Inocente Izucar’s dream of becoming an artist is alive and flourishing today, and the documentary in her name, produced by Fine Films, recently won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Short Film.
But under the vibrant and whimsically painted face is the painful story of a girl and her journey through a deeply unsettled childhood. Inocente Izucar’s story brings to light the dynamics of poverty and the impact of circumstances faced by many of the 1.8 million undocumented immigrant children.
Inocente Izucar at the Oscars (second from Left)
Izucar was brought to the US as a young child by her parents who entered the country without legal documents. Her father was deported shortly after their arrival, for domestic abuse. With no legal status, Izucar’s mother couldn’t work, and with no income the family soon found themselves homeless and destitute. In the 9 years that followed, Izucar and her three younger siblings moved from shelter to shelter more than 30 times.
Despite the unstable conditions she relentlessly held on to a dream: To be an artist. Art allowed her a brief escape from the severe realities of being a homeless child. A Distinctive Style recently had the honor of interviewing Inocente to learn about her journey from homeless to Hollywood.
Seed is not just the source of life. It is the very foundation of our being. ~Vandana Shiva
Seed is the self urge of life to express itself, in her diverse expression, her abundance, her permanent renewal and rejuvenation. Altering the genetics of a seeds to create GMOs means disrupting the most natural expression of life itself.
A new documentary film that will investigate the dramatic story of seeds, the basis of life on earth. For 12,000 years man has been nurturing and cultivating seeds to form the backbone of civilization. Now, 94% of our seed varieties have been lost and many more are nearing extinction.
Vandana Shiva
SEED unveils a David and Goliath battle for the future of our seeds by examining how five chemical corporations have taken control of seeds through patents, copyrights and genetic modification. These companies are placing ownership on the seeds, literally stealing the genetic material from our ancestors who nurtured these seeds for thousands of years. As Vandana Shiva says “the threat to seed freedom impacts the very fabric of human life and life on the planet.”
SEED will reveal the awe, wonder and hidden beauty of seeds. It will ignite the imagination of audiences, inspiring them to be part of a new movement to help sustain seed diversity. We will unearth the resilience and power that all seeds have to sustain, enliven and enrich our humanity.
Corporations like Monsanto have created a seed emergency, a seed emergency through patents on seeds, seed monopolies, biopiracy genetic engineering and creation of non renewable sterile seeds. Seed monopolies have pushed 250,000 farmers to commit suicide in India. After contaminating farmer’s seeds and crops, Monsanto sues farmers “for stealing their gene”, putting the polluter pays principle on its head, and making it the polluter gets paid principle.
The multidimensional emergency created by patents on seeds and GMOs needs a global collective response. Join the Global campaign on Seed Freedom to stop the corporate hijack of seed and with it, the hijack of our freedom and our future.
A cardboard bicycle that’s strong, waterproof and costs less than £10 to manufacture.
Designed by Israeli engineer and systems developer Izhar Gafni
Izhar Gafni started developing the Cardboard Bicycle three years ago. “Since there was no know-how with regards to the cardboard material, the first two years were devoted to learning the properties and behaviour of the material,” explains Gafni.
“The idea is like Japanese origami,” he says in the movie. “You fold it once and then it doesn’t become twice the strength, it’s almost three times the strength. So I took it from there and did the same thing with cardboard.”
After the shape has been cut out, the cardboard is treated with a waterproof and fireproof coating specially created by Gafni, before lacquer paint is applied over the top.
The “urban bike” for adults costs around £6 per unit and weighs 9kg, while the kids’ bike costs £3 per unit and weighs 3.5kg.
Both are made almost entirely from recycled materials and cyclists will also have the option to add an electric motor, according to the designer.
Gafni’s business partner, Israeli investment group ERB, is currently fundraising and developing the bicycle for production.
Elephant News is an online environmental news network that specializes in educational outreach through media. Based in Thailand they have experience in filming throughout Asia. Their crew specializes in filming in remote areas and speak fluent English, Thai and Laos.
Navann lives with his mom and nanny at the Elephant Nature Park in northern Thailand.
Video and image courtesy of YouTube, elephantnews.
ELEPHANT FACTS
Height: 5-14 ft at shoulders (males); females of all subspecies are smaller than males.
Length: Up to 30 ft trunk to tail.
Weight: 6,000-15,000 lbs (males).
Lifespan Up to 70 years.
Seven-time GRAMMY winning trio Lady Antebellum announced the release of their fourth Capitol Nashville studio album GOLDEN, available in stores on May 7.
“This album feels to me like one of those that from start to finish could be a good road-trip record and that’s what we wanted,” said Lady A’s Charles Kelley. “It’s one of the reasons why the term ‘golden’ was kind of cool. I think about road trips and driving down the road with those little streaks of sunshine popping through the trees, especially at sunset. ‘Golden’…it just gives you this warm, easy feeling.”
Golden to release May 2013
“Writing and recording this record really took us back to when we first met each other,” added Hillary Scott. “When I first met the boys, we spent a lot of time around the piano at the house they lived in at the time. We didn’t really know each other at all, but there was still some magic and then the harmonies – that’s how it all started – that blend of our voices and that blend of our songwriting craft. So, it’s exciting that even on our fourth record, we can still find that.”
