As soon as Seth MacFarlane belted out the first few lines of ” We Saw Your Boobs ” at the 85th Academy Awards , it was clear a skinstant classic had arrived. A song seemingly pulled straight from the recesses of Mr. Skin ’s mind, or at least his all encompassing databases at MrSkin.com . And we’re not the only ones who thought so with Chicago Tribune columnist Phil Rosenthal tweeting “ I’m pretty sure @MrSkin should get a songwriting credit for this @SethMacFarlane song. #Oscars ”, CinemaBlend.com calling it ” Mr. Skin: The Musical ”, and The Atlantic opining that MacFarlane “ essentially read off a Mr. Skin database of shirtless-actress appearances over time ”. Pics after the jump!
As soon as Seth MacFarlane belted out the first few lines of ” We Saw Your Boobs ” at the 85th Academy Awards , it was clear a skinstant classic had arrived. A song seemingly pulled straight from the recesses of Mr. Skin ’s mind, or at least his all encompassing databases at MrSkin.com . And we’re not the only ones who thought so with Chicago Tribune columnist Phil Rosenthal tweeting “ I’m pretty sure @MrSkin should get a songwriting credit for this @SethMacFarlane song. #Oscars ”, CinemaBlend.com calling it ” Mr. Skin: The Musical ”, and The Atlantic opining that MacFarlane “ essentially read off a Mr. Skin database of shirtless-actress appearances over time ”. Pics after the jump!
Sean Lowe says that The Bachelor season premiere , which aired last night was an exciting, but anxious experience, one he “can’t quite put into words.” He tries his best, fortunately, in his weekly blog . Heading into the night, he wondered, “Would I feel a connection with anyone? Am I going to meet my future wife tonight? Am I going to make it out alive?” Sean did in fact survive to dole out the roses another day, and at least from The Bachelor spoilers we’ve read, the season goes pretty well for him. Neither here nor there right now. Here’s how Sean summed up his first night as the star of the ABC reality franchise, from beginning to end … “The women amazed me. They seemed sweet, funny and gorgeous! Any nerves I had going into the first night were calmed by the unusual and very funny antics of a few women.” “I felt so bad for Robyn when she attempted that back handspring and landed on her head. But I must admit, it was a great icebreaker and it definitely made a big impression on me.” “I love a girl who doesn’t take herself too seriously.” “Lesley definitely scored points with me when she pulled the football prank on me. It was fun, creative and most importantly, it made me want to spend more time with her.” “The woman who made the biggest entrance of the night had to be Lindsay.” “The girl showed up in a wedding dress! My first thought was that she was crazy, but I quickly learned that it was just her quirky sense of humor and she wasn’t afraid to put herself out there.” “Lindsay was someone I wouldn’t forget. But the woman who made the biggest impression on me was Tierra. I can’t explain it but I just felt an immediate connection with Tierra.” “Her piercing eyes and beautiful smile stopped me in my tracks and I knew right then and there that I wanted to give her a rose.” “I didn’t stop to think that by giving her a rose so quickly I might be putting a target on her back, but I’m glad I made that decision because I knew I wanted to spend more time with Tierra.” “After meeting the 25 women, I was ready to get inside and start talking with them but of course Chris Harrison had a surprise for me: there was a 26th woman and it was none other than Kacie from Ben Flajnik’s season of The Bachelor .” “I was shocked to see her step out of the limo because I was already friends with her. We met at a charity function a few months prior and I was able to spend a good amount of time with her.” “I thought she was really sweet and fun, but I never looked at her in a romantic light and I had no idea she had developed a crush on me.” “I knew it would be a transition for me viewing Kacie as someone who is more than a friend, but I was certainly willing to try because I respect her as a person so much.” “I made the decision to hand out roses during the cocktail party because I felt like being in the moment. Each rose I handed out was just a way of my telling that woman that I liked her and wanted to get to know her more.” “I found myself handing out roses left and right and thought it would make the ceremony easier. But then when it came time, there were so few roses left and so many great women that it was just as hard!” “Overall, I had an amazing first night and I am so excited to start this crazy new journey with all of you. I don’t think I realized right away, though, just how crazy the journey would be!”
