Fixing and making feels good, and everyone's doing it, so don't be shy. Experience the Joy of Fix.

It's the first conference of the North American Passive House Network and it sounds like it was a lot of fun.

A few tweaks by stores could make the process more efficient.

At yök we do not only work hard to save energy, but also water. According to Airbnb, guests in Europe renting a home use 45% less water than when staying in a hotel. But there is more to a bathroom than saving water; materials also play an important role

Juniper is an invasive species that's tough to work with.

Farmers Insurance "We Know From Experience" Ad Campaign Spot

XCMG Apprentice Program introduces latest technologies and Chinese culture to international apprentices.

Brad Hiranga, General Mills Business Unit Director, Pizza and Tacos Business Unit discusses the Bucking Couch and Bucking Couch Bowl.

Vivo’s New Flagship Smartphone V3 & V3Max: Faster than Faster

XCMG Apprentice Program introduces latest technologies and Chinese culture to international apprentices.

Vivo’s New Flagship Smartphone V3 & V3Max: Faster than Faster

Bayer MSMS “Say TkU” Campaign

The Amgen Biotech Experience empowers teachers to bring biotechnology into their classrooms to spark students’ love of science and features a hands-on curriculum that introduces students to the excitement of scientific discovery.

More Doctor Who fans than ever can now step inside a VR version of the TARDIS as the BBC’s hit virtual reality experience Doctor Who: The Runaway comes to the Doctor Who YouTube channel and launches internationally.

Äratuskell oli mul sellel hommikul pandud kella viieks, kuid selle abi ma ei vajanudki. Kerge ärevus ja põnevus eelseisva hommiku osas oli teinud oma töö – ärkasin kellata. Mul oli plaan minna varahommikusele metsatiirule ja sellel hommikul lootsin kohata just karu! Kuidagi tunne oli selline, et vot nüüd on küll õige aeg! Eks oma osa […]

Brain implants have revealed that we replay conscious experiences while we sleep, with the same patterns of neurons firing during sleep as in waking life

At React Conf 2019 we announced an experimental release of React that supports Concurrent Mode and Suspense. In this post we’ll introduce best practices for using them that we’ve identified through the process of building the new facebook.com.

This post will be most relevant to people working on data fetching libraries for React.

It shows how to best integrate them with Concurrent Mode and Suspense. The patterns introduced here are based on Relay — our library for building data-driven UIs with GraphQL. However, the ideas in this post apply to other GraphQL clients as well as libraries using REST or other approaches.

This post is aimed at library authors. If you’re primarily an application developer, you might still find some interesting ideas here, but don’t feel like you have to read it in its entirety.

Talk Videos

If you prefer to watch videos, some of the ideas from this blog post have been referenced in several React Conf 2019 presentations:

• Data Fetching with Suspense in Relay by Joe Savona
• Building the New Facebook with React and Relay by Ashley Watkins
• React Conf Keynote by Yuzhi Zheng

This post presents a deeper dive on implementing a data fetching library with Suspense.

Putting User Experience First

The React team and community has long placed a deserved emphasis on developer experience: ensuring that React has good error messages, focusing on components as a way to reason locally about app behavior, crafting APIs that are predictable and encourage correct usage by design, etc. But we haven’t provided enough guidance on the best ways to achieve a great user experience in large apps.

For example, the React team has focused on framework performance and providing tools for developers to debug and tune application performance (e.g. React.memo). But we haven’t been as opinionated about the high-level patterns that make the difference between fast, fluid apps and slow, janky ones. We always want to ensure that React remains approachable to new users and supports a variety of use-cases — not every app has to be “blazing” fast. But as a community we can and should aim high. We should make it as easy as possible to build apps that start fast and stay fast, even as they grow in complexity, for users on varying devices and networks around the world.

Concurrent Mode and Suspense are experimental features that can help developers achieve this goal. We first introduced them at JSConf Iceland in 2018, intentionally sharing details very early to give the community time to digest the new concepts and to set the stage for subsequent changes. Since then we’ve completed related work, such as the new Context API and the introduction of Hooks, which are designed in part to help developers naturally write code that is more compatible with Concurrent Mode. But we didn’t want to implement these features and release them without validating that they work. So over the past year, the React, Relay, web infrastructure, and product teams at Facebook have all collaborated closely to build a new version of facebook.com that deeply integrates Concurrent Mode and Suspense to create an experience with a more fluid and app-like feel.

Thanks to this project, we’re more confident than ever that Concurrent Mode and Suspense can make it easier to deliver great, fast user experiences. But doing so requires rethinking how we approach loading code and data for our apps. Effectively all of the data-fetching on the new facebook.com is powered by Relay Hooks — new Hooks-based Relay APIs that integrate with Concurrent Mode and Suspense out of the box.

Relay Hooks — and GraphQL — won’t be for everyone, and that’s ok! Through our work on these APIs we’ve identified a set of more general patterns for using Suspense. Even if Relay isn’t the right fit for you, we think the key patterns we’ve introduced with Relay Hooks can be adapted to other frameworks.