“The word ‘golden’ to me conjures up a lot of pictures,” continued Dave Haywood. “In the title track, it depicts driving down the road at sunset but, to me, it also depicts a special time in our career…a ‘golden,’ special time for us. We definitely want to value this time in our careers because it’s such a treasure that we can still sit in a room and write songs together. I personally feel so humbled to still be making records that people are excited to hear.”
The new album’s lead single “Downtown” already stormed the Country radio charts, becoming the trio’s career highest charting debut. People noted “this preview of Lady Antebellum’s next album is slinky, sexy fun…crazy-catchy and downright soulful.”
Lady Antebellum’s previous three studio albums have paved the way for GOLDEN, which follows over 11 million album sales, six career No. one hits and seven GRAMMY awards. Last year alone, more than one million fans in over 11 countries welcomed the ACM and CMA award-winning trio on their headlining tour.
Non-profit One Mind for Research (1mind4research.org) is dedicated to improving research, diagnostics, treatments, and cures for brain disease, mental illness, and brain injury with the goal of reducing the social and economic burdens on our society significantly within ten years. We need your help to launch our initial major research project, the Post-Traumatic Stress-Traumatic Brain Injury Knowledge Integration Network, and our first year of media advocacy to reduce the stigma and discrimination associated with mental illness and brain injury.
One Mind for Research is an independent, non-profit organization that is committed to curing diseases of the brain and eliminating the stigma and discrimination they cause. Through collaboration with partners in science, advocacy and corporations, One Mind for Research is working to advance a 10-year plan to cure the diseases of the brain by creating change in the way scientists, health care professionals, NGO and government partners think about and conduct scientific and translational research, and by advancing mental health related public policy.
About Brain Disease
Brain diseases are the number 1 cause of adult disability globally, afflicting, in some form, 1 out of every 3 people. For example, among the psychiatric diseases (i.e. mental illnesses), major depressive disorder leads in prevalence, disabling about 5% of the population to some degree in any given year. Among veterans returning stateside from service in Iraq, 300,000 are estimated to have TBI and/or PTS, adding to the total estimate of 1.5 million Americans living with these diseases. Beyond the emotional pain endured by these individuals and their families, the total lifetime treatment cost for these individuals calculates to about $3.3 trillion. This and the cost of dementia care for our nations’ growing elder population ($400 billion annually now, to triple by 2050) will soon prove beyond the ability of the U.S. economy to sustain—unless neuroscience starts an emergency pace, right now. At a time of decreasing government research funding and pharmaceutical industry’s widespread withdrawal from psychiatric drug R&D, this cause needs public support now to develop the preventions and cures that will protect the brain health of people worldwide.
What an unbelievably unique take on housing and architecture! Dan Philips creates houses that are made from 70-80% recycled materials. The creativity he puts to use is as impressive as the tons of materials he saves from the landfill. You will see decorative details made from eggshells and bottle caps. You will see rooftops made of license plates! You will see water faucets for the bathtub made of a Budweiser beer tap!
His philosophy is that our collective mindset of perfection is what creates all the waste. From the builders to the homebuyers to the marketers- everyone demands adherence to sterile, conventional norms. If a 2x 4 isn’t perfect, it goes in the dump. Dan Philips instead incorporates these blemishes and organic processes.
See all the materials he saves that were headed for the landfill- even vintage stoves! Hear his astute, original and truly amusing take on why we have come to tolerate this level of waste.
In 1998, he and his wife, Marsha, started The Phoenix Commotion, in Huntsville, Texas — a construction company that builds affordable houses from reclaimed and recycled materials. Their mission is to divert landfill waste while creating sustainable housing for single mothers, artists, and families with low incomes. The houses are energy-efficient, cheap and satisfying to build — and wildly, effervescently creative.
In the design process, we have to consider how design linked our social life and people’s perspectives.
There is consideration of his work:
Architecture related to human being and natural life. What human need and consideration of nature in our life. So, Dan Phillips design his architecture be a naturalism and not waste of materials. He was inspired organic texture and humanism.
Industrials revolution started, consumers wasting mass production and materials and also materials price was becoming expensive.
Power of mass media and consumption in our society
A Distinctive Style’s Winter issue features human interest, social awareness, sustainable and organic fashion and this years Academy Award nominees.
A Distinctive Style magazine kicked off the New Year with Brad Pitt. The amiable Hollywood heartthrob, actor, and philanthropist, graces the Winter 2013 cover and is featured in an exclusive interview.
“There is so much passion in this issue, from celebrities, to motivational women who run a horse ranch in Colorado,” says Denise Marie, publisher of A Distinctive Style. “The Winter 2013 issue is full of amazing humanitarians who pay-it-forward—just like Pitt does—by giving back to those less fortunate; individuals who possess a sincere love of family, or go through great lengths to save our environment. Everyone featured brings important social issues to the forefront. It may be tricky for people to see the reasons I have for each story I place, but there is always something humbling behind each editorial.”