Chicago Police are investigating the death of a lottery winner, Urooj Khan, 46, who was killed, reportedly by poison, just after he got his winnings. Khan won a $1,000,000 scratch-off ticket last June after he paid $60 to buy two tickets at a 7-11 in the Windy City’s Rogers Park neighborhood. A check for his prize money of almost $425,000 was issued July 19. He never got to see the check. Within 48 hours, he was dead. The next day, Khan came home from work, ate dinner and went to bed. The Chicago Tribune reports he woke up screaming and later died at an Evanston hospital. The Cook County medical examiner ruled Khan died from natural causes, but police investigators took a closer look into his death after a relative raised concerns. Last month, tests revealed that Khan died from cyanide poisoning and his death was ruled a homicide. A motive has not been determined yet, officially. Police haven’t ruled out the possibility that Khan was killed because of his seven-figure lottery win, a law enforcement source told the Tribune . As part of the ongoing investigation, officials say they are considering exhuming his body to determine how much cyanide he ingested or inhaled. Khan is survived by wife Shabana Ansari and their teenage daughter, Jasmeen Khan. His wife said he was the “best husband on the entire planet.” She has spoken with police about the investigation.
The family of late Real World star Joey Kovar is adamant: drugs did NOT play a role in this 29-year old’s death. Kovar’s body was found by authorities on Friday morning at a friend’s house in Chicago, with blood was reportedly coming out of his mouth and nose and with the friend, Stacey Achterhof, saying Joey showed up at her residence high on cocaine .
‘The performances are excellent, especially from Michael Fassbender,’ writes the AP ‘s Christy Lemire. By Kevin P. Sullivan Michael Fassbender as David 8 in “Prometheus” Photo: Twentieth Century Fox After 30 years away from the genre, director Ridley Scott returns to science-fiction with “Prometheus,” a film with tenuous connections to the “Alien” universe. Reactions to “Prometheus” have been decidedly split, but parties on both sides can’t help but praise Scott’s stunning visuals and the ambition of the screenplay. Here is our roundup of critic reactions to “Prometheus.” The Story Since most reviews can’t seem to explain the story without giving away significant plot details, let this suffice: A group of scientists go into space. Bad things happen. The Look “Nearly all the bits and pieces in director Ridley Scott’s ‘Prometheus’ come from other movies — either one of Scott’s or someone else’s. More and more, though, I appreciate Scott’s fundamental squareness as a filmmaker. ‘Prometheus’ may be the ‘Gladiator’ director’s first picture shot digitally and in 3-D, but there’s an old-school assurance in the pacing and the design. ‘Elegant’ and ‘stately’ are two adjectives that won’t mean a thing to the potential teen audience for ‘Prometheus,’ but they’re the most apt.” — Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune The “Alien” Connection “Ridley Scott’s ‘Prometheus’ is a magnificent science-fiction film, all the more intriguing because it raises questions about the origin of human life and doesn’t have the answers. It’s in the classic tradition of golden age sci-fi, echoing Scott’s ‘Alien’ (1979), but creating a world of its own. I’m a pushover for material like this; it’s a seamless blend of story, special effects and pitch-perfect casting, filmed in sane, effective 3-D that doesn’t distract.” — Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times Michael Fassbender “The performances are excellent, especially from Michael Fassbender as a robot with the looks and impeccable manners of an adult but the innocence and troublemaking instincts of a child. His character, the genteel, fair-haired David, serves as an homage to Scott’s own work as he calls to mind Ian Holm’s android Ash from the original ‘Alien.’ His eerily calm, precise demeanor also is reminiscent of the HAL 9000 computer program in ‘2001: A Space Odyssey,’ and the pop-culture influences that shape David’s habits and speech are a clever celebration of the power of classic cinema in general. (‘Prometheus’ probably will not go on to be considered one of Scott’s classics in the same category as ‘Alien’ and ‘Blade Runner,’ but you’ve got to admire its ambition.)” — Christy Lemire, The Associated Press The Final Word “You might also call [elements of the film] science-fiction clich
