Sushmita Sen plays a cop in Samay, directed by Robi Grewal.

The role and the film are supposed to be extraordinarily challenging. Samay opens after the World Cup.

Sushmita also flies to the US at the end of February to shoot for Mahesh Manjrekar's English-Bengali bilingual It Rained That Night (the remake of Astitva).

Then, there is director Sanjay F Gupta's remake of Oliver Stone's U-Turn for producers Sanjay Gupta and Sanjay Dutt, where Sushmita plays the tempestuous Jennifer Lopez character opposite Jackie Shroff and John Abraham.

Amitabh setback sets a few back

Amitabh Bachchan's shooting and dubbing engagements are at a standstill after he recently lost his father Harivansh Rai Bachchan.

The most immediately affected is Vikram Bhatt, whose thriller drama Aitbaar stars the Big B in a pivotal role. But Bhatt is far from perturbed. "Knowing Amitji, he must be more worried about the shooting cancellations than I am. His professionalism is irrefutable."

Meanwhile, as the Aitbaar shooting has been postponed for until after the 13-day mourning period, Vikram has been shooting for the late Bunty Soorma's unfinished film Humko Tumse Pyaar Hai featuring Arjun Rampal, Amisha Patel and Bobby Deol.

Bobby and Vikram happen to be school friends. "He's my best friend," Vikram says. 

John Abraham's career is looking up

John Abraham and Bipasha Basu are all set to be seen in one more film together after Jism, in Vikram Bhatt's Aitbaar.

John plays a scumbag who fools Bipasha into believing in him. Bipasha's father, Amitabh Bachchan, knows the truth.

In the paranormal thriller Saaya, John's costar is Tara Sharma, the petite heroine who costarred with Abhishek Bachchan in Om Jai Jagadish.

Saaya is produced by Mukesh Bhatt (also the producer of John's other forthcoming release Footpath), and is based on the Patrick Swayze-Demi Moore hit Ghost.

Anurag Basu, who directed 30 per cent of Ekta Kapoor's Kucch To Hai before he was asked to leave, is directing Saaya. 

Namrata Shirodkar in Adnan Sami's next video

Adnan Sami's music album Tera Chehra has become a gallery for actresses featured in the music videos. First there was Rani Mukherjee doing the title song.

Then there are Raveena Tandon and Mahima Chaudhry in the new videos on air.

The next one will feature the lovely Namrata Shirodkar.

Besides the fact that both Rani and Namrata are close friends of Raveena, the common link is Sanjay Leela Bhansali's gifted sister Bela Sehgal who directed all three music videos.

Having edited all three of her brother's feature films, Bela is all set to direct her own film soon.