A Distinctive Style Winter Cover
Pitt’s latest action movie, Killing Them Softly, directed by Andre Dominik, is currently available on DVD, and you can read more about his creative pursuits, and life with Angelina Jolie and their six children, on page 42.
Also in this issue, we learn about Trashed, a documentary that examines environmental pollution, executive produced by actor Jeremy Irons. The documentary—highlighted in an interactive, introductory video on page 18—is a political “wake-up call” about the ways food is affected by air, sea, and land pollution. We also provide readers with a list of 10 breakfast cereals that most likely contain GMO’s corn—which has been linked to tumors. Bringing readers health-oriented news remains a priority in our publication.
On a lighter side, we chat with Los Angeles-based fashion designer Deborah Lindquist, who up-cycles all sorts of eco-friendly fabrics to create one-of-a-kind clothes and accessories for women around the world. Story on page 64.
Oscar buzz is in the air—the 2013 nominees have been announced! In this issue, readers will find interviews with this year’s most watched Academy Award nominees, all vying for a coveted gold Oscar statue.
Daniel Day-Lewis as Lincoln
Honest Abe Lincoln leads the nominations with 12 accolades, including a Best Actor nomination for Daniel Day-Lewis, who portrays the 16th President of the United States. This is Lewis’s fifth academy award nomination; he previously won Best Actor Oscars for his leading roles in the films My Left Foot and There Will Be Blood. Read more about Day-Lewis—who recently won the 2013 Golden Globe for his role as President Lincoln— on page 58.
Also, in this issue, check out our chat with Oscar nominee Bradley Cooper, up for Best Actor for his leading role in Silver Lining Playbook, in which he plays a former high school teacher battling mental health issues.
“We do many editorials on individuals with all kinds of challenges, and this film brings up a very important topic—mental illness—and how it’s perceived,” says Publisher, Denise Marie. This is Cooper’s first academy award nomination; his interview is on page 36.
Hugh Jackman
Tony-award winning actor Hugh Jackman won the 2013 Golden Globe award for his portrayal as accused convict turned heroic mayor Jean Veljean in the musical-movie adaptation of the Les Misérables. He’s nominated for an Academy Award for the same role. An interview with the multi-talented Jackman can be found on page 52. “Hugh Jackman is a sincere person that truly loves his family over anything else,” says Marie. ‘I think that’s noble.
Les Misérables co-star Anne Hathaway also received a Golden Globe award for her portrayal of Fantine in the Les Misérables. Proving she is more than just a pretty face, the actress can add “singer” to her resume now. The spunky brunette, who remains close to her childhood friends despite her success, once co-hosted the 83rd annual Academy Awards and wed actor/designer Adam Shulman last year in Big Sur. Hathaway’s interview in this issue can be found on page 62.
A Distinctive Style continues to bring readers informative, interactive videos, and this issue is no exception. The documentary Chasing Ice, featured on page 26, explores the rapidly melting ice caps that affect our precious planet.
Founded in 2007 by Dallas resident Denise Marie, A Distinctive Style—a magazine with heart—is a pioneer in the digital online experience, proving that utilizing this medium is not only a green practice, but can actually enhance the reading experience. The online magazine can access a variety of media not available in a traditional print format, and incorporates music as well as video and audio interviews.
Bradley Cooper was recently nominated for “Best Actor” in “Silver Linings Playbook,” opposite Jennifer Lawrence and Robert De Niro, who were also nominated for “Best Actress” and “Best Supporting Actor.” In his recent interview with A Distinctive Style, Cooper talks about the stigma against mental illness.
Q: What was it like working with Jennifer Lawrence, you’ve done it twice now?
Bradley Cooper: Yeah, back to back. Very lucky, I feel like I latched onto a secret before everybody knew about it. She’s incredible. She’s just an incredible actress and such a professional. It’s easy. I would do every movie with her.
Q: How did you prepare for a role like this in Silver Linings?
Bradley Cooper in “Silver Linings Playbook”
Bradley Cooper: The guy you play obviously has some mental issues. Did you visit a hospital? There wasn’t much time, but David (O. Russell) sent me some material and a bunch of videos. I went online and I remember there was one thing; I saw a documentary of a guy who had recorded his own depression and mental illness for years. And I remember thinking that I could relate to it, the way it was written. It’s set in Philadelphia, and the relationship with the father and the mother, I know that world. So you make connections.
Q: Do you think love is the answer to cure illnesses?
Bradley Cooper: This guy meets a girl and then all is fine? Well I don’t think he’s cured. I don’t think the message is that he’s cured, I mean as life goes on, he’s made improvements. Did you get the feeling that he was cured?
Q: No, but he looked different in the end.
Bradley Cooper: Clearly. You see a guy who’s gotten his shit together, for sure. He doesn’t believe an illusion like he does at the beginning of the movie.
A long-awaited study by the EPA has confirmed that the Pebble Mine — along with its estimated 10 billion tons of mining waste — would spell disaster for Alaska’s Bristol Bay, its legendary salmon runs, its pristine environment and its Native communities.
Now we must prevail on the President to take the next crucial step: To direct his EPA to use its authority to stop the mine once and for all.
