Lord, pray for them. Southern California Wildfire Prompts Evacuation According to CNN A Southern California wildfire grew from 10 acres to more than 6,500 acres in a mere five hours Thursday, prompting the evacuation of homes and the campus of California State University Channel Islands, officials said. Winds reaching 25 mph aided the Springs Fire in Ventura County, and weather conditions grounded fixed-wing air tankers, allowing only helicopters to drop water, fire officials said. The blaze was 0% contained Thursday evening, officials said. Meanwhile, authorities late Thursday afternoon reopened a nine-mile leg of California’s scenic Pacific Coast Highway just north of Malibu, the California Highway Patrol said. The patrol had shut it down for a few hours as the fire threatened to approach the coast. That affected portions of the highway that runs between the ocean and the Santa Monica Mountains. The fire was one of two wildfires that firefighters were battling in the Los Angeles area. The other one was east of the city in Riverside County. The Ventura County blaze prompted the evacuation of homes in Newbury Park, fire authorities said. More than 850 fire and law personnel were assigned to the growing conflagration that began near Camarillo, where Cal State Channel Islands is located. The university campus will remain closed through Friday, the school said. Equipment included 96 fire engines, six helicopters and three fixed-wing aircraft, authorities said. In the evacuated Dos Vientos neighborhood, firefighters took a preventive posture beside million-dollar, Spanish mission style houses with red tile roofs. Flare-ups rose 15 feet behind backyards, but no houses had caught fire by about noon local time. These wildfires keep getting crazier and crazier. Shutterstock
Ben Affleck ‘s come a long way since his 1998 Oscar co-win for Good Will Hunting , arguably the first time Hollywood stood up and took notice of the multi-hyphenate as more than just an actor; according to Variety, he’s now being sought after to direct WB’s Justice League , DC’s answer to Marvel’s billion-dollar rival franchise starter The Avengers . But even after the successes of modest-scale thrillers Gone Baby Gone and The Town , and with his buzzed-about forthcoming picture Argo poised for awards season, is the writer/producer/actor/director the right filmmaker to helm the superhero studio tentpole? Sources tell Variety that Affleck has been given the Justice League script as WB approaches him to direct, speculating further that he could additionally star in the pic. But take it all with a healthy grain of salt: Insiders tell Movieline that the report, while plausible, “is ridiculously vague and early.” That’s pretty much what the report sounds like, coming conspicuously just a day after Disney’s Bob Iger spilled the news that Joss Whedon will be coming back to helm Avengers 2 . So somebody out there wants to gauge public opinion, generate a little Justice League buzz, stir the pot. Given the mixed reaction rippling through the blogosphere today, consider that pot stirred. The question is, would Affleck make a good choice for the Justice League movie? Notwithstanding the possibility that he’d star while simultaneously helming an epic megamillion-dollar production with billions of box office, a multi-film franchise, and the fiscal fate of the studio on the line — really, would he? Would anyone? — maybe he’d only take one job at a time in this case. Just maybe. What Gone Baby Gone did to put Affleck on the map as a bona fide seriouspants filmmaker to be taken seriously — if emphasized moreso because nobody really expected it of the guy who starred in Gigli — The Town amplified with its gritty genre leanings. Argo looks to be his most ambitious directing project to date, advancing from tidy Boston-set thriller to multinational historical-political drama. Project by project, Affleck is fine-tuning his sensibilities, widening his reach and skillset with each progressive (and well-chosen) film. Based on his two features to date, Affleck’s a decent but promising director, adept at balancing ensembles and gritty material and great with his actors. The critical and commercial success of The Town most recently demonstrates what any studio with most superhero movies in the post- Batman Begins age is aiming for — the ability to deliver complex, acclaim-worthy material while satisfying audiences. Variety’s report adds more ambiguity to the mix by noting that Affleck is also considering an offer to topline Greg Berlanti’s Replay at Warners, a Groundhog Day -esque sci-fi drama about a man who dies only to wake up, able to live out different potential life paths over and over. Back in 2010 Affleck was reported to be mulling the project, based on Ken Grimwood’s 1987 novel, only then — on the heels of The Town — he was looking to direct. I see Affleck more likely to continue along this route, building a directing resume out of smaller, character-driven dramas for grownups. Then again, he’s already brought Superman to the big screen once before, donning the spandex for Hollywoodland . Should he do it again? [ Variety ]
