Anne Heche ‘not expected to survive’ car crash, actor’s family says

The US actor will be taken off life support after it is determined if her organs are viable for donation, following a severe collision that left her car in flames

The family of Anne Heche say the US actor is “not expected to survive” a severe collision that left her vehicle engulfed in flames last Friday.

In a statement, Heche’s family said through a representative that she had suffered “a severe anoxic brain injury” and was now being kept on life support to determine whether her organs were viable for donation.

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Anne Heche is in a coma and has not regained consciousness since car crash

A representative for the actor has described her as being in an ‘extreme critical condition’ following the incident on Friday

Anne Heche has not regained consciousness since shortly after she crashed her car in Los Angeles on Friday.

Initial reports about the actor’s condition said she was “stable” and firefighters said she had spoken to rescuers as she was pulled from the wreckage.

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Lars von Trier diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease

Danish director, who won Palme d’Or for Dancer in the Dark, said to be ‘in good spirits’

Lars von Trier, the acclaimed and controversial Danish director, has been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, his production company has announced.

In a statement released on Monday, Zentropa – which von Trier co-founded in 1992 with producer Peter Aalbæk Jensen – said the director is in “good spirits and is being treated for his symptoms” while he completes the upcoming final season of his TV trilogy series.

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Anne Heche ‘stable’ after suffering severe burns in Los Angeles car accident

Fans and friends express support for Hollywood star who drove her car into house, which was left ‘uninhabitable’

Actor Anne Heche was “stable” in hospital amid a wave of support from fans and fellow stars following an accident in which she drove her car into a Los Angeles home, causing severe burn injuries to herself as well as damaging the house which has become “uninhabitable”.

As of Saturday, the Los Angeles police department (LAPD) said it was investigating the incident but had not determined its cause. The Los Angeles fire department (LAFD) said in a statement it took 59 firefighters to extinguish the fire.

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Actor Anne Heche reportedly in critical condition after car crash in Los Angeles

Collision near the home of actor known for films including Donnie Brasco left her vehicle ‘engulfed in flames’

The US actor Anne Heche has reportedly been taken to hospital in a critical condition after a collision that left her vehicle “engulfed in flames”.

The incident occurred on Friday morning in the Mar Vista area of Los Angeles, near to Heche’s home.

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Sexual assault case against director Paul Haggis dropped in Italy

Judge in Lecce rules no grounds to pursue investigation against Canadian director, 69, who spent 16 days under house arrest

Oscar-winning director Paul Haggis has had a sexual assault charge dropped by an Italian court six weeks after he was accused by a 28-year-old British woman of forcing her to have “non-consensual” sex with him.

A judge in the southern Italian city of Lecce ruled on Friday that there were no grounds to further pursue an investigation.

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Pat Carroll, voice of Disney villain Ursula in The Little Mermaid, dies aged 95

The comedy actor, who started out as a regular on variety shows and became a prolific voice actor, died at home on Saturday of pneumonia

Pat Carroll, the Emmy award-winning actor and voice of the memorable Disney villain Ursula in The Little Mermaid, has died aged 95.

Carroll died on Saturday of pneumonia at her home in Cape Cod, Massachusetts, her daughter Kerry Karsian told the Hollywood Reporter.

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US airman who rescued film of A-bomb horrors is honoured at last

Cameraman Daniel McGovern copied footage of Hiroshima and Nagasaki devastation to ensure lessons were learned

The photograph shows devastation in Nagasaki after the atomic bomb: a scorched wilderness where there was once a city. At its centre stands a lone man with a camera.

It was 9 September 1945 and Lt Daniel McGovern, a US Army Air Force cameraman, was documenting ground zero, the point directly below the bomb’s detonation four weeks earlier. Few would recognise McGovern, but the vision of apocalypse is familiar from documentary footage of Hiroshima and Nagasaki at the end of the second world war.

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Jihad Rehab: former Guantánamo prisoners call for documentary to be withdrawn

Film speaks with men at a rehabilitation centre in Saudi Arabia who had previously been held at Guantánamo Bay detention camp

A group of former Guantánamo prisoners are calling for the film Jihad Rehab to be withdrawn. In an open letter, the men express their “discomfort with the content of the film and its methods of production.”

The letter was published after the film was screened at the Doc Edge festival in New Zealand under a new name, The UnRedacted. “Changing the title of the film doesn’t change its harmful narrative or lazy stereotyping,” says Moazzam Begg, a former prisoner and director of the Cage advocacy group. “Following widespread criticism, the team behind Jihad Rehab had an opportunity to listen and learn. Yet this has been met with little corrective action or even acknowledgment.”

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Will Smith posts emotional apology for the slap: ‘I am deeply remorseful’

Actor releases video answering questions about the incident at this year’s Oscars where he slapped Chris Rock onstage

Will Smith has posted an emotional video to his social channels expressing remorse over the Oscars slap.

The 53-year-old actor caused controversy at this year’s ceremony after he slapped Chris Rock onstage after a joke about his wife, Jada Pinkett-Smith, and her appearance. Smith released a statement on Instagram to apologise but has been silent since.

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Goodfellas actor Paul Sorvino dies at 83

The Brooklyn-bred actor, who played mobster Paulie Cicero in Goodfellas, died of natural causes on Monday

Paul Sorvino, the Tony-nominated actor who played mobster Paulie Cicero in Goodfellas, has died at age 83. Sorvino, the father of actor Mira Sorvino, died of natural causes on Monday, his wife Dee Dee announced.