Best Practices for Suspense

It’s tempting to focus only on the total startup time for an app — but it turns out that users’ perception of performance is determined by more than the absolute loading time. For example, when comparing two apps with the same absolute startup time, our research shows that users will generally perceive the one with fewer intermediate loading states and fewer layout changes as having loaded faster. Suspense is a powerful tool for carefully orchestrating an elegant loading sequence with a few, well-defined states that progressively reveal content. But improving perceived performance only goes so far — our apps still shouldn’t take forever to fetch all of their code, data, images, and other assets.

The traditional approach to loading data in React apps involves what we refer to as “fetch-on-render”. First we render a component with a spinner, then fetch data on mount (componentDidMount or useEffect), and finally update to render the resulting data. It’s certainly possible to use this pattern with Suspense: instead of initially rendering a placeholder itself, a component can “suspend” — indicate to React that it isn’t ready yet. This will tell React to find the nearest ancestor <Suspense fallback={<Placeholder/>}>, and render its fallback instead. If you watched earlier Suspense demos this example may feel familiar — it’s how we originally imagined using Suspense for data-fetching.

It turns out that this approach has some limitations. Consider a page that shows a social media post by a user, along with comments on that post. That might be structured as a <Post> component that renders both the post body and a <CommentList> to show the comments. Using the fetch-on-render approach described above to implement this could cause sequential round trips (sometimes referred to as a “waterfall”). First the data for the <Post> component would be fetched and then the data for <CommentList> would be fetched, increasing the time it takes to show the full page.

There’s also another often-overlooked downside to this approach. If <Post> eagerly requires (or imports) the <CommentList> component, our app will have to wait to show the post body while the code for the comments is downloading. We could lazily load <CommentList>, but then that would delay fetching comments data and increase the time to show the full page. How do we resolve this problem without compromising on the user experience?

Render As You Fetch

The fetch-on-render approach is widely used by React apps today and can certainly be used to create great apps. But can we do even better? Let’s step back and consider our goal.

In the above <Post> example, we’d ideally show the more important content — the post body — as early as possible, without negatively impacting the time to show the full page (including comments). Let’s consider the key constraints on any solution and look at how we can achieve them:

• Showing the more important content (the post body) as early as possible means that we need to load the code and data for the view incrementally. We don’t want to block showing the post body on the code for <CommentList> being downloaded, for example.
• At the same time we don’t want to increase the time to show the full page including comments. So we need to start loading the code and data for the comments as soon as possible, ideally in parallel with loading the post body.

This might sound difficult to achieve — but these constraints are actually incredibly helpful. They rule out a large number of approaches and spell out a solution for us. This brings us to the key patterns we’ve implemented in Relay Hooks, and that can be adapted to other data-fetching libraries. We’ll look at each one in turn and then see how they add up to achieve our goal of fast, delightful loading experiences:

1. Parallel data and view trees
2. Fetch in event handlers
3. Load data incrementally
4. Treat code like data

Parallel Data and View Trees

One of the most appealing things about the fetch-on-render pattern is that it colocates what data a component needs with how to render that data. This colocation is great — an example of how it makes sense to group code by concerns and not by technologies. All the issues we saw above were due to when we fetch data in this approach: upon rendering. We need to be able to fetch data before we’ve rendered the component. The only way to achieve that is by extracting the data dependencies into parallel data and view trees.

Here’s how that works in Relay Hooks. Continuing our example of a social media post with body and comments, here’s how we might define it with Relay Hooks:

// Post.js
function Post(props) {
  // Given a reference to some post - `props.post` - *what* data
  // do we need about that post?
  const postData = useFragment(graphql`
    fragment PostData on Post @refetchable(queryName: "PostQuery") {
      author
      title
      # ...  more fields ...
    }
  `, props.post);

  // Now that we have the data, how do we render it?
  return (
    <div>
      <h1>{postData.title}</h1>
      <h2>by {postData.author}</h2>
      {/* more fields  */}
    </div>
  );
}

Although the GraphQL is written within the component, Relay has a build step (Relay Compiler) that extracts these data-dependencies into separate files and aggregates the GraphQL for each view into a single query. So we get the benefit of colocating concerns, while at runtime having parallel data and view trees. Other frameworks could achieve a similar effect by allowing developers to define data-fetching logic in a sibling file (maybe Post.data.js), or perhaps integrate with a bundler to allow defining data dependencies with UI code and automatically extracting it, similar to Relay Compiler.

The key is that regardless of the technology we’re using to load our data — GraphQL, REST, etc — we can separate what data to load from how and when to actually load it. But once we do that, how and when do we fetch our data?

Fetch in Event Handlers

Imagine that we’re about to navigate from a list of a user’s posts to the page for a specific post. We’ll need to download the code for that page — Post.js — and also fetch its data.

Waiting until we render the component has problems as we saw above. The key is to start fetching code and data for a new view in the same event handler that triggers showing that view. We can either fetch the data within our router — if our router supports preloading data for routes — or in the click event on the link that triggered the navigation. It turns out that the React Router folks are already hard at work on building APIs to support preloading data for routes. But other routing frameworks can implement this idea too.