Hope Springs is not what it says on the package. The trailer is all comedy and quirk, but the movie is not. Let’s face it though, the premise is a hard sell. Films about old people are an anathema to mainstream Hollywood. Since the success of Cocoon — which featured its over-50 cast rejuvenated by a swimming pool containing alien pods — movies featuring actors of a certain age are rare, and despite the success of Driving Miss Daisy , It’s Complicated and Meryl Streep’s last Oscar-winning vehicle, The Iron Lady , it is almost impossible to get a film made unless someone under 20 is pivotal to the script. Hope Springs is even more thorny because it is about a particularly unattractive aspect of marriage: Not the falling in love and getting married aspect, or the falling out and getting divorced phase, but rather, the living inside of an unhappy marriage angle. Surely this has to be pretty special to sustain our interest. Despite having the odds stacked against it, Hope Springs is, in parts, raw, moving, brave, audacious and painful thanks to the combined ability of Streep and Jones to commit fully to unhappy suburban mediocrity. Had the movie been made with two different lead actors, I surely believe the movie would have been unwatchable. Streep and Jones play Kay and Arnold, who, after 31 years of marriage, are mired in a relationship that is a form of living death. He is sutured to Golf Tips magazine and slavishly devoted to daily rituals. She follows him around with plates of food like a nurse. They sleep in separate rooms. There is no physical contact between them. They don’t even speak to each other anymore. For their wedding anniversary, they buy each other cable TV. While Arnold is grumpily in denial about the state of his marriage, Kay has the self-awareness to know she is unhappy. She browses Barnes & Noble, finds a book called You Can Have The Marriage You Want and books a week’s worth of intensive marital counseling in Maine with the author Dr Feld (a deadly serious Steve Carell). She then gets on the plane alone and waits to see if her husband will fill the seat beside her. Begrudgingly, Arnold joins his wife, and, unleashing his inner curmudgeon, begins to bitterly complain about the cost of everything related to their therapeutic sojourn. It is in the sessions with Dr Feld that the going really gets tough. From here on in, Hope Springs is like ripping off a series of well-stuck Band-Aids. The pain is palpable as Kay and Arnold discuss the loss of intimacy and their sex life and admit to the loneliness and anger that each suffers. As you might expect, the couple do attempt to resurrect their sex life, but watching this was about as comfortable as contemplating my parents getting it on. I was not alone either: these scenes provoked much nervous laughter at the screening I saw – and yet, the discomfort generated had much to do with the authentic performances that both actors give. Streep, as ever, is extraordinary. Her conviction to character makes Kay frumpy, vulnerable and not particularly bright. She is an ordinary woman without a whiff of glamour, and Streep conveys this with every hand gesture and facial expression. It is Jones’ performance that is the real revelation, however. His character has the furthest distance to travel and watching him do this is at the core of this film’s heart — and its heartbreak. In contrast to the nuanced and powerful work of these two titans, Hope Springs suffers from simplistic framework and some heavy-handed signposting. The soundtrack desperately tries to lift us up where we belong. There are endless shots of watches and clocks — presumably to emphasize the passing or running-out of time. The aesthetic is also very obvious. The suburban drab shifts visually as soon as the couple reach Maine. Dr. Feld’s office floods with sunlight the minute the pair of them have a relationship breakthrough. Then again director David Frankel is not renowned for his subtlety. The representation of the all-American family in Marley and Me made me want to throw myself under a bus. Which leaves us where, exactly? Hope Springs does authentically depict how scary and lonely it is to be inside a failing marriage, and anyone who has endured or witnessed the break-up of a long-term relationship will feel the sting here. In many respects, it’s a subject that deserves Hollywood’s attention and ours as well. Lately, movie audiences have been inundated with younger couples on celluloid that can’t make it past six years ( Celeste and Jesse Forever) or even six months ( Ruby Sparks ). The long run is relatively untapped territory and arguably much more interesting. But Hope Springs does not keep its eye on the prize. The movie is an unsatisfying combination of touching and excruciating, and a large part of the problem stems from Frankel’s attempt to hammer such serious and sensitive subject matter into a half-hearted comedy. Despite Streep and Jones’ honest, moving performances, the movie’s tone is horribly forced — so much so that by the time Annie Lennox’s poignant “Why?” played on the soundtrack, I felt like wailing along with her. Follow Lorien Haynes on Twitter. Follow Movieline on Twitter.