‘We did not like how he treated her,’ Hudson says of alleged killer William Balfour. By Gil Kaufman Jennifer Hudson in court on Monday Photo: Splash News What was expected to be one of the most dramatic moments in the trial of the man accused of killing Oscar-winning singer Jennifer Hudson ‘s mother, brother and nephew occurred in the first hours when Hudson took the stand and tearfully recounted her family’s disapproval of William Balfour. According to the Chicago Tribune Hudson choked back tears on Monday (April 23) morning as she told jurors that no one in her family wanted Balfour to marry her sister. “We didn’t like the way he treated her, and I didn’t like the way he treated my nephew,” she said of Balfour, who has pleaded not guilty to three counts of first-degree murder in the October 24, 2008 slayings of Hudson’s mother, Darnell Donerson; brother Jason Hudson; and her 7-year-old nephew, Julian King. Dressed in all black with her hair pulled back into a ponytail, Hudson spoke at a whisper at times and was asked by the judge to speak louder when she became inaudible. Hudson didn’t offer much insight into the murders themselves, but the Tribune reported that her emotional testimony painted a “heartbreaking picture of a close-knit family torn apart by a violent crime.” The singer had to stop to compose herself at times on the stand as she spoke about her beloved mother and nephew. She said she spoke to or texted Donerson every day and when she received a call from her distraught sister about the murders she flew back immediately to Chicago to identify the bodies of her mother and brother at the morgue. “We were trying everything, anything we could do to get him back,” she said of the $100,000 reward offered for the safe return of King. “It was always me and my Tugga Bear,” she said, using the family’s pet name for King as she fought to retain her composure. The child was found two days after the murders in an abandoned vehicle that prosecutors claim Balfour stole from the scene of the crime. Hudson is expected to attend every day of the trial and was accompanied on the first day by her fianc
Super Bowl performance reinstates Madge as ‘the biggest pop vixen on the planet.’ By Jocelyn Vena Madonna performs at Super Bowl XLVI Photo: Jeff Kravitz/ FilmMagic Madonna did it all on Sunday night when she performed during the Super Bowl halftime show in Indianapolis. She was an Egyptian Queen “Vogue”-ing it up for her biggest devotees. She was a cheerleader, cheering on L-U-V alongside a middle-finger flinging M.I.A. and Nicki Minaj for “Give Me All Your Luvin’.” She got her “Music” on with LMFAO and she sang the gospel of “Like a Prayer” with Cee Lo Green. In a sea of costume changes (with looks by Givenchy and Adidas Originals Jeremy Scott), dancers, acrobats, A-list collaborators and a killer set list, Madonna seemed to leave very little to chance. Sure, there were a few slip-ups , but, in the end, Madonna ensured that all anyone would be talking about around the water cooler come Monday morning was her, whether or not you completely loved what she did during the show. “It’s Madonna Louise Ciccone’s world, we’re just living in it,” Billboard.com wrote about her 12-minute-plus performance. “The pop icon took to the world’s biggest stage to rock three-and-a-half older tracks and a playful new song during the Super Bowl halftime show.” While the Super Bowl audience is usually dominated by people who most likely aren’t Madge fans, the singer, according to one review, seemed indifferent to that fact. “Madonna was defiantly unconcerned with the more conservative red state wing of the football fanbase who’d never be caught dead singing along to one of her songs,” the Los Angeles Times noted about her performance. “And her halftime show was pure spectacle by the Cleopatra of the game.” The show, according to the Chicago Tribune , wasn’t just about her, but also about reminding fans that she’s about to drop her next album, MDNA, in March. “This was Madonna’s party, and besides breaking off bits of her greatest hits to remind people of a time when she was the biggest pop vixen on the planet, she had important career-advancing work to do,” the review noted. “Madonna, after all, never does anything unless she’s got something to sell, and with a new studio album due out in March and a tour to follow, she had plenty on her to-do list.” Leave your review of Madonna’s halftime performance in the comments below! Related Photos Super Bowl XLVI Performances: Madonna And Kelly Clarkson Katy Perry’s Super Bowl Appearance Related Artists Madonna
Despite all the hype and controversy, critics are pretty impressed by Del Rey’s atmospheric music. By Gil Kaufman Lana Del Rey in “Born To Die” Photo: Interscope The now-infamous “Saturday Night Live” performance fail. All the hype about her looks, her path to the spotlight and the obligatory album leak a week before her debut dropped. Lana Del Rey survived a lifetime’s worth of slings and arrows before her major-label debut, Born to Die, was even released. But now that it’s officially out, critics have had a chance to listen to the atmospheric tracks she’s put together, and for the most part, they’re pretty impressed. The Chicago Tribune gave it two out of four stars and said the finished product is not always as interesting as the run-up to its release. “[The album] positions itself as a knowing retro commentary. It borrows heavily from B movies starring various second- and third-level ‘Rebel Without a Cause’ bad boys on motorcycles, string-drenched ‘Last Kiss’ pop tunes in which young lovers die in each other’s arms, beehived teens-with-attitude declaring, ‘He