Conceptually, we want every route definition to include two things: what component to render and what data to preload, as a function of the route/url params. Here’s what such a route definition might look like. This example is loosely inspired by React Router’s route definitions and is primarily intended to demonstrate the concept, not a specific API:

// PostRoute.js (GraphQL version)

// Relay generated query for loading Post data
import PostQuery from './__generated__/PostQuery.graphql';

const PostRoute = {
  // a matching expression for which paths to handle
  path: '/post/:id',

  // what component to render for this route
  component: React.lazy(() => import('./Post')),

  // data to load for this route, as function of the route
  // parameters
  prepare: routeParams => {
    // Relay extracts queries from components, allowing us to reference
    // the data dependencies -- data tree -- from outside.
    const postData = preloadQuery(PostQuery, {
      postId: routeParams.id,
    });

    return { postData };
  },
};

export default PostRoute;

Given such a definition, a router can:

• Match a URL to a route definition.
• Call the prepare() function to start loading that route’s data. Note that prepare() is synchronous — we don’t wait for the data to be ready, since we want to start rendering more important parts of the view (like the post body) as quickly as possible.
• Pass the preloaded data to the component. If the component is ready — the React.lazy dynamic import has completed — the component will render and try to access its data. If not, React.lazy will suspend until the code is ready.

This approach can be generalized to other data-fetching solutions. An app that uses REST might define a route like this:

// PostRoute.js (REST version)

// Manually written logic for loading the data for the component
import PostData from './Post.data';

const PostRoute = {
  // a matching expression for which paths to handle
  path: '/post/:id',

  // what component to render for this route
  component: React.lazy(() => import('./Post')),

  // data to load for this route, as function of the route
  // parameters
  prepare: routeParams => {
    const postData = preloadRestEndpoint(
      PostData.endpointUrl, 
      {
        postId: routeParams.id,
      },
    );
    return { postData };
  },
};

export default PostRoute;

This same approach can be employed not just for routing, but in other places where we show content lazily or based on user interaction. For example, a tab component could eagerly load the first tab’s code and data, and then use the same pattern as above to load the code and data for other tabs in the tab-change event handler. A component that displays a modal could preload the code and data for the modal in the click handler that triggers opening the modal, and so on.

Once we’ve implemented the ability to start loading code and data for a view independently, we have the option to go one step further. Consider a <Link to={path} /> component that links to a route. If the user hovers over that link, there’s a reasonable chance they’ll click it. And if they press the mouse down, there’s an even better chance that they’ll complete the click. If we can load code and data for a view after the user clicks, we can also start that work before they click, getting a head start on preparing the view.

Best of all, we can centralize that logic in a few key places — a router or core UI components — and get any performance benefits automatically throughout our app. Of course preloading isn’t always beneficial. It’s something an application would tune based on the user’s device or network speed to avoid eating up user’s data plans. But the pattern here makes it easier to centralize the implementation of preloading and the decision of whether to enable it or not.

Load Data Incrementally

The above patterns — parallel data/view trees and fetching in event handlers — let us start loading all the data for a view earlier. But we still want to be able to show more important parts of the view without waiting for all of our data. At Facebook we’ve implemented support for this in GraphQL and Relay in the form of some new GraphQL directives (annotations that affect how/when data is delivered, but not what data). These new directives, called @defer and @stream, allow us to retrieve data incrementally. For example, consider our <Post> component from above. We want to show the body without waiting for the comments to be ready. We can achieve this with @defer and <Suspense>:

// Post.js
function Post(props) {
  const postData = useFragment(graphql`
    fragment PostData on Post {
      author
      title

      # fetch data for the comments, but don't block on it being ready
      ...CommentList @defer
    }
  `, props.post);

  return (
    <div>
      <h1>{postData.title}</h1>
      <h2>by {postData.author}</h2>
      {/* @defer pairs naturally with <Suspense> to make the UI non-blocking too */}
      <Suspense fallback={<Spinner/>}>
        <CommentList post={postData} />
      </Suspense>
    </div>
  );
}

Here, our GraphQL server will stream back the results, first returning the author and title fields and then returning the comment data when it’s ready. We wrap <CommentList> in a <Suspense> boundary so that we can render the post body before <CommentList> and its data are ready. This same pattern can be applied to other frameworks as well. For example, apps that call a REST API might make parallel requests to fetch the body and comments data for a post to avoid blocking on all the data being ready.

Treat Code Like Data

But there’s one thing that’s still missing. We’ve shown how to preload data for a route — but what about code? The example above cheated a bit and used React.lazy. However, React.lazy is, as the name implies, lazy. It won’t start downloading code until the lazy component is actually rendered — it’s “fetch-on-render” for code!

To solve this, the React team is considering APIs that would allow bundle splitting and eager preloading for code as well. That would allow a user to pass some form of lazy component to a router, and for the router to trigger loading the code alongside its data as early as possible.

Putting It All Together

To recap, achieving a great loading experience means that we need to start loading code and data as early as possible, but without waiting for all of it to be ready. Parallel data and view trees allow us to load the data for a view in parallel with loading the view (code) itself. Fetching in an event handler means we can start loading data as early as possible, and even optimistically preload a view when we have enough confidence that a user will navigate to it. Loading data incrementally allows us to load important data earlier without delaying the fetching of less important data. And treating code as data — and preloading it with similar APIs — allows us to load it earlier too.