A Palm Springs man is under arrest for allegedly threatening to kill Congressman Jim McDermott . Charles Turner Habermann is charged with threatening a federal official, after making two “expletive-laden, threatening phone calls” to the Seattle… Read more
‘There’s going to be a four-week beatnik boot camp,’ she says of prep for the film adaptation of Jack Kerouac’s novel. By Jocelyn Vena, with reporting by Josh Horowitz Kristen Stewart Photo: MTV News While Kristen Stewart is currently busy promoting “Eclipse,” out June 30, another project has her excited for the future: the film adaptation of Jack Kerouac’s classic 1957 Beat novel “On the Road.” With the film set to shoot in August, Stewart is welcoming the chance to learn a bit more about the pivotal literary and cultural movement. “I’m really nervous, like, honestly and genuinely really nervous about it,” she told MTV News. “But not in a bad way. People think nerves are a bad thing. I love them. They get you ready to do something big. I’m stoked” Filming will take place in Canada, but first, she and the rest of the cast will get schooled in all things beat. “There’s going to be a four-week beatnik boot camp in Montreal,” she revealed. “That’s going to be amazing, because I haven’t read everything those guys read. There’s a huge education process that’s going to take place with the whole cast. It’s a small movie, so to have that much time is just awesome.’ “On the Road” also stars Garrett Hedlund (“Tron Legacy”) as Dean Moriarty, the disaffected drifter at the center of the story. Stewart will play Marylou, Dean’s wife. Filling out the rest of the cast are Kirsten Dunst and British actor Sam Riley (“Control”). Francis Ford Coppola is producing, and Walter Salles (“The Motorcycle Diaries”) will direct. The film will begin shooting August 2 in Montreal. Producers have already set up an office at Cite du Cinema, the city’s largest film production facility. After filming there for most of August, the shoot will shift to New Orleans for a month, then head to Mexico for a few weeks and finally return to Montreal before wrapping just in time for Stewart to shoot the final two “Twilight” flicks, adapted from “Breaking Dawn.” We’ll be live at the L.A. premiere of “The Twilight Saga: Eclipse” on Thursday, June 24. Tune in to Movies.MTV.com at 9:30 ET (8:30 Central) for our red-carpet webcast, and watch us chat with Robert, Kristen, Taylor and all your favorite stars. And don’t forget to submit your burning ‘Eclipse’ questions ! Check out everything we’ve got on “On the Road.” For young Hollywood news, fashion and “Twilight” updates around the clock, visit HollywoodCrush.MTV.com . Related Videos MTV Rough Cut: Kristen Stewart
Filed under: January Jones , Celebrity Justice TMZ has obtained the 911 call made moments after ” Mad Men ” star January Jones slammed into a couple of parked cars last week. A female witness called 911right after the incident.
