Madonna booed in Bucharest for defending Gypsies

By ALINA WOLFE MURRAY, Associated Press
At first, fans politely applauded the Roma performers sharing a stage with Madonna. Then the pop star condemned widespread discrimination against Roma, or Gypsies — and the cheers gave way to jeers.
The sharp mood change that swept the crowd of 60,000, who had packed a park for Wednesday night's concert, underscores how prejudice against Gypsies remains deeply entrenched across Eastern Europe. Despite long-standing efforts to stamp out rampant bias, human rights advocates say Roma probably suffer more humiliation and endure more discrimination than any other people group on the continent. Sometimes, it can be deadly: In neighboring Hungary, six Roma have been killed and several wounded in a recent series of apparently racially motivated attacks targeting small countryside villages predominantly settled by Gypsies.
"There is generally widespread resentment against Gypsies in Eastern Europe. They have historically been the underdog," Radu Motoc, an official with the Soros Foundation Romania, said Thursday.

Blake Lively going to "Town" on big screen

"Gossip Girl" star Blake Lively has joined the ensemble cast that Ben Affleck is assembling for "The Town," a crime thriller he's directing.
In addition, Chris Cooper is in negotiations to board the Warner Bros. movie.
Affleck, Jon Hamm, Rebecca Hall and Jeremy Renner already are cast in "Town," an adaptation of Chuck Hogan's novel "Prince of Thieves."
Lively is playing Renner's sister and Affleck's troubled ex-girlfriend. Cooper would play Affleck's father. Lively returns as Serena van der Woodsen on the CW's "Gossip." whose new season begins September 14. She also will be seen on the big screen in "New York, I Love You."
The story follows a bank manager (Hall), the career criminal (Affleck) who stole more than her heart and the dedicated FBI agent (Hamm) trying to bust the crook and his gang, of which Renner is a part.
Cooper, who won an Academy Award for "Adaptation," also appears in "New York" and the upcoming drama "The Company Men," which stars Affleck.

Prince Michael Malachi Jet Jackson: Another Michael Jackson Love Child?

According to TMZ and Radar Online, 24-year-old Prince Michael Malachi Jet Jackson is claiming with the intention of he is the son of the in the dead of night sovereign of Pop Michael Jackson. And Prince Michael Malachi Jackson, who hails from San Francisco, California, wants to take a genetic material test to verify it. To with the intention of aim, Prince
Prince Michael Malachi Jet Jackson: Another Michael Jackson be fond of Child?
Michael Malachi Jackson and his protect, Zerline LaVette Dixon, be inflicted with filed a creditor's aver hostile to Michael Jackson's estate - and the birth certificate submitted with the aver lists Michael Joseph Jackson of Indiana as the father. (Radar Online has posted the incite ID; to read carefully them, click the link by the underside of this article.)
Many thumbs down doubt will occur to the conclusion with the intention of Prince Michael Malachi Jet Jackson's primary motivation pro appearance forwards and claiming with the intention of he is Michael Jackson's son is money. But according to LeRue Grim, who is Prince Micheal Malachi Jackson's attorney, nothing may possibly be additional from the truth.
And according to Grim, "Malachi" looks "exactly like Michael." But, as of yet, a picture of Prince Michael Malachi Jet Jackson has not yet surfaced on the Internet and until it does, we'll solely be inflicted with to take LeRue Grim's word pro it - even though attorneys are renowned to stretch the truth from calculate to calculate.
"Malachi has been told his full life with the intention of he is Michael Jackson's son," understood LeRue Grim to Radar Online. "His primary goal is to be inflicted with closure on whether or not Michael was his father, and he wants a genetic material test to verify it. Malachi's primary motivation isn't money."
Of way, even if Prince Michael Malachi Jet Jackson turns made known to be the spitting image of Michael Jackson, it doesn't mean with the intention of he's his son. Inside addition, with the intention of his first name is Prince Michael (as are Michael Jackson's two "official" sons) and with the intention of his father's first name is Michael Joseph Jackson of Indiana doesn't mean he's Michael Jackson's son either. It may possibly all curve made known to be a coincidence.
To be guaranteed, a genetic material test must settle the topic some time ago and pro all and the father's signature on the birth certificate will help back it up - if it matches MJ's John Hancock, with the intention of is.

Danyl Johnson X Factor - Britains most talented singer failed before finding success

Danyl Johnson, X-Factor singer from Britain, had failures previous to his record singing "With A not enough Help From My Friends" became a viral secure.
According to the Today Show, Johnson's been instruction in Reading, outside of London, pro six years. He was in three uncommon bands and winning a inhabitant karaoke contest.
While noting with the intention of his students should be vacant crazy, Ann Curry mentioned, "He furthermore seems to be inflicted with splendid range."
Cowell told NBC he thinks he could be the preeminent contestant they've had yet.
Co-host Matt Lauer added with the intention of Johnson had "incredible presence" on stage.
The Daily Mail reports with the intention of Johnson has been invited to be on NBC's Today Show, but his advent hasn't been inveterate due to private commitments.