Using These Patterns

These patterns aren’t just ideas — we’ve implemented them in Relay Hooks and are using them in production throughout the new facebook.com (which is currently in beta testing). If you’re interested in using or learning more about these patterns, here are some resources:

• The React Concurrent docs explore how to use Concurrent Mode and Suspense and go into more detail about many of these patterns. It’s a great resource to learn more about the APIs and use-cases they support.
• The experimental release of Relay Hooks implements the patterns described here.

• We’ve implemented two similar example apps that demonstrate these concepts:

  • The Relay Hooks example app uses GitHub’s public GraphQL API to implement a simple issue tracker app. It includes nested route support with code and data preloading. The code is fully commented — we encourage cloning the repo, running the app locally, and exploring how it works.
  • We also have a non-GraphQL version of the app that demonstrates how these concepts can be applied to other data-fetching libraries.

While the APIs around Concurrent Mode and Suspense are still experimental, we’re confident that the ideas in this post are proven by practice. However, we understand that Relay and GraphQL aren’t the right fit for everyone. That’s ok! We’re actively exploring how to generalize these patterns to approaches such as REST, and are exploring ideas for a more generic (ie non-GraphQL) API for composing a tree of data dependencies. In the meantime, we’re excited to see what new libraries will emerge that implement the patterns described in this post to make it easier to build great, fast user experiences.

Actor Vicky Kaushal feels the phenomenon of sleep paralysis is scary. On Instagram, Vicky recently conducted an interactive session with fans. When a user asked him if he has ever seen a ghost in real life, Vicky opened up on the subject of sleep paralysis.

"I have experienced sleep paralysis couple of times. It's damn scary," he wrote. Sleep paralysis is a medical condition where a person, on waking up from sleep, experiences temporary inability to move or speak.

The actor also shared that he is scared of watching horror films. Incidentally, he recently starred in the horror film, "Bhoot Part One: The Haunted Ship". The film performed below expectations.

Vicky will next be seen in Shoojit Sircar's "Sardar Udham Singh". He has also signed Meghna Gulzar's film biopic of Field Marshal Sam Manekshaw. He will be essaying the title roles in both films.

Catch up on all the latest entertainment news and gossip here. Also, download the new mid-day Android and iOS apps.

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Thane: Tremors measuring 3.1 on the Richter scale were experienced at around 1:38 am on Sunday in Dundalwadi village in Dahanu area of neighbouring Palghar district, a civic official said.

District Disaster Control Officer Vivekananad Kadam said no damage was reported. Earlier, on November 24 and November 3, tremors of the magnitude of 3.3 on the Richter scale shook Dahanu and Talasari talukas.

Civic officials said that quake-preparedness training programmes were held for villagers between November 26-29 in two talukas of Palghar district.

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This story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed, agencies. Mid-day accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability, trustworthiness, reliability and data of the text. Mid-day management/mid-day.com reserves the sole right to alter, delete or remove (without notice) the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever

Parvaaz, a four-member outfit, believes in spreading the message of peace through their progressive rock music with guitar-driven compositions. With their Urdu lyrics and the familiar sound of chimes, the soundscape is a refreshing change. Now, they are back in the city for a gig that promises to be about the coming together of western guitar techniques and Indian elements, making them one among a handful of true-blue fusion indie bands today.

Parvaaz, which translates to "flight", came together in 2010 when childhood friends Khalid Ahmed and Mir Kashif Iqbal (both on vocals and guitar), reconnected in Bengaluru over their shared love for blues rock melodies, and were joined by Sachin Banandur (drums and percussions) and Fidel D'Souza (bass). But they only started developing their own sound two years later. "We were playing at competitions and winning, which was a great boost. We felt confident enough to make original music, and our sound shifted towards progressive and classic rock of the '60s and '70s," says Ahmed, quoting Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, The Doors, and Indian Ocean and Avial, as their influences.

It was a process of trial and error till they found the best way to let all their individual influences flow while jamming, which is when the Urdu lyrics also came in, the natural form of communication for two members at least. "Hindi and Urdu come naturally to us. Singing in English would have just not flowed with the music. Besides, the sound of the fusion that comes out of a merging of different styles of music is what our goal has been. It is the sound that guides most of our writing," says Ahmed.

Their lyrics primarily talk about the human nature and comprise metaphorical poetry, like their song Beparwah, which talks about man's dependence on materialistic objects, and Shaad, which is about loss and regret.

Khalid Ahmed

But lyrics are the last thing that get added onto their music, and that too if they deem it necessary. "A lot of our jams just end up being instrumental, and hence our seven minute-long songs," reasons Ahmed.

They will also be playing some new songs from their upcoming album that they have been putting together for four years, and will be releasing later this year. For fans who like to sing along, they will also perform songs from their first EP and debut album, including Ziyankar and the achingly serene Itne Arse Ke Baad, which echoes a longing to go back home. Home, for Ahmed and Iqbal, is a sensitive issue now, since both hail from Kashmir, which is still trying to heal from the Pulwama attack. Both were reluctant to comment, and as they say, prefer to let their music do the talking.