Filed under: Jason Alexander , Celebrity Justice TMZ has obtained the 911 call made after ” Seinfeld ” star Jason Alexander was involved in a car vs. bike accident with a young boy in Los Angeles back in April. The call was made by a woman who had just witnessed the accident — she says a “nurse” had… Read more
‘Party of Five’ star escaped bizarre kidnapping last week; alleged kidnapper is in custody. By MTV News staff Jeremy London Photo: Charley Gallay/WireImage Jeremy London — the actor best known for his roles in “Party of Five” and Kevin Smith’s “Mallrats” — was robbed and abducted by a man in Palm Springs, California, on Thursday night, beginning a five-hour ordeal in which he was held at gunpoint and forced to smoke drugs. Palm Springs police told RadarOnline that London, 37, was attempting to change a flat tire on his vehicle when several men stopped to help him. After London offered to drive the men home, one of them — a man identified as Palm Springs resident Brandon Adams — pulled a gun on the actor, then forced him to drive his own vehicle, smoke drugs and buy alcohol. “[During the kidnapping] he was forced to smoke dope [crack cocaine or amphetamines] and then purchase booze and hand it out in a gang area of Palm Springs,” Sergeant Steve Douglas told Radar. London managed to escape around 3 a.m. Friday, Douglas added. The actor’s vehicle was later recovered in the Palm Springs neighborhood where Adams lived. Adams was arrested and charged with several felonies, including kidnapping for ransom with injury, strong arm robbery, carjacking, receiving stolen property and taking a vehicle without the owner’s consent. Adams pleaded not guilty, The Associated Press reported Thursday, but remains in custody with bail set at slightly more than $500,000. A publicist for London confirmed to the AP that the actor was indeed the kidnapping victim and that he is working closely with police in their investigation, adding that he is currently at “an undisclosed location with family and friends.” In the past, London has struggled with drug abuse. In an April interview with People magazine , he said he had spent time in a rehabilitation center due to a prescription drug addiction. In 2004, he was arrested for allegedly driving with a suspended license and carrying controlled substances.
‘Party of Five’ star escaped bizarre kidnapping last week; alleged kidnapper is in custody. By MTV News staff Jeremy London Photo: Charley Gallay/WireImage Jeremy London — the actor best known for his roles in “Party of Five” and Kevin Smith’s “Mallrats” — was robbed and abducted by a man in Palm Springs, California, on Thursday night, beginning a five-hour ordeal in which he was held at gunpoint and forced to smoke drugs. Palm Springs police told RadarOnline that London, 37, was attempting to change a flat tire on his vehicle when several men stopped to help him. After London offered to drive the men home, one of them — a man identified as Palm Springs resident Brandon Adams — pulled a gun on the actor, then forced him to drive his own vehicle, smoke drugs and buy alcohol. “[During the kidnapping] he was forced to smoke dope [crack cocaine or amphetamines] and then purchase booze and hand it out in a gang area of Palm Springs,” Sergeant Steve Douglas told Radar. London managed to escape around 3 a.m. Friday, Douglas added. The actor’s vehicle was later recovered in the Palm Springs neighborhood where Adams lived. Adams was arrested and charged with several felonies, including kidnapping for ransom with injury, strong arm robbery, carjacking, receiving stolen property and taking a vehicle without the owner’s consent. Adams pleaded not guilty, The Associated Press reported Thursday, but remains in custody with bail set at slightly more than $500,000. A publicist for London confirmed to the AP that the actor was indeed the kidnapping victim and that he is working closely with police in their investigation, adding that he is currently at “an undisclosed location with family and friends.” In the past, London has struggled with drug abuse. In an April interview with People magazine , he said he had spent time in a rehabilitation center due to a prescription drug addiction. In 2004, he was arrested for allegedly driving with a suspended license and carrying controlled substances.
At a meeting in Palm Springs the Stonewall Democrats endorsed the November ballot initiative to tax and regulate marijuana. The initiative would raise millions of dollars for local cities and counties plus put an end to the unjust prohibition against cannabis. added by: RubyVideo