Bestseller No1 - The Beatles Stereo Box Set

Description:
Hard black glossy lift top with magnet clasp
CDs packaged in three panel digi-pak with digital mini documentaries
Remastered by Guy Massey, Steve Rooke, Sam Okell with Paul Hicks and Sean Magee
Contains:
All 13 Studio remasters plus Past Masters (digi packaging with digital mini documentaries)

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Planet Earth - The Complete BBC Series

As of its release in early 2007, Planet Earth is quite simply the greatest nature/wildlife series ever produced. Following the similarly monumental achievement of The Blue Planet: Seas of Life, this astonishing 11-part BBC series is brilliantly narrated by Sir David Attenborough and sensibly organized so that each 50-minute episode covers a specific geographical region and/or wildlife habitat (mountains, caves, deserts, shallow seas, seasonal forests, etc.) until the entire planet has been magnificently represented by the most astonishing sights and sounds you'll ever experience from the comforts of home. The premiere episode, "From Pole to Pole," serves as a primer for things to come, placing the entire series in proper context and giving a general overview of what to expect from each individual episode. Without being overtly political, the series maintains a consistent and subtle emphasis on the urgent need for ongoing conservation, best illustrated by the plight of polar bears whose very behavior is changing (to accommodate life-threatening changes in their fast-melting habitat) in the wake of global warming--a phenomenon that this series appropriately presents as scientific fact. With this harsh reality as subtext, the series proceeds to accentuate the positive, delivering a seemingly endless variety of natural wonders, from the spectacular mating displays of New Guinea's various birds of paradise to a rare encounter with Siberia's nearly-extinct Amur Leopards, of which only 30 remain in the wild.
That's just a hint of the marvels on display. Accompanied by majestic orchestral scores by George Fenton, every episode is packed with images so beautiful or so forcefully impressive (and so perfectly photographed by the BBC's tenacious high-definition camera crews) that you'll be rendered speechless by the splendor of it all. You'll see a seal struggling to out-maneuver a Great White Shark; swimming macaques in the Ganges delta; massive flocks of snow geese numbering in the hundreds of thousands; an awesome night-vision sequence of lions attacking an elephant; the Colugo (or "flying lemur"--not really a lemur!) of the Philippines; a hunting alliance of fish and snakes on Indonesia's magnificent coral reef; the bioluminescent "vampire squid" of the deep oceans... these are just a few of countless highlights, masterfully filmed from every conceivable angle, with frequent use of super-slow-motion and amazing motion-controlled time-lapse cinematography, and narrated by Attenborough with his trademark combination of observational wit and informative authority. The result is a hugely entertaining series that doesn't flinch from the predatory realities of nature (death is a constant presence, without being off-putting). At a time when the multiple threats of global warming should be obvious to all, let's give Sir David the last word, from the closing of Planet Earth's final episode: "We can now destroy or we can cherish--the choice is ours."

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Hollywood playing catch-up with videogames

reuters
COLOGNE, Germany (Hollywood Reporter) – Films and videogames would seem a match made in heaven, so why are games based on hit movies so bad? Despite sharing the same demographic of devoted fans, action, sci-fi and fantasy films rarely translate into branded videogame hits.
"Movie-based games almost never work. No matter how cool the movie, the game is almost always lame," said Philipp Dollinger, a gamer reviewer for German blog Pressakey.com and one of thousands of gamers swarming the halls of the gamescom trade fair, which runs until Sunday in Cologne.
"Most are just bad imitations of better games already out there," he added.
Hollywood has been burned before in the gaming space. Just ask Brash Entertainment, the U.S. group that raised $400 million to buy up film licenses and turn them into hit games. After two major flops -- an "Alvin and the Chipmunks" game and one based on Fox's sci-fi feature "Jumper" (2008) -- Brash folded. It was a similar story for Pandemic Brisbane, the Australian outpost of the Los Angeles-based game developer, which shuttered in February after a disastrous attempt to deliver an ambitious game based on Christopher Nolan's blockbuster "The Dark Knight."
Despite those warning signs, there are plenty of new A-list movie ties at gamescom, and plenty of developers saying they have learned their lessons.
LONG-TERM PROJECTS
"For a lot of movies, the game is an afterthought," said Jake Meri, a producer at LucasArts. "The filmmakers are close to finishing production and they say, 'Oh, what about the game?' But a good game takes years of development."
LucasArts put in the time for its new release, "Star Wars: The Old Republic," a game it is developing with Canadian outfit BioWare for games giant Electronic Arts.
"Star Wars"-based games have gotten mixed reviews in the past, but the buzz has been strong for "The Old Republic." LucasArts and BioWare have spent years designing the title, which will be a massively multiplayer online game similar to "World of Warcraft" -- a game intended to be played online by thousands of people simultaneously.
PC Gamer U.K. called "The Old Republic" "a credible 'World of Warcraft' killer," and the lineups to see the demo at gamescom have been longer than those at most movie premieres.
"We have a lot to live up to with this game, which is why we've spent so much time and money on it," Meri said. "It will be the first fully voiced MMO game in the world. Voicing this game has been the most ambitions voiceover project ever -- we have thousands of characters speaking more than 200,000 lines of dialogue."
LucasArts is famous for its obsessive protection of the "Star Wars" franchise, but the trend toward closer cooperation between film and games studio is one seen across the industry. James Cameron was hands-on for the more than three years France's Ubisoft took to develop "Avatar," a combat game based on Cameron's upcoming film.
"It was really unprecedented," Ubisoft developer Patrick Naud said. "We had full access to everything -- the story boards, the concept art, the sound, the voices, the animation. It wasn't a typical movie licensing, where you buy the license and go away and make the game. It was a much closer collaboration."
"Avatar" will be one of the first big tests of this kind of tight movie-game teamwork when it hits stores in November, ahead of the film's holiday release. "It might be too soon to say this, but James Cameron is a trendsetter, so maybe, in the future, this is the way everyone will be doing business," Naud said. "It would certainly make a lot more sense."