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An average 18.39 per cent voter turnout was recorded in the first four hours in Maharashtra's 17 seats on Monday as polling for the fourth and last phase of Lok Sabha elections in the state was underway. Polling began at 7 am and long queues were seen outside many booths, some of which were decorated with balloons and 'rangolis'.

Mumbaikars took to the social media platform and posted their voting experience on Twitter. As many as 3.11 crore voters spread across the Mumbai metropolitan region and northern and western Maharashtra are eligible to exercise their franchise to decide the fate of 323 candidates in the fray in these 17 seats. Around 40 polling booths in these constituencies, including 26 in suburban Mumbai, are being managed by women.

#VoteKarMumbai
Citizens braving the hot weather and long queues to make their voices count at St Anthony school, Malvani church, Malad (w) pic.twitter.com/u88glP96iD

— Sushant shetty (@The_Outlaw_Poet) April 29, 2019

If you ain't voting then you ain't getting any right to rant about the government.

Use the opportunity to vote rather than enjoying the 'holiday".#VoteKarMumbai #VoteBecauseYouCan #VoteForChange pic.twitter.com/Tj3EkYhi3A

— SA (@Bts_sonia3) April 29, 2019

My first vote as a responsible citizen of India 🇮🇳 @narendramodi @PMOIndia @TanmayNPatel @siddhar98531723 @Republic_Bharat @ECISVEEP I appeal everyone to vote for better 🇮🇳 do your duty as a responsible citizen 🙏🏻 #2019Elections #VoteKarMumbai pic.twitter.com/L4B6rE3RNB

— Chowkidar shraddha shetty (@sssshetty499) April 29, 2019

#VoteKarMumbai Took 2.5 hrs to cast my vote due to EVM failure. Anyway guys use your wisdom before you cast your precious vote. pic.twitter.com/w4FLL8xb5J

— Sibu Varghese (@35ce5c7275f049b) April 29, 2019

#Keep phones at #home when you go to vote #LokSabhaElections2019 #VoteKarMumbai pic.twitter.com/uHKrcFr5Yy

— Richa Pinto (@richapintoTOI) April 28, 2019

I have Done my National Duty.Have You?#VoteKarMumbai #VoteForIndia pic.twitter.com/79i0T77cxh

— Shubham Anil Dhande (@ShubhamADhande) April 29, 2019

Monday done right ✔️✔️ #VoteKarMumbai #MumbaiVotesForNation pic.twitter.com/dAG7atOCCY

— Smita Diwan (@smitadiwan) April 29, 2019

Voting experience for the first time was quite good. All the officers and staff were doing great job and are cooperative with the people. #VoteKarMumbai #VoteIndia #VotingRound4 #UnitedByVote pic.twitter.com/1kosbophnn

— Bhanushali Disha (@dbhanushali01) April 29, 2019

Family trip to the polling booth is more important than a family trip over an extended weekend to a nearby tourist destination.Lonavala,Khandala etc etc will still be there next weekend,the polling booth won't.#LokSabhaElections2019 #VoteKarMumbai #Democracy #Elections2019 pic.twitter.com/uoss2FZsWI

— Rohit D (@rohitd1999) April 29, 2019

#VoteKarIndia #VoteKarMumbai #vote We did, did you? Pls go and vote, make a difference. pic.twitter.com/i1bd6qLF5W

— Prasanna R Coondapur (@prax3) April 29, 2019

Finished voting. Took us about 1.5 hours, but it's worth it if we get our voice heard and get to participate in this democracy. #Elections2019

Also, lots of first time voters! High time, but big ups! Today, I feel hopeful. Sweaty, but hopeful. #VoteKarMumbai pic.twitter.com/OSmCg2ZTtw

— Smriti Sant (@temporarysant) April 29, 2019

Ultra senior citizens with full of energy voted. feeling proud of them as my uncle & aunt!!#MumbaikarVoteKar #IndianElections2019 #Vote4Nation #VoteKarMumbai #VoteKar#DeshKaMahaTyohar@abpmajhatv @zeemarathi @zee24taasnews @ZeeTV @ECISVEEP @narendramodi @narendramodi_in pic.twitter.com/OdDkwToRXp

— Mangirish Herwadkar (@hmangirish) April 29, 2019

My First Vote to strengthen Democracy 👆
I Appeal you all to vote wisely 🙏#VoteForIndia #VoteKarMumbai #LokSabhaElection2019 #VoteBecauseYouCan pic.twitter.com/Pr2HESJiAj

— Prathamesh Thanekar (@One_two_ka_four) April 29, 2019

The voting figures till 11 am in other constituencies are as follows: Dhule- 18.26 per cent, Dindori - 21.06 per cent, Nashik- 17.22 per cent, Palghar- 21.46 per cent, Bhiwandi- 17.25 per cent, Thane-17.43 per cent, Mumbai-North- 19.46 per cent, Mumbai-North West 17.64 per cent, Mumbai-North East-18.39 per cent, Mumbai-North Central- 16.21 per cent, Mumbai-South Central-16.80 per cent, Mumbai- South 15.51 per cent, Maval- 18.23 per cent, Shirur- 18.65 per cent and Shirdi 20.55 per cent.