I’ll be working arm in arm with NRDC this month to bring our “Stop Pebble” message directly to Capitol Hill and the White House through a major media campaign.
Then make your voice heard. Tell President Obama to save Bristol Bay and secure a lasting environmental legacy by stopping the Pebble Mine.
Since 2010, you and I have fought alongside NRDC to block this disastrous project — a colossal open-pit copper-and-gold mine that global mining giants want to gouge out of the spectacular untamed wilderness above Bristol Bay.
But now a decisive battle in Washington is at hand — and we need to mobilize again.
Please send a message to President Obama today. He needs to hear loud and clear from the American people — both those in Bristol Bay and millions more across the country.
The mining companies have already spent more than $100 million on this ill-begotten scheme. They’re not about to give up without a monumental fight.
If we are going to counter their lobbying juggernaut, we need each and every NRDC activist to get our message to the White House.
I’m sure you share my conviction that we must not allow one of America’s last and greatest wild places to be plundered for copper and gold.
Please help by taking a minute to watch my video. Then, join me in calling on President Obama to do the right thing for Bristol Bay, its wildlife and its people by directing EPA to stop the Pebble Mine. Thank you.
Sincerely,
Robert Redford
Trustee
Natural Resources Defense Council
Matt Damon and John Krasinski co-wrote and co-star in the eco-drama about the controversial drilling practice known as fracking.
Promised Land is a new contemporary drama directed by Gus Van Sant (Good Will Hunting, Milk). Matt Damon plays Steve Butler, an ace corporate salesman who is sent along with his partner, Sue Thomason (Frances McDormand), to close a key rural town in his company’s expansion plans. With the town having been hit hard by the economic decline of recent years, the two outsiders see the local citizens as likely to accept their company’s offer, for drilling rights to their properties, as much-needed relief.
What seems like an easy job for the duo becomes complicated by the objection of a respected schoolteacher (Hal Holbrook) with support from a grassroots campaign led by another man (John Krasinski), as well as the interest of a local woman (Rosemarie DeWitt). Promised Land explores America at the crossroads where big business and the strength of small-town community converge.
Fracking has become a major issue for celebrity activists; Sean Lennon and his mother, Yoko Ono, recently formed a coalition of stars to fight against the practice’s spread to New York State. Damon, for his part, has become an activist for clean water access, co-founding the charity Water.org.
Brad Pitt Balances Marriage, a Large Family and a New Film
The nuptials between Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie serve as the ultimate realization of Pitt’s lifelong dream of fathering a large family – even if shuttling six children between homes in London, Los Angeles, New York, and southern France can, at times, resemble a covert military operation. Pitt, however, has no qualms about logistics. He lives for his kids.
A Distinctive Style Magazine Cover with Brad Pitt
When asked what life as a movie star father was like, he responded, “I still have to get up at 6 a.m. and make breakfast for six kids. I don’t see my daily life as being that remarkable, except for the fact that I’ve struck the lottery when it comes to my work and the opportunities it’s given me.” “Being a parent of several children is exhausting – no matter what,” Pitt continued. “I’m lucky that Angie has so much energy and [she] never gets down or complains.The only time I’ve ever seen her really tired was after the twins were born. That proved very demanding and made it difficult for her to spend as much time with the other children as she did before. But now that the twins are older, it’s becoming a lot easier for all of us. I mean, when you have a big family, you learn to develop good logistical training and then it’s just like a machine that keeps moving forward,” he laughed.
“I carry on a running conversation with myself about how I’m raising our children, the kind of education I’m giving them and how they seem to be evolving. I want to help them grow up to be independent and aware individuals. The kids are a huge part of my world and I love being an active and engaged father and family man,” Pitt stated.
Larry Hagman, who emerged in the 1960s as the slightly befuddled astronaut in “I Dream of Jeannie,” then became a major star in the 1980s primetime soap “Dallas,” playing evil oil baron J.R. Ewing, has died. He was 81.
Hagman’s cause of death was due to complications related to his battle with cancer according to his family.
Linda Gray, who played Hagman’s on-screen wife on “Dallas” was at the actor’s bedside when he died.
He truly loved portraying this globally recognized character, and he leaves a legacy of entertainment, generosity and grace.
“He brought joy to everyone he knew. He was creative, generous, funny, loving and talented, and I will miss him enormously. He was an original and lived life to the fullest,” Gray said in a statement released through her publicist.
Warner Bros.”Dallas” executive producers Cynthia Cidre and Michael M. Robin, and the show’s cast and crew released the following statement today: “Larry Hagman was a giant, a larger-than-life personality whose iconic performance as J.R. Ewing will endure as one of the most indelible in entertainment history. He truly loved portraying this globally recognized character, and he leaves a legacy of entertainment, generosity and grace. Everyone at Warner Bros. and in the “Dallas” family is deeply saddened by Larry’s passing, and our thoughts are with his family and dear friends during this difficult time.”
Hagman inherited the acting gene from his mother, Broadway musical legend Mary Martin. He’d had roles in television programs 20 years prior to “Dallas,” including “I Dream of Jeannie” from 1965-70.
