Brittany Murphy Dead At 32

LOS ANGELES, Calif. — Brittany Murphy died on Sunday morning, a spokesperson for the Los Angeles County Coroner’s Office has confirmed to Access Hollywood. She was 32.

According to the Coroner’s Office, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Hollywood reported to them that an individual named Brittany Murphy died in the hospital on Sunday.

A Cedars-Sinai spokesperson also confirmed to Access that the star was pronounced dead at their facility at 10:04 AM.

A Los Angeles Fire Department spokesman told Access that they responded to a 911 call made from the 1800 block of N. Rising Glen Road — the same street where the actress lives — at 8 AM on Sunday.

A rep for the actress also confirmed the news, telling Access Hollywood, “In this time of sadness, the family thanks you for your love and support. It is their wish that you respect their privacy.”

The LAPD confirmed to Access later on Sunday that they have opened an investigation into the star’s death.

Just weeks ago, a smiling Brittany spoke with Access at the Tt Collection Pop-Up Party in LA on December 3, where she discussed her hopes for the coming year.

“As far as having a New Year’s resolution, I’d love to have a child next year,” she said at the time. “But that’s kind of a large one!”

The actress also spoke of her love for her family, whom she said she was very close to.

“I’ve been very blessed to have a really great loving husband,” she said. “I spend more time with my family than anyone else in the world”

Brittany rose to fame after a memorable role in 1995’s “Clueless.” She went on to star in such films as “8 Mile,” “Just Married,” “Girl, Interrupted,” “Sin City” and “Riding In Cars With Boys,” among others.

She also made a splash in the music world with the track “Faster Kill Pussycat,” with Paul Oakenfold in 2006 – the track topped the Billboard Hot Dance Club Play Chart that year. She also sang a pair of songs for the animated film “Happy Feet,” in which she was also a voice actress.

Brittany was married to screenwriter Simon Monjack, whom she wed in May 2007.

Avatar is the best movie of the Year

Back in 1996, James Cameron announced that he would be creating a film called Avatar, a science-fiction epic that would feature photo-realistic, computer-generated characters.

Watch Making of Avatar Part (part 1/3)

Watch Making of Avatar Part (part 2/3)

Watch Making of Avatar Part (part 3/3)

He had a treatment for the film, which already defined many things, including the Na’vi a primitive alien race standing ten feet tall with shining blue skin, living in harmony with their jungle-covered planet Pandora.

Soon after, though, Avatar had to be shelved as the technology of the time could not satisfy the creative desires of the director.

Fast-forward to October 2009: Dan Lemmon, FX supervisor and Andy Jones, animation director at Weta Digital have about two weeks left of visual effects production for Avatar. The near-900 strong crew spanned across six locations are practically working around the clock to achieve what was deemed impossible a decade earlier.

Weta Digital, the New Zealand studio responsible for the groundbreaking visual effects in The Lord of the Rings trilogy and King Kong, is taking VFX to a new level of creative and technological excellence.
For Avatar, the studio has created over 1,800 stereoscopic, photo-realistic visual effects shots, many of them of the Na’vi as ‘hero’ characters. In addition to digital characters and environments are the machines, vehicles, equipment and everything else that help blur the line between imagination and reality.
“We’re not just talking about the environment, but the creatures, the machines and the vehicles that people use to get around. The whole world is unique and because of the way James Cameron approaches things, everything seems functional and believable. Compared to other sci-fi fantasy genre films there’s a certain level of realism just in the design that makes it very believable,” says VFX

Michael Jackson’s Lawyer Becomes Muslim

An American millionaire, Mark Shaffer declared his Islam in Saudi Arabia on Saturday, 17th October 2009. Mark was at that time on a holiday in Saudi Arabia to visit some famous cities like Riyadh, Abha and Jeddah for 10 days.Mark is a well-known millionaire and also a practiced lawyer in Los Angeles, specializing in cases of civil laws. The last big case he handled was the case of the famous American pop singer, Michael Jackson, a week before he passed away.

A tourist guide who accompanied Mark for 10 days in Saudi Arabia, Dhawi Ben Nashir told: Since he set foot for the first time in Saudi Arabia, Mark already started to ask question about Islam and Solat. As soon as he arrived in Saudi, Mark stayed in Riyadh for two days. While in Riyadh, Mark was very interested in Islam. After moving to Najran, we went to Abha and Al-Ula. There, his fascination on Islam grew more obvious, especially the time when we ventured out into the desert.

Mark was amazed to see three Saudi youths who were in our group in Al-Ula, performing solat in the expanse of the very wide desert. A very fantastic panorama indeed.