Watch Video:

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Kalank
U/A: Action, Drama, History
Director: Abhishek Varman
Cast: Varun Dhawan, Alia Bhatt, Madhuri Dixit, Sanjay Dutt, Sonakshi Sinha and Aditya Roy Kapur
Rating: 

Not one to get wooed by the scale and production value of a film, I can't help but be smitten by the sheer beauty of Abhishek Varman's Kalank. In 2019, when Netflix rules our lives, this film is a rare cinematic experience that blends in opulence, glamour with a solid story about a family torn by its own skeletons in the closet. Star crossed pairs, their infidelities and how it destroys the world around them.

Drawn to forbidden pleasures and immoderate love is Roop, played with heft by Alia Bhatt. Varman's vast screenplay primarily plays off the luminous chemistry between Bhatt and co-star Varun Dhawan. There's a tantalising quality about their pairing and Varman uses this element to full effect. But a lot of the emotions drown in its self imposed ornate design of the film, which gives it a synthetic quality.

Watch the trailer of Kalank here:

So when a feisty Rajputana girl (Alia's Roop) is compelled by circumstances to marry a man (Aditya Roy Kapur's Dev) she can't even recognise in broad daylight, you want to discover more about their faulty dynamics. Or even how a well-educated woman like her, who has opinions strong enough to be voiced in front of an all-male team of writers running a flourishing newspaper, would fall for a visibly dubious man (Varun Dhawan's Zafar) with a promiscuous life. All of this and much more about the period's socio-political submerges beneath Binod Pradhan's gorgeous cinematography. It's almost as if there is a barrier between the audience and the characters - a gulf presumably created because of the director's reluctance to delve deeper into the plot.

Kalank movie poster

It's at the casting department, Varman scores big. Raging with simmering pain, Varun's aching performance beautifully transcends from showing him as a bitter man thirsty for revenge to a kind soul softened by love. Aditya's character has little graph but he adds soul to his act, supported adequately by Sonakshi Sinha who keeps her brief role serene all through. The seniors - Madhuri Dixit and Sanjay Dutt bring their effortless experience in a climactic sequence which packs a punch. Kunal Kemmu's grey part is portrayed with flair.

Also Read: Kalank: Here's everything you should know about the multi-starrer film

By no means is Kalank an unbearable film, despite being nearly 2 hours 48 minutes long. But there is a constant tryst to divert our attention from its storyline; Varman distracts us with his suggestive background scores, special numbers and sometimes even the perfectly created Manish Malhotra costumes. It's also equally problematic that a film set in pre-Partition doesn't stir up much political conversations throughout the narrative. There are stray mentions of their noble intentions but it remains largely detached from the divisive politics of the time it is set in. It also pays a tribute to Sanjay Leela Bhansali's school of filmmaking by borrowing a lot of his trademark sequences (especially Alia's entry which reminds one of Aishwarya's first scene in Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam). Varman's prism is fresh - his women aren't caricatures, his characters aren't perfect. Roop is innately flawed, her decisions are damaging but she fights back for love with all her might. His men aren't all heroic and larger than life; they stumble, are unforgiving and equally faulty.

Watch the video of the Kalank movie review here:

I was reminded of Deepa Mehta's masterpiece - 1947, Earth, rightly melodramatic, potently emotional which walked the tightrope of a love triangle in stormy times in a balanced way. Kalank doesn't aim for that depth. It's content in being pretty even when it has the potential of so much more.

Kalank screening: Janhvi Kapoor, Alia Bhatt, Aditya Roy Kapur attend:

Also Read: Kalank Celeb Review: B-town can't stop praising this period drama

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Jacqueline is one of the most successful actresses who has given commercially hits as well as some great performances. With every project, the actress has entertained the audiences and will be soon making her digital debut with Mrs. Serial Killer up next.

Stirring things up a bit this time, Jacqueline has opted for a role which is completely opposite of her Miss sunshine avatar, in reel-life with her OTT debut Mrs. Serial Killer which is just a couple of days away from the release. The film is all set to premiere on 1st May.

The actress will be seen alongside celebrated actor Manoj Bajpayee and sharing her experience on working with the actor for the first time, Jacqueline says, "I met him at the shoots in the high altitudes; he is so full of energy and has so may stories to tell you. He is a bit funny as well and that made the shoot worth the while."

Earlier as well the actress had shared how she is a big fan of Manoj Bajpayee's body of work and for her OTT debut grabbed the opportunity to work with him. The actress also loved Manoj's work in 'The Family Man.'

Jacqueline loves to always experiment with her projects and never shies away from trying out something new. Her OTT debut performance is something we are all looking forward to. From the trailer itself, Jacqueline looks extremely promising and we're excited!

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The media industry and movie industry are very much interlinked with each other. It’s very common that many media personnel are associated with well-known film stars. One such name who is building her reputation among many celebrities is Vaishali Rathod, a journalist who is the favourite of every celebrity in Dhollywood. She has not just covered events but has also interviewed many big stars and veteran personalities from Bollywood and Dhollywood. With a degree in journalism from the University of Mumbai, Vaishali also had the flair of writing and taking interviews.

