son of the living Legend Amitabh Bachchan) in presence you'd expect more of a fuss...

Provoked is a UK based English language film, directed by Jag Mundhra. It stars Aishwarya Rai (Devdas, Bride and Prejudice, former Miss World), Naveen Andrews (Kama Sutra, Lost), Miranda Richardson, Robbie Coltrane (Cracker), Nandita Das (Fire) and Steve McFadden ("Oh Phil?!" - "Shut it you TART!"). This film is very loosely based on the true story of Kiranjit Ahluwalia who killed her allegedly abusive husband and is sentenced under a murder charge... After 3 years of work with the Southall Black Sisters to build a case for appeal, it is reduced to manslaughter. Regina VS Alhuwalia was a landmark case that argued that provocation can include years of accumalitve actions (in this case; an abusive marriage) not just a moment of action after which the victim has a 2 hour 'cooling off' period. Any retaliation after this cannot be considered provocation. This case also saw 'battered woman syndrome' to be recognised as a legal/medical condition affecting the psychological/emotional state of mind.

Cinematography for the film is being handled by Madhu Ambat. The film's score and soundtrack has been composed by A. R. Rahman, and the theme song for the film, "Alive", was composed by Rahman and sung by Karen David, who has a small cameo in the film. She's quite cute with her blasé attitude toward the bayliffs taking the office photocopier, and her psuedo early ninties outfits.

...As I mentioned earlier, a fuss around Ash/Abhi was expected, especially considering tickets were on general sale to the public. I expected with all their airs and graces of Bollywood stardust they'd have secluded seating... They were sitting behind where I was. Furthermore whose decision was it to sell tickets to public?! Any way to make a quick buck hey? Hoardes of screaming pubescent girls chirped like a hedge full of crickets in desperate attempt to catch Abhishek's attention...

That's right love, he's looking at you (squashed amongst all the other homegenous Hounslow girls that you are aesthetically completely not different to in any way whatsoever)...

Abhishek has a personal message for all those girls...



"I'm married."