After two days in Al-Ula, we went to Al-Juf. As soon as we arrived in Al-Juf, Mark asked if I could get him some books on Islam. I then obtained some books on Islam for him. Mark read all those books. The next morning, he asked me to teach him how to perform solat. I then taught him how to pray and take wudhu (ablution). Then, he joined me and performed solat beside me.

After solat, Mark told me that he felt peace in his soul. On Thursday afternoon, we left Al-Ula heading for Jeddah. He looked very serious throughout the journey reading those books about Islam. On Friday morning, we visited the old town of Jeddah. Before the time for the Friday prayer approached, we went back to the hotel and I excused myself to go for the Friday prayer. Then, Mark told me: I would like to join you for the Friday prayer so that I can witness myself how the Friday prayer is like. So I answered: welcome…

We then went to a masjid which was not far from the hotel where we stayed in Jeddah. Since we were quite late, I and many other jamaah had to pray outside, as the number of jamaah was overflowing. I could see Mark observing the jamaah, especially after the Friday prayer was completed, when everybody was shaking hands and embracing each other with radiant and happy faces. Mark was very impressed with what he saw.

When we return to the hotel, Mark suddenly told me that he wanted to become a Muslim. So I said to him: Please have a shower first. After Mark took the shower, I guided him in saying the kalimah of shahadah (declaration of faith) and then he prayed two rakaah. Later on, Mark expressed his desire to visit the Masjidil Haram in Makkah and perform solat there before leaving Saudi Arabia.

In order to fulfill his wish, we went to the Da’wah and Irshad office in the area of Al-Hamro’, Jeddah, to obtain a formal proof of his conversion to Islam, so that he would be allowed to enter the city of Makkah and Masjidil Haram. Then, Mark was given a temporary certificate of his conversion to Islam. As a number of group members who participated in Mark’s visit to Saudi Arabia had to go back to America on Saturday afternoon, Al-Hamdulillah, Ustadz Muhammad Turkistani was willing to send Mark to the Holy Land of Makkah that same morning.

Regarding Mark’s visit to Masjidil Haram, Ustadz Muhammad Turkistani narrated: After Mark obtained his temporary certificate, we straight away departed heading for the noble Masjidil Haram. When he witnessed the Masjidil Haram, he face looked radiant and it emanated an extraordinary happiness. When we entered the Masjidil Haram and witnessed the Ka’bah for ourselves, his happiness increased. By Allah, I could not express that scene with words. After performing the tawaf around the noble Ka’bah, we performed the sunnah solat and went out of Masjidil Haram. I could see Mark very reluctantly wanting to leave Masjidil Haram.

After Mark declared his Islamic faith, he had the chance to express his happiness in Al-Riyadh Newspaper saying: I could not express my feeling at this time but I am being reborn and my life has just started… then he added: I am very happy. This happiness that I am feeling could not be expressed in words especially when I visited the Masjidil Haram and noble Ka’bah.

Regarding his next step after his conversion to Islam, Mark explained: I will learn more about Islam, I will delve deeper into this religion of Allah (Islam) and come back to Saudi Arabia to perform the Hajj.

As to what impelled him into converting to Islam, Mark explained: I have already had information about Islam, but it was very limited. When I visited Saudi Arabia and personally witnessed the Muslims there, and saw how they performed the solat, I felt a very strong drive to know more about Islam. When I read true informations about Islam, I became confident that Islam is a religion of haq (truth).

Sunday morning, 18th October 2009, Mark left the Airport of King Abdul Aziz Jeddah heading for America. When filling in the immigration form before leaving Jeddah, Mark wrote ISLAM as his religion.

Farewell Mark… May Allah bless you and make you an obedient Muslim and a Da’i who would invite the American society to benefit from the happiness of being Muslims, just as how you have felt because only Islam could save mankind in this world, as well as in the akhirah later… Ameen.

James Cameron’s New 3-D Epic Could Change Film Forever

n 1977, a 22-year-old truck driver named James Cameron went to see Star Wars with a pal. His friend enjoyed the movie; Cameron walked out of the theater ready to punch something. He was a college dropout and spent his days delivering school lunches in Southern California’s Orange County. But in his free time, he painted tiny models and wrote science fiction — stories set in galaxies far, far away. Now he was facing a deflating reality: He had been daydreaming about the kind of world that Lucas had just brought to life. Star Wars was the film he should have made.