“Dallas,” which debuted in 1978 on CBS and had an astonishing 13-year run, centered on the Ewings, a family of Texas oil barons who had money, cattle, and more scandals and power struggles than the Kardashians.
The original strategy behind “Dallas” was to focus on the newly-married Bobby and Pam Ewing. But Hagman made his role more than the producers had intended, and he quickly became the focus of the program.
When TNT revived the program earlier this year, he was the undisputed power villain.
“All of us at TNT are deeply saddened at the news of Larry Hagman’s passing. He was a wonderful human being and an extremely gifted actor,” TNT officials said in a statement. “We will be forever thankful that a whole new generation of people got to know and appreciate Larry through his performance as J.R. Ewing. Our thoughts and prayers are with his family at this very difficult time.
American actor, director and producer, Larry Hagman, best known for his role as “J.R. Ewing” in the TV series “Dallas,” at a Red Carpet Event for the opening of the new “Dallas” series. Photo by YONY KIM for A Distinctive Style Magazine.
But though he may be best known as a villain, Hagman used his fame to try to give back.
In addition to actively supporting charities like the National Kidney Foundation and, in what might seem an irony, efforts to develop solar power, Hagman just last month announced the formation The Larry Hagman Foundation, to fund education programs promoting the fine arts and creative learning opportunities for economically disadvantaged children in Dallas.
American actor, director and producer, Larry Hagman, best known for his role as “J.R. Ewing” in the TV series “Dallas,” at the Red Carpet Premier for the opening of the new “Dallas” series. Photo by YONY KIM, for A Distinctive Style Magazine
Hagman began his acting career in the late 1950s, but it wasn’t until “I Dream of Jeannie” premiered in 1965 that he found himself a star. He played Anthony Nelson, an astronaut who during a mission finds an unusual bottle, and when he opens it, out pops a genie named Jeannie — Barbara Eden.
Through the series’ five-year run, Jeannie found new ways to make Hagman’s life difficult, as she tried to serve her “master.”
Though Hagman continued to work regularly after “I Dream of Jeannie” ended in 1970, it wasn’t until “Dallas” hit the air in 1978, that he again struck a chord with audiences.
The show was originally only supposed to be a five-episode miniseries, but the show caught on so quickly, that it was extended and eventually became a series that would become the highest rated TV show of all time.
Unlike many TV stars, who find themselves playing variations on the same character over and over, the Hagman viewers saw in J.R. Ewing was worlds away from Major Nelson.
While the astronaut was always at wits end, trying to keep Jeannie a secret and trying to prove to the base psychiatrist that he was sane, Ewing was a man who seemed completely in control of his world, wheeling and dealing, backstabbing and cheating on his wife.
“I had been running to keep up with a world which I could not catch for so long, trying to find somewhere to belong.” ~Alison Sudol
PINES, Alison Sudol’s third full-length Album as A Fine Frenzy, is a fable about a pining tree who is given the unheard-of chance (for a conifer) to make a life of her own choosing. Drawing inspiration from the redwood forests and dramatic landscapes of Northern California and Washington’s Cascade Mountains, the thirteen new original songs survey a sonic landscape as vast and deep as the woods, their namesake.
Alison Sudol
Sudol crafted PINES in response to our accelerating pace of life in the 21st century. “Sometimes I feel like the world has been strapped onto the back of a giant rocket and it’s hurtling us into the unknown at a pace we’re not entirely equipped to deal with. All kinds of things are falling off, good and bad. It’s a crazy, exciting, terrifying time- so much is changing, and fast. Yet some of the most wonderful things in the world are slow- rivers and seasons and turning leaves and growing older with the ones you love. I wanted to create an environment where a person could retreat to, somewhere vivid and real where their minds and hearts could wander freely. I wanted it to be a place you could go to feel, like a quiet spot in a forest or the sea on a cloudy day.”
The adventure of PINES is further realized in a companion book and short film. The animated film PINES, (produced by TakePart, the digital division and Social Action network of Participant Media, whose mission is to create entertainment that inspires and compels social change) integrates hand-cut sets, puppets, stop motion, physical effects, and layered glass to augment the depth and texture of the film. The book is a collaboration with illustrator Jen Lobo, whose aesthetic Sudol chose for her blend of “scientific precision and whimsical beauty.”
Won’t Back Down — If you can’t beat the system, change it!
This drama is directed by Daniel Barnz and stars Maggie Gyllenhaal, Viola Davis and Holly Hunter. It’s about two determined mothers, a bartender (Gyllenhaal) and a teacher (Davis), look to transform their children’s failing inner city school. Facing a powerful and entrenched bureaucracy and corruption from the teacher’s union president (Hunter) and the school’s principal (Nunn), they risk everything to make a difference in the education and future of their children.
www.facebook.com/WontBackDown
The film is loosely based on the events surrounding the use of the parent trigger law in Sunland-Tujunga, Los Angeles, California in 2010, where several groups of parents attempted to take over several failing public schools. The Parent Trigger law, which was passed in California and other states in 2010, allowed parents to enforce administrative overhaul and overrule administrators in under-performing public schools if petitioned. If successful, petitions allow parents to direct changes such as dismissal of staff and potential conversion of a school to a charter school.