“Our hearts are broken, there will never be another Paul Sorvino, he was the love of my life and one of the greatest performers to ever grace the screen and stage,” she said in a statement published by the Hollywood Reporter.

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Rising costs pose threat to independent film-making in UK, says BFI

Indie productions struggling to compete with well-financed, studio-backed projects, research shows

There are serious questions about the long-term viability of independent film-making in Britain, the British Film Institute (BFI) has said.

Making Oscar-winning films such as The King’s Speech and Slumdog Millionaire has become all the more difficult, with “significant challenges” putting the sector on a downward trend, research shows.

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Jafar Panahi sentenced to six years in jail

The Iranian director was arrested last week for criticising the government after enquiring about the earlier arrest of fellow film-maker Mohammad Rasoulof

The director Jafar Panahi has been sentenced to six years’ imprisonment by the Iranian judiciary, who are seeking to enforce a previously handed-down sentence.

Panahi, who has won the top prizes at the Venice and Berlin film festivals, and is the director of films including The Circle, The White Balloon, Crimson Gold, Taxi and This Is Not a Film, is one of three film-makers arrested in Tehran in less than a week.

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Jackie Chan-produced action movie films in devastated Syrian city

The decision to produce a film glorifying China’s Communist party in a town destroyed by civil war has been described as ‘appallingly bad taste’

A Chinese action film executive-produced by Jackie Chan has triggered outrage after shooting scenes in al-Hajar al-Aswad, a Syrian town destroyed in the civil war.

Home Operation, directed by Song Yinxi, is inspired by China’s evacuation of hundreds of its nationals from Yemen in 2015 during the civil conflict there, and is the first joint venture between Chinese and Emirati producers. AFP reported that Song said the film was intended to glorify the Chinese Communist party (CCP): “It takes the perspective of diplomats who are Communist party members, who braved a hail of bullets in a war-torn country and safely brought all Chinese compatriots on to the country’s warship unscathed.”

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‘Worth waiting for’: Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck get married in Las Vegas

Lopez and Affleck married in a small ceremony on the weekend, culminating a relationship that has stretched over two decades and two engagements

Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck got married in a Las Vegas drive-through chapel late on Saturday night, culminating a relationship that stretched over two decades in two separate romances and headlined countless tabloid covers.

Lopez announced their marriage on Sunday in her newsletter for her fans, On the J Lo, with the heading “We did it”. Lopez initially made their engagement public in April on the same newsletter.

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Film based on Daniel Morcombe murder case is ‘selfish cash grab’, parents say

Bruce Morcombe asks filmgoers to not see Thomas M Wright’s The Stranger, but producers say it does not name Daniel or depict his death

The father of murdered Queensland schoolboy Daniel Morcombe has called for Australians to boycott The Stranger, a film based on the undercover police operation that led to the arrest of Morcombe’s killer, which is scheduled to premiere next month.

On Friday, Bruce Morcombe told Perth’s 6PR radio station that filmgoers should “save their 20 bucks” on a film ticket and instead donate it to the foundation set up in his son’s name.

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Country Queen: first Netflix series to be produced in Kenya hits the screen

Streaming company’s family drama marks shift from locally made ‘edutainment’ to shows that reflect complex realities of Kenyan life

Kenya’s first homegrown Netflix series, the family drama Country Queen, has its premiere on Friday, marking the beginning of a significant investment in African film by the streaming company.

Shot in English, Swahili and a mix of other local languages, the series features a female lead character and chronicles the lives of ordinary Kenyans fighting against corporate power and land grabs. It explores urban and rural Kenya through characters intertwined by love, betrayal and conflict.

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Constance Wu says she attempted suicide after Twitter backlash in 2019

In her first post in nearly three years, the Hustlers actor said she tried to kill herself after a negative response to tweets she had sent

Constance Wu has said that she attempted suicide after backlash to a series of “careless” tweets in 2019.

In a statement marking her first return to Twitter in nearly three years, the Hustlers actor announced her upcoming book, Making a Scene, and explained that she was “afraid of coming back on social media because I almost lost my life from it: 3 years ago, when I made careless tweets about the renewal of my TV show, it ignited outrage and internet shaming that got pretty severe.”

In the UK, Samaritans can be contacted on 116 123 and the domestic abuse helpline is 0808 2000 247. In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is on 13 11 14 and the national family violence counselling service is on 1800 737 732. In the US, the suicide prevention lifeline is 1-800-273-8255 and the domestic violence hotline is 1-800-799-SAFE (7233). Other international helplines can be found via www.befrienders.org.

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Roman Polanski rape case testimony can be unsealed, LA prosecutor says

District attorney George Gascón says his office has asked to unseal transcripts in effort to re-examine case

The Los Angeles district attorney’s office will no longer object to the release of documents in the 45-year-old rape case against the film director Roman Polanski, the office said on Tuesday.

George Gascón, the Los Angeles DA, said his office had reversed its position and asked to unseal the transcripts of the testimony of the former deputy district attorney Roger Gunson as part of an effort to re-examine the case against the 88-year-old film-maker.

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Amber Heard loses bid to dismiss $10m Johnny Depp judgment

US judge Penney Azcarate rejects Heard’s claims after actor filed motion seeking to have defamation verdict against her set aside

A judge on Wednesday rejected a request from the actor Amber Heard to set aside the $10m defamation judgment awarded against her in favor of her ex-husband, Johnny Depp.

Depp won a suit against Heard last month in a high-profile civil trial. Heard won a $2m judgment on a counter-claim against Depp.

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