It got him so angry he bought himself some cheap movie equipment and started trying to figure out how Lucas had done it. He infuriated his wife by setting up blindingly bright lights in the living room and rolling a camera along a track to practice dolly shots. He spent days scouring the USC library, reading everything he could about special effects. He became, in his own words, “completely obsessed.”

He quickly realized that he was going to need some money, so he persuaded a group of local dentists to invest $20,000 in what he billed as his version of Star Wars. He and a friend wrote a script called Xenogenesis and used the money to shoot a 12-minute segment that featured a stop-motion fight scene between an alien robot and a woman operating a massive exoskeleton. (The combatants were models that Cameron had meticulously assembled.)

The plan was to use the clip to get a studio to back a full-length feature film. But after peddling it around Hollywood for months, Cameron came up empty and temporarily shelved his ambition to trump Lucas.

The effort did yield something worthwhile: a job with B-movie king Roger Corman. Hired to build miniature spaceships for the film Battle Beyond the Stars, Cameron worked his way up to become one of Corman’s visual effects specialists. In 1981, he made it to the director’s chair, overseeing a schlocky horror picture, Piranha II: The Spawning.

One night, after a Piranha editing session, Cameron went to sleep with a fever and dreamed that he saw a robot clawing its way toward a cowering woman. The image stuck. Within a year, Cameron used it as the basis for a script about a cyborg assassin sent back in time to kill the mother of a future rebel leader.

This time, he wouldn’t need any dentists. The story was so compelling, he was able to persuade a small film financing company to let him direct the picture. When it was released in 1984, The Terminator established Arnold Schwarzenegger as a huge star, and James Cameron, onetime truck driver, suddenly became a top-tier director.

Over the next 10 years, Cameron helmed a series of daring films, including Aliens, The Abyss, Terminator 2: Judgment Day, and True Lies. Generating $1.1 billion in worldwide box office revenue, they gave Cameron the kind of clout he needed to revisit his dream of making an interstellar epic. So in 1995, he wrote an 82-page treatment about a paralyzed soldier’s virtual quest on a faraway planet after Earth becomes a bleak wasteland. The alien world, called Pandora, is populated by the Na’vi, fierce 10-foot-tall blue humanoids with catlike faces and reptilian tails. Pandora’s atmosphere is so toxic to humans that scientists grow genetically engineered versions of the Na’vi, so-called avatars that can be linked to a human’s consciousness, allowing complete remote control of the creature’s body. Cameron thought that this project — titled Avatar — could be his next blockbuster. That is, the one after he finished a little adventure-romance about a ship that hits an iceberg.

Titanic, of course, went on to become the highest-grossing movie of all time. It won 11 Oscars, including best picture and best director. Cameron could now make any film he wanted. So what did he do?

He disappeared.

Cameron would not release another Hollywood film for 12 years. He made a few underwater documentaries and did some producing, but he was largely out of the public eye. For most of that time, he rarely mentioned Avatar and said little about his directing plans.

But now, finally, he’s back. On December 18, Avatar arrives in theaters. This time, Cameron, who turned 55 this year, didn’t need to build half an ocean liner on the Mexican coast as he did with Titanic, so why did it take one of the most powerful men in Hollywood so long to come out with a single film? In part, the answer is that it’s not easy to out-Lucas George Lucas. Cameron needed to invent a suite of moviemaking technologies, push theaters nationwide to retool, and imagine every detail of an alien world. But there’s more to it than that. To really understand why Avatar took so long to reach the screen, we need to look back at the making of Titanic.

Can you kill a goat by staring into its eyes?

McGregor’s new film is about US military’s psychic spying

At first glance, the goat shed at Fort Bragg in North Carolina could be anywhere in the world. Thirty goats are happily munching away on their hay and staring at the blank concrete walls of their stable.

Every few minutes, one stops chewing, looks around, and then nonchalantly continues eating as if nothing has happened.

But that is where the normality ends. For in an equally nondescript room next door, a young sergeant in combat fatigues is staring at the goats through a window fitted with one-way glass.

Two soldiers and a general are anxiously watching him, and every so often, the general shakes his head, a slightly worried look crossing his face.

And then the seemingly impossible happens. The sergeant takes another swig of coffee and focuses his mind on Goat Number 17 — which promptly lets out a silent bleat, keels over and dies.

“My God,” says the general. “It works!” The sergeant nods silently — and not a little proudly. For he has just managed to kill the goat using nothing more than the power of his mind.

Finally, after years of research, the US Army’s Project Jedi seems to be on the verge of success.

This was a top-secret military project to create a breed of “super-soldier” who, if all went to plan, would revolutionise warfare.