Walden Media, a film studio which released a 2010 documentary film Waiting for Superman with Paramount Pictures and Participant Media about the American Educational System, produced the film. American actresses Maggie Gyllenhall and Viola Davis were among the first to be cast with Academy award-winning actress Holly Hunter being cast later on.
The film has received mixed to negative reviews from critics, as Won’t Back Down currently holds a 32% rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on 77 reviews. Variety called the film a “heavy-handed inspirational drama” that “grossly oversimplifies the issue at hand.” The site continued, “Barnz’s disingenuous pot-stirrer plays to audiences’ emotions rather than their intelligence, offering meaty roles for Maggie Gyllenhaal as a determined single mom, and Viola Davis as the good egg among a rotten batch of teachers, while reducing everyone else to cardboard characterizations. Absent high-profile champions, femme-centric pic could suffer from low attendance.” Michael Medved liked the film, giving it three and a half stars (out of four) and calling it “…one of the better films of 2012.”
Michelle Rhee former Chancellor of the Washington, DC school system said of the movie, ““They had done a remarkable job capturing some of the difficult tensions within the reform movement.” Critics have contended that the film is an ideological vehicle of conservative activist Philip Anschutz and that the film is slanted to promote the parent trigger movement. Alexander Zaitchik, writing for Salon.com, described the movie as a “propaganda flick” which attacks teachers’ unions. He argues that Walden Media are “linked at the highest levels to the real-world adult alliance of corporate and far-right ideological interest groups that constitutes the so-called education reform movement, more accurately described as the education privatization movement.”
A groundbreaking initiative created to accelerate innovative cancer research that will get new therapies to patients quickly and save lives now.
SU2C is bringing together the best and the brightest researchers and encouraging collaboration instead of competition among the entire cancer community. By galvanizing the entertainment industry, SU2C creates awareness and builds broad public support for this effort.
Here we stand, on the verge of unlocking the answers that will finally conquer cancer.
Cancer takes one person every minute. One life in a moment. They are our brothers, our sisters, our fathers and mothers, our husbands and wives, our best friends, our children, ourselves. Every day in America 1500 people die despite the fact that the means to save them are literally within our reach. To wait any longer for someone else to save our lives and the lives of those we love is unforgivable. We must act now.
For the first time in history, we can envision the possibility of stopping cancer in its tracks. Now more than ever, as government funding for cancer research is disappearing from the national agenda, every single one of us affected by cancer must stand up and be heard.
How?
Working with the top experts in cancer research, Stand Up To Cancer is forging a new way to develop breakthroughs that will end cancer. We’re putting together the best and the brightest minds in cancer research, investing in their projects and taking the bureaucratic obstacles out of their way. SU2C’s interdisciplinary Dream Teams of scientists, clinicians, technicians and other experts, are hard at work on solutions to the unique problems that cancer presents. Learn More.
SU2C’s funding is administered by the American Association for Cancer Research, the largest scientific organization in the world focusing on every aspect of high-quality, innovative cancer research. Together with Stand Up To Cancer’s “Blue Ribbon” Scientific Advisory Council, comprised of world-class scientists across several disciplines and patient advocates, the most promising projects are identified, mentored, and funded.
Why Now?
We now understand the very biology that drives cancer. With knowledge gained from the mapping of the human genome, we can target the genes and pathways that are involved in turning normal cells into cancerous ones. We are on the brink of possessing a toolbox full of new, advanced therapies just waiting to be adapted to benefit patients. Right before us, so close we can almost touch them, are scientific breakthroughs in the prevention, detection, treatment – and even reversal – of this disease.
This is where the end of cancer begins: when we unite in one movement, unstoppable.
Join the world’s leading experts in Nutrition and Natural Medicine in this inspiring film about taking your health into your own hands. Learn how you can boost your energy levels, keep excess weight at bay and transform your health through food. www.hungryforchange.tv
The first film in its genre to really empower and provide practical and realistic solutions. Find out what’s keeping you from having the body and health you deserve and how to escape the diet trap forever.
Featuring interviews with best selling health authors and leading medical experts plus real life transformational stories from those who know what it’s like to be sick and overweight.
Learn from those who have been there before and continue your health journey today.
HUNGRY FOR CHANGE exposes shocking secrets the diet, weight-loss and food industry don’t want you to know about. Deceptive strategies designed to keep you craving more and more.
Could the foods we are eating actually be keeping us stuck in the diet trap?
How to navigate your supermarket – what to buy and what to avoid
The real truth behind “DIET,” “SUGAR-FREE” and “FAT-FREE” products
How to overcome food addictions and cravings
Why fad diets don’t work
What food additives to avoid and how to read labels
What is fat and cellulite and how do we get rid of it for good
The most effective detox and cleansing strategies, and
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Find out what’s keeping you from having the body and health you deserve and how to escape the diet trap forever.