She is currently handling the Gujarati entertainment section from Mumbai. Some of the well-known names from Dhollywood with whom Vaishali share a warm rapport include Khushi Shah, Aarohi Patel, Malhar Thakar, Mitra Ghadvi, Hiten Kumar, Alisha Prajapati, Meet Jain, Bharat Chawda among others. As far as Bollywood is concerned, she has interviewed top stars including Shah Rukh Khan, Salman Khan, Ranbir Kapoor, Katrina Kaif, Yami Gautam, Ranveer Singh, Alia Bhatt, Vicky Kaushal and many other prominent names.

Besides writing, the journalist also loves to act and loves to create videos during her leisure time. While speaking about her work, she said, "As a celebrity journalist, it is always a pleasure to meet some of the dignitaries from the film industry. Every celebrity has his or her fair of struggles before they gain success and it has always been a delight to know about their life story", said Vaishali. When asked about her future plans and, she said, "My current focus is to build and grow myself in the field of journalism. There are a lot of things to learn. So I am going with the flow." The journalist further stated that she focuses on one thing at a time as she does not like to do things in haste.

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Sanya Malhotra is an actress that breathes life into characters on-screen with her impactful performances. She has made a space for herself in the Indian film industry with the awe-striking characters she has played. Not only is she renowned for her acting but she is also well acclaimed for her mesmerizing dance moves!

One might say that the actress is a multifaceted package of entertainment. Sanya is to be seen making an engrossing appearance in an upcoming Indian 2020 Hindi language dark anthology comedy film Ludo. The film contains four chapters, each of which revolves around a different story.

The actress is known to prepare immensely for all her characters to truly submerge into the depths of the characters, however, with Ludo things were very different as Anurag Basu's brief for Sanya was basically just coming to the set unprepared.

It was quite an enriching experience as the actress went on the set completely clueless about the character and that was Anurag's artistic appeal towards weaving the character which Sanya surely aced. This is proof of how the actress takes on different roles and experiments with her characters.

Apart from Ludo, she has created quite a huge space for herself in the industry on the basis of her dedication and passion towards acting, owing to which she has bagged roles in upcoming films like 'Shakuntala Devi' where the actress will be playing Anupama Banerjee while sharing the screen with Vidya Balan and Guneet Monga’s Pagglait.

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We're asked to first wait at the Breakout Room, before being led to the Vetting Room (have spelt that right). After quite a few minutes, finally, allowed in to the Interview Suite. Felt like going past check-in, through security, into immigration.

Except, this passage to the Hollywood home of Australian-born superstar Chris Hemsworth — globally, best-known as the superhero Thor — with various check-points in place, is happening over Zoom, the video-conferencing app. There's a posse of international press logging in at their designated time-slots, from respective homes, across the world. All of them, like Hemsworth at his place, it appears, are living under lockdown, due to COVID-19 spread/scare.

"If you think about it, what we're doing is unbelievable," says Sam Hargrave, referring to the unusual manner of this junket. This is before formal conversations begin, with a moderator rotating questions, as per a pre-decided order. Everyone but the specific questioner's microphone is on mute. No doubt, these are extraordinary times.

Chris Hemsworth and Sam Hargrave (encircled) during the interview  

Hargrave, placed in the window to my right, is the director of the Netflix film Extraction, starring Hemsworth, that drops on April 24. If it wasn't for the pandemic, they'd both have been in Mumbai promoting this film. Which is where I am. And where, along with Ahmedabad, mostly, Extraction was shot.

What was that like? Hemsworth offers the common adjectives — life, energy, people, positivity —that the uninitiated usually refer to mean an overwhelming experience, which India, without a national curfew, can certainly be. He recalls, "The [crowds] couldn't have been more accommodating, supportive — thousands of people standing in buildings and bridges, watching and applauding. The shoot felt like being in a coliseum, or live theatre!"

For Hargrave though, besides sanity, there was also the question of maintaining safety: "We were doing intricate action sequences, with cars flying over locked-up streets, at 50 miles per hour. [At any point in time], you'd have 300 people for security personnel alone, to make sure no one got hurt."

A working still of Extraction

Hargrave is one of Hollywood's top stunt-coordinators, with films from the Marvel Cinematic Universe under his belt, including the Avengers blockbusters directed-produced by (Anthony and Joe) Russo Brothers.

Extraction however is Hargrave's first film as director, and evidently furthest from his comfort zone, given its setting to start with: "Joe Russo, who wrote the script, actually set the film in Dhaka [Bangladesh] and India. Because western audiences haven't seen much of that side of the world. It offered lots of opportunities, visually."

Directing, as a job, is challenging enough. Double whammy for the debutant was, as he puts it, "Directing actors in two different languages — Hindi and Bengali. Neither of which I speak! We had an interpreter with us. But because of the prep we'd put in during rehearsals, while I couldn't understand what they were saying [in the dialogue], I could tell the intention.

Randeep Hooda

"I knew when we'd nailed a take. And if something was off, I knew if we'd missed a line. With cinema, you can tell the scenario. Especially with action — once you've set up the hero and the villain, and they're at odds — the film speaks for itself."

