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September 28, 2004 - Stax here with a review of the script for All the King's Men! Oscar-winner Steven Zaillian wrote this August 13th, 2004 screenplay adaptation of Robert Penn Warren's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, which was a roman à clef based on the life of Southern politician Huey Long. Zaillian will also direct the Columbia project for Phoenix Pictures. Sean Penn and Jude Law will star. Filming begins soon in New Orleans for a 2005 release.

Siberia feels the heat. It's a frozen peat bog the size of France and Germany combined, contains billions of tonnes of greenhouse gas and, for the first time since the ice age, it is melting.

Synopsis: John Constantine has been to hell and back. Born with a gift he didn’t want, the ability to clearly recognize the half-breed angels and demons that walk the earth in human skin, Constantine (KEANU REEVES) was driven to take his own life to escape the tormenting clarity of his vision. But he failed. Resuscitated against his will, he found himself cast back into the land of the living. Now, marked as an attempted suicide with a temporary lease on life, he patrols the earthly border between heaven and hell, hoping in vain to earn his way to salvation by...

Each of the three members of RUSH, drummer Neil Peart, bassist/vocalist Geddy Lee and guitarist Alex Lifeson is considered a Maestro of his respective instrument. Induction into a number of magazines' 'Halls of Fame' throughout the world for Best Guitarist, Bassist, Keyboardist, Drummer, and Band, attests to Rush's "musician's musician" status. RUSH is renowned for their complex, sprawling, and epic song arrangements, featuring intricate time, tempo and key changes and deeply philosophical, mystical, political and scientific lyrics and messages. The band's virtual hero status in Canada is further born out by a place on Canada's Walk of Fame and for...

Glad to see Tobey Maguire back in the tights? So is he. 'Spider-Man 2' was a pain to get off the ground. But here's the good news: the movie really soars June 28 issue - Superheroes are not supposed to get fired. Sure, they quit now and then, but saving the world from evil forces would appear to be a pretty secure career choice since bad guys are never in short supply. So the call Tobey Maguire received from "Spider-Man" director Sam Raimi last year must have come as a shock. The two men had not spoken for quite a...

Sex: do we really need it? Wilson da Silva in Melbourne ABC Science Online   Birds do it, bees do it, humans do it - but nobody knows why sex evolved at all, the world congress of genetics heard in Melbourne today. "The evolution of sex has presented a paradox to evolutionary biology for over a century," said Associate Professor Sally Otto, an evolutionary biologist at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, to delegates attending the 19th International Congress of Genetics. "It's known there are a lot of costs to reproducing sexually. Why make sons and males, if you could...

REPEAL THE 17TH AMENDMENT ByJohn MacMullinAfter the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, the federal government announced that it would preempt all state jurisdiction over airport security.  The federal government preempted state powers without regard to balancing federal and state responsibilities so that these responsibilities, and related costs, could be distributed across federal, state, and local governments.  To carry out this preemption, the federal government recently reported that it will employ more than 47,000 federal recruits in the fight against terrorism as newly trained security screeners.  They are to begin working at 424 airports nationwide. These developments, and numerous others in the...

Two Hollywood films that deal with American youth caught up in the swirl of hate and prejudice are being released this month even as the country itself grapples over the real-life murder of a gay college student who was pistol-whipped and left to die on a fence post in Wyoming. Both films are expected to arouse debate, and groups that monitor hate groups praised the filmmakers for grappling with such volatile current issues. But whether the controversy these films engender can be turned into healthy box office remains to be seen. In "Apt Pupil," which Sony's TriStar Pictures will release...

Lessons learned          Modern, mechanized forces are still in peril when committed to fight guerrillas in the middle of a civil war on rugged terrain. The Soviet-Afghanistan war demonstrated that:   A guerrilla war is not a war of technology versus peasantry. Rather, it is a contest of endurance and national will. The side with the greatest moral commitment (ideological, religious or patriotic) will hold the ground at the end of the conflict. Battlefield victory can be almost irrelevant, since victory is often determined by morale, obstinacy and survival. Secure logistics and secure lines of communication are essential for the...