Young Obama impatient for change, friends say
As a young man, Barack Obama idolized civil rights leaders. "Reading about people not that much older than me who had gone to jail and suffered beatings in order to liberate a people," he said, "I thought there's something powerful about that." But Obama was born too late to join the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.'s movement. So he did the next best thing.
Columbia Scaring Up Ghostbusters Revival (E! Online)
E! Online - No need to believe in UFOs, astral projections, mental telepathy, ESP, clairvoyance, spirit photography, telekinetic movement, full trance mediums, the Loch Ness monster and the theory of Atlantis.
Review: `Secret Life of Bees' not the bees knees (AP)
AP - "The Secret Life Of Bees" teases with talent. How can a movie populate a house with Queen Latifah, Alicia Keys and Jennifer Hudson and NOT give us a song?
Cheerleaders ditch skimpy uniforms
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Red-hot "'Mamma" rules overseas box office (Reuters)
Reuters - The ABBA-inspired
musical romance "Mamma Mia!" grabbed the No. 1 spot at the
weekend foreign box office for the first time, grossing an
estimated $15 million from 39 markets.
Hospitals use lessons from Katrina
Three years after Hurricane Katrina taught New Orleans' medical community some painful lessons, hospitals here are trying to learn from past mistakes.
Kidman, Jackman bask in beauty of "Australia" (Reuters)
Reuters - With his audaciously titled epic "Australia," Baz Luhrmann has delivered a shamelessly melodramatic, often eccentric spectacle with true-blue blockbuster potential.
Prominent Pakistani film-maker kidnapped: police (Reuters)
Reuters - A prominent Pakistani film-maker and distributor, Satish Anand, has been kidnapped in Pakistan's biggest city of Karachi, a top police official said Tuesday.
Paramount delays release of "Soloist," "Defiance" (Reuters)
Reuters - Paramount Pictures is fiddling with its holiday release plans at the eleventh hour, delaying the wide release of true-life drama "The Soloist," starring Robert Downey Jr. and Jamie Foxx, and the Daniel Craig-toplined Nazi escape film "Defiance" until the first quarter.
Scientists bet North Pole will melt away this year
All ice at the North Pole may melt away this summer, scientists say. "We kind of have an informal betting pool going around in our center and that betting pool is 'does the North Pole melt out this summer?' and it may well," said Mark Serreze, senior research scientist at the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colorado.
"Parque" a memorable portrait of a lonely man (Reuters)
Reuters - Mexican director Enrique Rivero's first feature film, "Parque Via," is the study of a simple man who lives alone and really likes it that way. Slow and repetitious, it uses the structure of a short story that lulls the reader with ordinariness before a stinging climax.
Batman's Latest Archenemy: Batman (E! Online)
E! Online - It may be more the provenance of Superman, but this time it's Batman who's entered Bizarro World.
Troyer reaches settlement in sex tape lawsuit (AP)
AP - Actor Verne Troyer has settled a lawsuit he filed against a porn broker after the defendant agreed not distribute a sex tape depicting Troyer and a former girlfriend, court documents filed Friday show.
Baby born to Indian surrogate out of legal limbo
A 3-month-old girl born to an Indian surrogate mother has flown to Japan to join her biological father after spending the first months of her life in legal limbo.
Holy hooligans! Phony 'Joker' arrested in Michigan (AP)
AP - Police in Michigan have arrested a man who they say tried to steal posters and other items related to the new Batman movie from a cinema lobby while dressed up as the Joker.
Smoke forces adult, child to leap to their deaths
A 45-year-old man and a 5-year-old boy leapt to their deaths Tuesday after a fire swept through an apartment building, authorities said.
N.Y. millionaire jailed for enslaving maids
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Pressure on biggest U.S. insurer
The pressure on American International Group reached fevered pitch on Monday night as the troubled insurer was hit by a series of credit rating downgrades.
50 Cent runs with British gangster movie (Reuters)
Reuters - American rapper Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson plays a ruthless loan shark in the London gangland movie "Dead Man Running," which began shooting Wednesday.
Police shoot man as he beats toddler
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Comics, film and figurine fans flock to Comic-Con (AP)
AP - The most passionate Spider-Men, Storm Troopers, Harry Potters and other pop-culture fanatics are headed south for their annual pilgrimage. Comic-Con, the country's biggest comic-book convention, begins Thursday at the San Diego Convention Center.