One of the major Indian actors Hargrave directed for Extraction was Randeep Hooda, who comes up rather often in this conversation, as Hemsworth specifically refers to the "major [fight scene], involving hand-to-hand combat. It was so exhausting for both [Randeep and I]. Yet, when you've got an actor who's putting in a 110 per cent, neither of you is willing to quit, it's the best."

Which gives you fair sense of the film's genre — sort of a pure, street-style actioner in the old-world, Western mould. Hemsworth elaborates, "[It's] everything they used to do in the '80s and prior, [without] relying on special effects and green screen, because you couldn't. It was refreshing and rewarding to shoot like that."

Hargrave recalls, "When Randeep and I met, we spoke about the characters, relating them to the classic Westerns — Once Upon a Time in the West, The Good the Bad the Ugly..." Randeep has come again — maybe we could go further on that route (him and I went to the same school).

Or talk more about other Indian actors Hemsworth was referring to hanging out a lot with, while he was here. Or, perhaps mildly pick his brains on his last huge release, Avengers: Endgame — hugest one in the history of films!

Oh, I'm on mute. Chatting on a screen through a moderator is at best interviewing an interpreter, with a dysfunctional hearing aid. Feels rather distant. Upside? Could casually roll out of bed in boxers in Bombay, find myself seated opposite Thor for a few minutes, and then back to bed again. Done. Hoping it's not the new 'normal' though.

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If not for the lockdown, Sara Ali Khan and Varun Dhawan starrer Coolie No 1 would have been playing in the theatres right now. The film directed by David Dhawan is a remake of the 1995 film of the same name starring Govinda and Karisma Kapoor. In an exclusive conversation with Bollywood Hungama, Sara Ali Khan spoke about her experience working with Varun Dhawan.

Three-film-old Sara Ali Khan worked with Varun Dhawan for the first time. While the trailer of their film has not been released yet, fans are already rooting for this pairing based on the pictures from the sets of Coolie No 1 and the camaraderie shared by the two on social media. Talking about her experience working with Varun Dhawan, Sara Ali Khan said, “I think I had an absolute blast working with Varun. Firstly, I think he knows his job so, so well and he is fully focussed on that, which I think is important when you are on a film set. That side, I think he is very, very supportive as a co-actor. He is superbly friendly and he is a lot of fun. I think I had one of my best experiences so far working with him. He knows how to be professional and serious and we need to give work the importance it needs and deserves, but he is also, in general, a very fun and chill person. So, I think he is one of the only people who I have worked with and actually hang with as well. I really like that about him. He is definitely one of my favourites.”

Watch video here:

Meanwhile, on the work front, Sara had started shooting for Atrangi Re before the lockdown was imposed. Atrangi Re directed by Aanand L Rai also stars Akshay Kumar and Dhanush.

A study on teenage girls and young women in Kenya reveals that if the first sexual encounter is forced, such women are four times more likely to experience gender-based violence later in life.

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In an exclusive conversation with International Business Times India, Manoj Bajpayee spoke about his role in Mrs Serial Killer, his experience of working with Shirish Kundar and Jacqueline Fernandez and further went on to speak about the rise of OTT platforms and also spills the beans on how he is spending his lockdown time with family amidst nature.

An interview with Sigbjørn Johnsen, Minister of Finance, Norway. High female participation in the workforce has a decisive effect on a country’s performance, as Norway shows.

After the success of song 'Pyar Karona', Salman Khan is ready with the love song called 'Tera Bina' with Jacqueline Fernandez.

From Ayushmann Khurrana to Ranveer Singh, here's the list of male actors in Bollywood who faced horrific incidents of casting couch in their career.

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Summary: Job Description: Job description Hiring Freshers and experienced MBA/B.Tech candidates for recruitment executive role. work would be resume sourcing, interview schedule, Offer followup and MIS reporting. Salary:INR50,000 –....

In the framework of a project with the Mexican Ministry of Economy, this report provides an overview of international experiences and best practices regarding the role of courts in the implementation of competition policy. It presents different institutional designs, the role of courts, courts specialisation and their benefits as well as their relationship with other government bodies and stakeholders.

Tax officials from 21 jurisdictions met this week in Yangzhou, China, to share experiences from the first year of country-by-country reporting and explore how information can be used most effectively in the tax risk assessment of MNE groups. The workshop also included representatives of large MNE groups headquartered or with major operations in China and the Asia-Pacific region.

Mutual legal assistance, and international co-operation more broadly, are important issues in the investigation and prosecution of corruption crimes. This report outlines common barriers to MLA among the 31 member jurisdictions of the ADB/OECD Anti-Corruption Initiative for Asia and the Pacific, and describes best practices used to overcome these barriers.

To help inform the Conference on Managing Hospital Volumes, co-organised by the German Federal Ministry of Health and the OECD, and held on the 11th April 2013 in Berlin, the OECD Secretariat produced a paper to provide an international perspective on Germany’s situation and the current policy debate.

This event to be held on 21 June 2016 in Lisbon, Portugal, will discuss the preliminary findings of the OECD project "Resilient Cities" and share cities' experience on enhancing resilience.

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Targets to include more women mean little without cultural change in the industry