They would be fantastically strong and possess superior intelligence, cunning and intuition. They would use psychic powers to spy on the enemy, disable nuclear bombs with telekinesis, and effortlessly kill with the power of thought alone.

Not only that, they would also have the ability to become invisible at will and to walk through walls.

You might think Project Jedi was the product of Hollywood scriptwriters eager to tempt audiences with a delightfully crazy plot.

Indeed, the project does lie at the heart of the soon-to be released Hollywood blockbuster The Men Who Stare At Goats, starring George Clooney and Ewan McGregor.

What is less well-known, however, is that the US military did try to create such a breed of “supersoldier”. And that killing goats with psychic powers was just the tip of the iceberg.

Indeed, the fruits of Project Jedi, and several other clandestine paranormal projects, have been actively used in battle — and are almost certainly being employed in the war on terror and the hunt for Osama Bin Laden.

“They were seen as the next military frontier. We needed to know whether it was possible to use paranormal forces for military ends. We also needed to know how to protect ourselves should they be used against us,” Sergeant Glenn Wheaton, a Special Forces soldier seconded to Project Jedi.

Source: Gulf News

Michael Jackson Died [June 25th 2009]

LOS ANGELES — Michael Jackson, the “King of Pop” who once moonwalked above the music world, died Thursday as he prepared for a comeback bid to vanquish nightmare years of sexual scandal and financial calamity. He was 50.

Jackson died at UCLA Medical Center after being stricken at his rented home in Holmby Hills. Paramedics tried to resuscitate him at his home for nearly three-quarters of an hour, then rushed him to the hospital, where doctors continued to work on him.

“It is believed he suffered cardiac arrest in his home. However, the cause of his death is unknown until results of the autopsy are known,” his brother Jermaine said. Police said they were investigating, standard procedure in high-profile cases.

Jackson’s death brought a tragic end to a long, bizarre, sometimes farcical decline from his peak in the 1980s, when he was popular music’s premier all-around performer, a uniter of black and white music who shattered the race barrier on MTV, dominated the charts and dazzled even more on stage.

His 1982 album “Thriller” _ which included the blockbuster hits “Beat It,” “Billie Jean” and “Thriller” _ is the best-selling album of all time, with an estimated 50 million copies sold worldwide.

At the time of his death, Jackson was rehearsing hard for what was to be his greatest comeback: He was scheduled for an unprecedented 50 shows at a London arena, with the first set for July 13.

As word of his death spread, MTV switched its programming to play videos from Jackson’s heyday. Radio stations began playing marathons of his hits. Hundreds of people gathered outside the hospital. In New York’s Times Square, a low groan went up in the crowd when a screen flashed that Jackson had died, and people began relaying the news to friends by cell phone.

“No joke. King of Pop is no more. Wow,” Michael Harris, 36, of New York City, read from a text message a friend had sent him. “It’s like when Kennedy was assassinated. I will always remember being in Times Square when Michael Jackson died.”

The public first knew him as a boy in the late 1960s, when he was the precocious, spinning lead singer of the Jackson 5, the singing group he formed with his four older brothers out of Gary, Ind. Among their No. 1 hits were “I Want You Back,” “ABC” and “I’ll Be There.”

He was perhaps the most exciting performer of his generation, known for his backward-gliding moonwalk, his feverish, crotch-grabbing dance moves and his high-pitched singing, punctuated with squeals and titters. His single sequined glove, tight, military-style jacket and aviator sunglasses were trademarks, as was his ever-changing, surgically altered appearance.

“For Michael to be taken away from us so suddenly at such a young age, I just don’t have the words,” said Quincy Jones, who produced “Thriller.” “He was the consummate entertainer and his contributions and legacy will be felt upon the world forever. I’ve lost my little brother today, and part of my soul has gone with him.”

Jackson ranked alongside Elvis Presley and the Beatles as the biggest pop sensations of all time. He united two of music’s biggest names when he was briefly married to Presley’s daughter, Lisa Marie, and Jackson’s death immediately evoked comparisons to that of Presley himself, who died at age 42 in 1977.

As years went by, Jackson became an increasingly freakish figure _ a middle-aged man-child weirdly out of touch with grown-up life. His skin became lighter, his nose narrower, and he spoke in a breathy, girlish voice. He often wore a germ mask while traveling, kept a pet chimpanzee named Bubbles as one of his closest companions, and surrounded himself with children at his Neverland ranch, a storybook playland filled with toys, rides and animals. The tabloids dubbed him “Wacko Jacko.”