In the last 100 years dozens of doctors, scientists and researchers have come up with the most diverse, apparently effective solutions against cancer, but none of these was ever taken into serious consideration by official medicine. Most of them were in fact rejected out-front, even though healings were claimed in the thousands, their proposers often being labeled as charlatans, ostracized by the medical community and ultimately forced to leave the country. At the same time more than 20,000 people die of cancer every day, without official medicine being able to offer a true sense of hope to those affected by it. Why?
If people, actually worked to promote the common good, as opposed to promoting their own selfish motives, there might be more hope for those with cancer today. ~Massimo Mazzucco This is the story of Essiac, Hoxsey, Laetrile, Shark Cartilage, Mistletoe, and Bicarbonate of Soda all put together in a stunning overview that leaves no doubt that inexpensive cures for cancer do exist but are systematically blocked by Big Pharma because they come from nature and cannot be patented.
This is not to say that doctors do not detect genuine cancer in many people. If the statistics are true then we have a real epidemic on our hands. Two questions arise. Firstly, why are so many people dying from this condition and secondly, what are the options for people who receive a cancer diagnosis.
This is an educational not for profit production. Copyright Disclaimer Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for fair use for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. Non-profit, educational or personal use tips the balance in favour of fair use.
Massimo Mazzucco is an Italian filmmaker who is known for producing documentary films such as “The New American Century” and “Cancer -The Forbidden Cures.”
From TNT’s relaunch of the iconic series showcases stars old and new in a steamy shower
While there are no guns aimed at J.R. Ewing from an unseen assailant, TNT evokes one of the original series’ iconic moments in a new ad for their upcoming Dallas reboot. Twenty-four years after the show debuted, J.R. (Larry Hagman) joins his brother Bobby (Patrick Duffy) in the shower where he first blissfully cleaned himself off after a nightmarish cliffhanger involving a fatal automobile accident.
The ad appears in the current issue of The Hollywood Reporter in addition to other print and online publications. Featuring a variety of new and old characters, this early image clearly hints at the producers’ aims to attract a cross-generational viewership for the series.
TNT revealed the tease campaign for its new series Dallas. The steamy artwork flashes back to one of the most iconic scenes in Dallas history: the shower scene, in which Bobby Ewing surprised viewers by returning and revealing that the previous season had been a dream.
Patient research work involving more than 5 thousand photographs resulted in a 1 minute film that AlmapBBDO created to advertise Getty Images, the world leading image database for creating and distributing visual contents. The film is surprising when showing 873 images in 15 images per second, sufficient speed to transform the series into a video that, without any text, tells a beautiful story. All photos, without any exceptions, are from the Getty Images archives.
Copywriter Sophie Schoenburg and art director Marcus Kotlhar worked 6 months researching images, improving the script and building each scene so they would not only be understood, but would also touch viewers. Sometimes, for example, a scene would look perfect on paper, but the images chosen to depict it were not sufficient or did not perfectly match up to offer the right movement and sense. And hence the research had to be restarted. The film was directed by Cisma, via Paranoid BR, along with Marcos Kotlhar, the art director at the agency.
For this creation team, the purpose was to adhere to the concept that Getty Images has so many images that anybody is capable of telling any story they want by only using their archives. In the film “Do amor ao Bingo em 873 imagens” [From love to Bingo in 873 images], a storyteller in the corner of the screen describes the images used. The Getty Images logo appears at the end of the story, but the storyteller continues to turn until reaching the exact number of images in the Getty Images archive.
Credits — Film
Advertiser: Getty Images
Title: From love to bingo in 873 images
Product: Getty Images
General Creative Director: Marcello Serpa, Luiz Sanches
Creative Director: André Kassu, Marcos Medeiros, Renato Simões
Art Director: Marcos Kotlhar
Copywriter: Sophie Schoenburg
Producer: Paranoid BR
Executive producer: Egisto Betti
Direction: Cisma, Marcos Kotlhar
Animation: Split Filmes, Marcos Kotlhar
Rtvc: Vera Jacinto, Gabriel Dagostini, Diego Villas Bôas
Soundtrack / Voice-Over Artist: Kito Siqueira
Editor / Assembler: Marcos Kotlhar, Jonas Brandão
Finishing Editor: Split Filmes
Service: Cristina Chacon, Marina Leal
Media: Paulo Camossa Jr
Approval: Renata Simões
Insane Michigan government announces plan to destroy ranch livestock based on hair color and arrest hundreds of ranchers as felons
The state of Michigan has enacted, by law “animal genocide” (the mass murder of ranch animals) on all Michigan farmers. It’s all part of a shocking new “Invasive Species Order” (ISO) put in place by Michigan’s Department of Natural Resources (DNR). This Invasive Species Order suddenly and shockingly defines virtually all open-range pigs raised by small family farms to be illegal “invasive species,” and possession of just one of these animals is now a felony crime in Michigan, punishable by up to four years in prison.
As of April 1, 2012, the state ordered farmers to “destroy” all pigs or the DNR would raid their farms with government-issued rifles, then shoot the pig herds while arresting the members of the family and charging them with the “crime” of raising pigs.
A state-sponsored serial animal killing spree
This is factually true and verifiable through documents, videos and websites. The state of Michigan seriously carried out a mass murder spree of pigs starting April 1.
