Anita Ekberg, star of La Dolce Vita, has died aged 83.

The Swedish-born actress was branded a "sex goddess" for her performance in Federico Fellini's 1960 movie.

The moment where she wades through Rome's Trevi Fountain in a strapless dress is considered one of cinema's most iconic scenes. She died in Rome on Sunday morning, her lawyer confirmed. She had been in hospital since Christmas following a series of illnesses.

Born in Malmo, Sweden, in 1931, Ekberg travelled to America after winning the Miss Sweden title at the age of 20.

She was immediately signed by a Hollywood studio and sent to work in Italy, where she met director Frederico Fellini.He cast her in La Dolce Vita as Sylvia Rank - "the most wonderful woman created since the beginning of time" - an actress pursued by news photographers.

Ironically, the film, which gave rise to the term paparazzo, resulted in Ekberg being hounded by the press herself.

She was constantly in the headlines for her romances with Hollywood's leading men, and her lovers were said to include Errol Flynn, Yul Brynner and Frank Sinatra.But she also made the front pages when, in 1960, she turned on photographer Felice Quinto with a bow and arrow.Quinto was amongst a pack of reporters who followed from a nightclub to her villa in Rome. During the fracas, she was photographed with her knee in one man's groin.

Alongside La Dolce Vita, Ekberg also appeared as a foil in Bob Hope's comedies Paris Holiday (1957) and Call Me Bwana (1963). Her other roles included Blood Alley 1955, Hollywood or Bust 1956 and the historical epic War and Peace (1956).

But the actress's popularity was not enduring.By the late 1970s, Ekberg had virtually disappeared from the screen, making only rare appearances in forgettable European films, although she appeared as herself in Fellini's 1987 cinematic memorybook Intervista. According to several reports, the actress was almost penniless at the time of her death.

Source : BBC News

muel Goldwyn Jr., who was born into one of the founding families of the Hollywood studio system but became a champion of independent film productions, died Friday at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. He was 88.

The cause was congestive heart failure, according to his son, Peter Goldwyn.

Though his father was one Hollywood's original moguls, Sam Jr. became one of the leaders of the independent film movement of the 1970s and '80s, producing low-budget hits such as “Mystic Pizza,” which proved to be Julia Roberts' big break, and “Cotton Comes to Harlem.”

His company was one of the largest indie operations, rivaling New Line and Miramax.

Goldwyn, named for his famous father, became known as an accomplished filmmaker in his own right. He formed the Samuel Goldwyn Co. after his father's death in 1974. In 1986, Goldwyn told the Los Angeles Times that his goal was to appeal to sophisticated movie lovers.

"I was brought up in a tradition of patience," Goldwyn said. "My father never made films that were instantaneous hits. 'Wuthering Heights' was not a success the first time around. Neither was 'Best Years of Our Lives.' They had to be nursed.... Basically, he was always waiting."

Source : The LA Times

Annabelle is available from February 11 on Blu-ray ™ , DVD, Video on Demand and Digital Download

John Form has found the perfect gift for his expectant wife, Mia - a beautiful, rare vintage doll in a pure white wedding dress. But Mia's delight with Annabelle doesn't last long. On one horrific night, their home is invaded by members of a satanic cult, who violently attack the couple. Spilled blood and terror are not all they leave behind. The cultists have conjured an entity so malevolent that nothing they did will compare to the sinister conduit to the damned that is now... Annabelle.. 

SYNOPSIS

In this thriller based on the terrifying doll from The Conjuring , John has found the perfect gift for his wife Mia: a rare vintage doll. But Mia's fun Annabelle is short...

BONUS MATERIALS

The Curse of Annabelle (BD, DVD)
Bloody Tears of Possession (BD)
Dolls of the Demon ( BD)
A Demonic Process ( BD)
Deleted Scenes (BD)

15 years of German Gothic history reach their tentative peak! 15 years of melancholy, of musical grief, of despair and of solitude culminate in a new studio album that is bearing the agony, the power and the wrath of the last 15 years and is yet gazing into the future. And above all that, above the dark melodies and the elegiac vocals, a single name looms. A name that could not be chosen better for this album, for this music, for this career: “Melancholia.” The end of all things is near. We knew that. We didn't know, however, how near it was. Martin Schindler did. After 15 years behind the steering wheel of Gothic galley MANTUS he should have said everything, should have done everything to free his demons and gain salvation. But apparently, he didn't, which is why he struggles on.

“Melancholia” tells of battles and of failures in a hostile world, tells how hard it is not to lose hope when faced with war, sorrow, terror and injustice. How hard it is not to look away. And thus, “Melancholia” begins with the end – with “Die Welt zerbricht”, a monument for depression, a song carried by a waltzing heaviness repeating one thing over and over again: “Und wir haben keine Tränen mehr.” Why is he still carrying on? Why is he still the architect of his sorrow, the composer of his very own requiem? Because he has no other choice. He is haunted, hoping against all odds that even after 15 years he will find answers in his dark music, in his suffering and cathartic lyrics. After the last, more or less worldly albums, “Melancholia” gazes at the inside, at the fragile soul of Martin Schindler, at his thoughts, his doubts, these always returning doubts and at the spectres of his past. Never has he written a more intimate and personal song than “Auf Papier” whose oceanic strings and pressing Metal guitars allow a totally unobscured view of his inner life.

Perhaps, though, this is the way. Perhaps this forced engagement with all things painful is his only, his last opportunity to finally understand what life is all about. 15 years with MANTUS, 15 years against the world have turned him into an artist that has been playing by his own rules for long and that is gracing the Gothic scene with an album breathing progress and being a scene masterpiece through and through. There is “Kopie” with its sorrowfully played acoustic guitars and the “Lied vom traurigen Sonntag,” the long overdue MANTUS version of the Hungarian suicide song. And because 15 years existence almost force you to glance backwards, the bonus CD contains new versions of classics like “Wir warten auf den Tod” which has been interpreted by Chiara in a way that can only be described as angelic. A lot has happened, a lot of scars will remain. But next to the wounds, the deep craters of the soul, one certainty will endure: It is music that saves us from an even worse fate. It's a work like “Melancholia” in whose tenor of desperation also lies the power that keeps us from giving up. Dark, deep and meaningful - “Melancholia” is the musical definition of gloom. 

“A Passage to Rhodesia” is ROME's tenth album, but it's safe to say it's one of the most important releases in its long-standing career.

The album unites instant dark folk classics such as “A Farewell to Europe” and “One Fire” with ambient collages in the best industrial and experimental traditions. Mastermind Jerome Reuter has accomplished a great swirling devil of a record, an epic and tragic masterpiece of considerable scale, rich in theme and philosophic inquiry. “A Passage to Rhodesia” is set against the backdrop of the Bush War (Bush as in jungle, not the American presidents) in the country named after imperialist Cecil Rhodes.

The protagonists - a generation of Whites in Black Africa fighting and dying for a lost cause - are caught in a web of blinkered complacency and radical prejudice. Jerome Reuter takes an open-hearted look at the tragedies, insanities and absurdities of war-torn Rhodesia in the dog days of white supremacy in southern Africa. “A Passage To Rhodesia” is a remarkable, yet deeply disturbing odyssey driven by a strange love for the country and its people, a witness-bearing of the rarest courage.