hit me and it felt like a kiss,’ ” music critic Greg Kot wrote. While Kot said Del Rey wishes to be taken seriously as “the bad girl in a gown, the cabaret singer with a masochistic streak,” he said she’s not always up to the task, even as he praised her distinctive, draggy vocal delivery and the dramatic, eerie arrangements from producer Emilie Haynie. Over at BBC , the focus was squarely on the music, saying above and beyond the drama, Born to Die is about “something older and more mysterious than that; the extraordinary, resilient power of the pop song.” The reviewer lamented that nothing on the 12-track album quite reaches the exquisite bummerness of lead single “Video Games,” with several of the songs running “perilously close, while revealing there’s more to her than the love-stunned torch singer [of that song].” What makes the album so fascinating and sets Del Rey apart from the typical “I’m hot, you’re hot” pop tart is her “preoccupation with Hollywood archetypes of American femininity, and her ability to shape-shift between them.” MTV News’ own James Montgomery believed the hype, writing that the album was “positively brimming with atmospherics — soaring, sonorous strings, echoing electronic boom-bap, morose, maudlin guitar crescendos — all of which imbue it with a truly epic (if not unnecessarily dramatic) scope.” For him, the album is a “thrilling headphone experience” that sounds like the $1 million he suspected it cost to make. The U.K.’s Guardian also praised the “sumptuous” orchestration and Del Rey’s “fine” voice. But after being impressed by the “beguiling description of a mundane love” affair in “Video Games,” the reviewer said the album’s other lyrics are “incredibly heavy-handed in their attempts to convince you that Lana del Rey is the doomed but devoted partner of a kind of Athena poster bad boy, all white vest, cheekbones and dangling ciggie.” If anything, the Guardian critic didn’t buy the Del Rey tough-girl personality and said the best bet is to mostly ignore the lyrics and focus on “how magnificently most of the melodies have been constructed.” Leave your own review of Born to Die in the comments! Related Videos MTV News Extended Play: Lana Del Rey Related Artists Lana Del Rey
Critics give mostly positive reviews to the Liam Neeson’s wolf-punching thriller. By Kevin P. Sullivan Liam Neeson in “The Grey” Photo: Open Road Films For the third January in a row, Liam Neeson returns to kick ass more than any other 59-year-old we know. This time he isn’t taking down sex traffickers like in “Taken” or whatever he was fighting in “Unknown.” No, this time, it’s wolves. For a movie that was sold on the notion of wolf punching, “The Grey” has received primarily positive reviews for its deeper-than-you’d-think story and characters. Check out what the critics are saying about “The Grey.” The Story “We meet Neeson’s character, a heartbroken loner named John Ottway, on the verge of suicide and thinking back, obsessively, to the woman who got away. His demons temporarily quelled, Ottway boards a small plane with his fellow refinery workers and in one of the most nerve-racking flights ever put on film, the aircraft runs afoul of bad weather and crashes. (For a turbulence wimp like me, this scene was not easy.)” — Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune The Star “Having paid his quality biopic dues as Oskar Schindler, Michael Collins and Alfred Kinsey, Mr. Neeson has, at least for now, turned to the rougher and perhaps more lucrative work of action heroism. It takes nothing away from his earlier achievements to note that he’s really good at it. He conveys a ferocious and absolute seriousness even when the going gets silly, and he finds the soul in each new angry-everyman cipher he is asked to play.” — A.O. Scott, New York Times The Wolves ” ‘The Grey’ is an unrelenting demonstration that wolves have no opinion. When they attack, it’s not personal. They’ve spent untold millennia learning how to survive, naked and without weapons, in fearsome places like the Arctic Circle in the dead of winter. They aren’t precisely unarmed; they have their teeth and claws, but how far would that get us, even if we had rifles?” — Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times The Director “We’ve come, in vain, to see [Neeson] danse-macabre with wolves, and the film’s director, Joe Carnahan, provides the occasional horror-film sneak attack. He also manages to create one of the movies’ more nightmarish plane crashes and conclude with just the sort of ludicrous finale that paying customers who’ve seen the ads might assume they would be getting a whole film of.” — Wesley Morris, Boston Globe The Final Word “For all its macho standoffs and action set pieces and menacing off-screen howling, ‘The Grey’ is at heart a simple moral fable about how true heroism consists in helping other human beings to live as long and die as well as they can, which is, after all, the task all of us face each day, even when we’re not fending off wolves with broken glass duct-taped to our knuckles.” — Dana Stevens, Slate