Finally, the Michigan Swine outrage is breaking into the media, RT America, based in Washington, DC did this excellent video news report on the horrible treatment of farmers by the state of Michigan.
Declaring it pig genocide in Michigan is putting it mildly. Government agencies and the governor (by his inaction), are destroying the fabric of a community and the dreams of their citizens for a business of their own.
By the way, isn’t it about time our politicians started talking about business opportunities? I am so sick of the emphasis on JOBS in the political dialog. Businesses are what we really need, but our politicians seem to want all of us beholden to them for jobs. What about all the business killing regulations? You can’t have jobs if you don’t first encourage business start-ups! This regulatory hostility toward business owners, farmers and ranchers has got to stop!
Think about it. Would you rather be working in someone else’s pork factory, or tending to a few pigs on your own land? Which is going to be the least hazardous to your health? Which potentially could lead to more wealth?
The government is criminalizing the latter, therefore forcing these farmers back into the workforce. They will have to get JOBS to survive. What a Shame!
Make your voice be heard on this! Spread this video far and wide. Only a huge outcry can stop this kind of abuse of power. Wake UP America, THEY will come for your livelihood NEXT!
“Helping people fall in love with the world is a catalyst to wanting to save it.” ~ Sebastian Copeland
The work Sebastian Copeland does, work that includes Antarctica: The Global Warning, which won him the 2007 Photographer of the Year Award, and Into the Cold: A Journey of the Soul, a breathtaking documentary of his Arctic expedition that premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival.
Copeland says individuals, too—even those at the other end of the financial spectrum—can express concern for the environment. Energy conservation—letting laundry dry in the sun instead of in a clothes dryer, for example—is but one suggestion. He also points to urban farming, which is catching on all over the country, as well as the need to establish a legal code for the rights of nature.
Copeland applauds small towns, where residents use their own resources to create food sources. He’s fascinated by what people do to save money and save energy, especially when facing dire conditions. “Each of us can take small steps,” he urges. “To illustrate, we can all take shorter showers. But we have to do some mental shifting. We have to think ‘sustainability’ every day.”
There are big issues, of course, involved with collective mind-sets being rearranged. “We’ve been conditioned for generations,” Copeland worries, “to operate within one mode of energy consumption. Comfort, though, doesn’t have to be at odds with the environment.”
READ MORE and see Sebastian’s Live Video: (It’s absolutely incredible)
A Story so unbelievable it must be true! A new movie release with a stand-out cast…
Shirley MacLaine, Jack Black and Matthew McConaughey star in this dark comedy.
The process began for Linklater with a feature story in “Texas Monthly” back in 1998 (read it here), telling of small town funeral director Bernie Tiede (Black) and how he killed a local 81-year-old spinster by the name of Marjorie Nugent (MacLaine). The key to this story, however, isn’t so much the murder, but the town itself and its reaction to the news.
Not only was Mrs. Nugent disliked by most of the town’s 6,500-person population, but Bernie was loved by just about everyone. So when news broke that not only had Bernie killed Mrs. Nugent, but that he had kept it quiet for the better part of nine months, most of them couldn’t believe it and even if they did, the reaction from one such Bernie supporter was to say, “It’s not as bad as people say; he only shot her four times… not five.”
Jack Black fills the role of Bernie perfectly, taking on effeminate characteristics and owning them, convincing you he just may be the nicest and most caring person alive. MacLaine’s performance is hardly in question, her appearance on screen alone is convincing enough, but when it comes to doing what’s necessary to convince the audience she may be one of the worst people to have lived, MacLaine falls right in line. As for McConaughey, at this point I think we can all agree playing a southern lawyer is right up his alley.
Part of the story’s mystery comes when we see how Bernie and Marjorie became rather close. The two traveled together, went to the opera and ultimately began spending large chunks of time together. Seeing how all of this was done on Marjorie’s dime that was enough to raise some eyebrows, but for the most part no one seemed to have cared too much.
However, Marjorie’s negative qualities soon get the best of Bernie, just as they do everyone else, and it almost makes you wonder — Is there ever a justified reason for non-premeditative murder? To ask the people of Carthage you may get a surprising answer in this case, and that is certainly part of this film’s charm.
This year, over 5 million American kids will be bullied at school, online, on the bus, at home, through their cell phones and on the streets of their towns, making it the most common form of violence young people in this country experience. The Bully Project is the first feature documentary film to show how we’ve all been affected by bullying, whether we’ve been victims, perpetrators or stood silent witness. The world we inhabit as adults begins on the playground. The Bully Project opens on the first day of school. For the more than 5 million kids who’ll be bullied this year in the United States, it’s a day filled with more anxiety and foreboding than excitement. As the sun rises and school busses across the country overflow with backpacks, brass instruments and the rambunctious sounds of raging hormones, this is a ride into the unknown. For a lot of kids, the only thing that’s certain is that this year…
tap!
Finally, the Michigan Swine outrage is breaking into the media, RT America, based in Washington, DC did this excellent video news report on the horrible treatment of farmers by the state of Michigan.