“It seemed to me that his internal essence was at war with the norms of the world. It’s as if he was trying to defy gravity,” said Michael Levine, a Hollywood publicist who represented Jackson in the early 1990s. He called Jackson a “disciple of P.T. Barnum” and said the star appeared fragile at the time but was “much more cunning and shrewd about the industry than anyone knew.”

Jackson caused a furor in 2002 when he playfully dangled his infant son, Prince Michael II, over a hotel balcony in Berlin while a throng of fans watched from below.

In 2005, he was cleared of charges he molested a 13-year-old cancer survivor at Neverland in 2003. He had been accused of plying the boy with alcohol and groping him, and of engaging in strange and inappropriate behavior with other children.

The case followed years of rumors about Jackson and young boys. In a TV documentary, he acknowledged sharing his bed with children, a practice he described as sweet and not at all sexual.

Despite the acquittal, the lurid allegations that came out in court took a fearsome toll on his career and image, and he fell into serious financial trouble.

Michael Joseph Jackson was born Aug. 29, 1958, in Gary. He was 4 years old when he began singing with his brothers _ Marlon, Jermaine, Jackie and Tito _ in the Jackson 5. After his early success with bubblegum soul, he struck out on his own, generating innovative, explosive, unstoppable music.

The album “Thriller” alone mixed the dark, serpentine bass and drums and synthesizer approach of “Billie Jean,” the grinding Eddie Van Halen solo on “Beat It,” and the hiccups and falsettos on “Wanna Be Startin’ Somethin’.”

The peak may have come in 1983, when Motown celebrated its 25th anniversary with an all-star televised concert and Jackson moonwalked off with the show, joining his brothers for a medley of old hits and then leaving them behind with a pointing, crouching, high-kicking, splay-footed, crotch-grabbing run through “Billie Jean.”

The audience stood and roared. Jackson raised his fist.

By then he had cemented his place in pop culture. He got the plum Scarecrow role in the 1978 movie musical “The Wiz,” a pop-R&B version of “The Wizard of Oz,” that starred Diana Ross as Dorothy.

During production of a 1984 Pepsi commercial, Jackson’s scalp sustains burns when an explosion sets his hair on fire.

He had strong follow-up albums with 1987’s “Bad” and 1991’s “Dangerous,” but his career began to collapse in 1993 after he was accused of molesting a boy who often stayed at his home. The singer denied any wrongdoing, reached a settlement with the boy’s family, reported to be $20 million, and criminal charges were never filed.

Jackson’s expressed anger over the allegations on the 1995 album “HIStory,” which sold more than 2.4 million copies, but by then, the popularity of Jackson’s music was clearly waning, even as public fascination with his increasingly erratic behavior was growing.

Jackson married Lisa Marie Presley in 1994, and they divorced in 1996. Later that year, Jackson married Deborah Rowe, a former nurse for his dermatologist. They had two children together: Michael Joseph Jackson Jr., known as Prince Michael, and Paris Michael Katherine Jackson. Rowe filed for divorce in 1999.

Cardiac arrest is an abnormal heart rhythm that stops the heart from pumping blood to the body. It can occur after a heart attack or be caused by other heart problems.

Billboard magazine editorial director Bill Werde said Jackson’s star power was unmatched. “The world just lost the biggest pop star in history, no matter how you cut it,” Werde said. “He’s literally the king of pop.”

Jackson’s 13 No. 1 one hits on the Billboard charts put him behind only Presley, the Beatles and Mariah Carey, Werde said.

“He was on the eve of potentially redeeming his career a little bit,” he said. “People might have started to think of him again in a different light.”

official website of Michael Jackson: http://www.michaeljackson.com/

___

Associated Press Writers Derrik J. Lang, Solvej Schou and Thomas Watkins in Los Angeles and Virginia Byrne, Hillel Italie, Nekesa Mumbi Moody and Jocelyn Noveck in New York contributed to this report.

Source: huffingtonpost.com

Outlandish – Sound Of a Rebel – ALBUM OUT NOW!!

Rock All Day by Outlandish [watch video with lyrics now]

The Long Awaited, Heavily Anticipated and Highly Recommended Outlandish album is out now!!!

Sound of a Rebel – Album Preview

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mC88ZdshIvw

Get your hard copy from:

http://cdon.eu/music/outlandish/sound_of_a_rebel-4195567

or from

http://tinyurl.com/p4m76x

it doesn’t matter from where you buy it, just buy it !!

Elmoro4Life

After break-up, Lindsay Lohan harming herself?

Actress Lindsay Lohan has lost an astonishing amount of weight in just a short while after her break-up with girlfriend

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