Vanessa Carlton announces that she's bi-sexual

Vanessa Carlton Joins the League of Bisexuals in Hollywood seem to be turning bisexual these days! Cameron Diaz, Christina Aguilera, Lady Gaga, Fergie...etc

The latest celeb to come out is singer/songwriter Vanessa Carlton.  
While headlining at the Nashville Pride on Saturday, Vanessa told the audience:

"I've never said this before, but I am a proud bisexual woman."

I guess we'll still see more!

The Most Successful Movie Franchise of All Time

The most successful movie franchise of all time is no longer James Bond, it's now the "Harry Potter" series, which recently edged out James Bond.

According to Box Office Mojo, the first six adaptations of J.K. Rowling's beloved books have earned a staggering $5.4 billion worldwide.

The 22 films considered part of the official Bond canon have earned an estimated $5 billion globally.

Still, Bond is certainly Hollywood's greatest franchise in terms of endurance and longevity. Since the first Bond adventure, "Dr. No" in 1962, it has thrived for 48 years, although the 23rd Bond picture is reportedly on hold for now.

Bond may need to stick around awhile to have any chance of overtaking Potter.

"Star Wars" movies have earned $4.2 billion, coming third.**

Introducing - Thomas Ikimi - The Nigerian Hollywood Movie Director

31 year old handsome movie director, Thomas Ikimi, may not be known in Nollywood, but in Hollywood, the Nigerian movie director has made a name for himself as the first Nigerian to direct a Hollywood movie.

His movie, Legacy, featuring Idris Elba (featured above with Thomas) will be released in Nigeria later in the year.

Legacy will be showing next at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York, followed by the American Black Film Festival in Miami.
 

Mini Bio
Thomas Ikimi was born in Westminster, London on April 10th 1979. He is of Nigerian descent. He attended primary school in Nigeria, prep and public school in England and university in America. He holds a literature and writing degree from Columbia University, New York.

Thomas' student film, 'Limbo' (2005), after a showing at the Cannes Film Market in 2005, was subsequently invited to the Taormina International Film Festival in Sicily, Italy as an Official Selection. It was one of only 12 films chosen worldwide, and had the added honour of opening the festival. This brought attention to Thomas due to the fact 'Limbo' only cost $9000 to produce mostly on his student credit card, and it was in a fest where the $153 million Batman Begins was premiering in Italy.

Thomas was a second year student when he wrote, directed and produced the film, balancing the 2 1/2 week shoot with his mid term exams. He was nominated for best director and best picture at the Eerie Horror Festival 2004, and he won the Honorable Mention Award at the Flint International Film Festival 2005. Thomas has been working as a screenwriter in London since 2005, writing and developing screenplays for producers.
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Hollywood and Bollywood join arms to fight piracy

Hollywood and Bollywood linked arms Thursday to fight piracy, with the announcement of a coalition among the Motion Picture Association of America and seven Indian companies to tackle counterfeiting in one of the world's largest film markets.

 

The alliance comes as Hollywood tries to tap global markets more aggressively and as Indian movie studios grow in size and stature � narrowing the gap between Indian and U.S. filmmakers, who have not always seen eye-to-eye on intellectual property issues.

A year in the making, the coalition to fight film piracy in India will work with movie theaters to crack down on camcorder piracy � the source of 90 percent of all pirated DVDs � with police to tighten enforcement, with Internet service providers to fight Internet piracy and with politicians to create more effective laws.

MPAA, which has similar anti-piracy alliances in the U.S., Europe and Hong Kong, would not disclose the size of the coalition's budget but said funding would come from members.

The Indian film industry has a rich history of copycat productions and traditionally has had less respect for the sanctity of intellectual property than Hollywood would like.

In 2008, for example, Warner Bros. unsuccessfully sued to block the release of an Indian Punjabi film called "Hari Puttar � A Comedy of Terrors" on the grounds that the name was too close to its Harry Potter series.

That friction has started to ease with the rise of corporate studios in India, like UTV Motion Pictures and Reliance Big Pictures, which last year took a 50 percent share in Steven Spielberg's DreamWorks for $325 million.

Over the last two years, a growing number of successful partnerships � like "My Name is Khan," produced by two Indian companies and distributed by Fox in India and the U.S. � as well as successful crossover movies � like "Slumdog Millionaire" and "Avatar," which both did well in India � have also strengthened ties.

"People are becoming more of the same mind," Dan Glickman, the outgoing chairman of the Motion Picture Association of America, told The Associated Press in an interview. "The Indian film industry now understands their product is getting stolen at significant rates."

Piracy cost India's $2.3 billion film industry $959 million and 571,000 jobs in 2008, according to an Ernst & Young study, and pirated DVDs account for 60 percent of the market, according to KPMG.

"Piracy is one of the most pernicious problems facing the entertainment industry, and the Indian industry in particular," said Reliance Big Pictures chief executive Sanjeev Lamba.

Lamba attributed part of the financial success of "3 Idiots," distributed by Reliance Big Pictures last year, to the studio's aggressive anti-piracy efforts.

Round-the-clock work helped prevent 10 million illegal downloads, he said, adding that at one point his staff was finding new illegal digital copies of the film on the Internet every five minutes.

Piracy has gotten worse in India as Internet connection speeds have improved and DVD player usage has increased.

In the last two years, the number of Indian households with DVD players surged from 4 million to 45 million, said Harish Dayani, chief executive of India's Moser Baer, the world's second-largest CD and DVD manufacturer.

He estimates that Indian consumers snap up 700 million illegal DVDs every year, giving them little incentive to go to theaters and generating 15 billion rupees ($330 million) for counterfeiters.

Reducing that leakage is crucial for Hollywood studios as they try to push into India.

"More and more, the growth of film is outside the U.S.," Glickman said. "Hollywood is now looking at the world as their marketplace."

KPMG expects Indian film industry revenues to hit 136.7 billion rupees ($3 billion) by 2014, an average annual growth of 8.9 percent.

"This is a country of 1 billion people who love movies more than anywhere else in the world," Glickman said. "We'd be foolish not to want to come into this market."

Hollywood Movie: IJE

Feature film IJE prepares to meets and exceeds Hollywood�s expectations at all exclusive screening

The time has come for Nollywood films to be taken seriously, for them to be able to compete with international films, and have lasting value. Change has been brewing for since the inception of film-making in Nigeria, and for 14 months an incredible woman has been working on making the film that will undoubtedly make Nigerian films a force to be reckoned with. Her name is Chineze Anyaene, and IJE: The Journey is what we've all been waiting for.

Chineze Anyaene, Nigerias's director and producer is changing the face of Nollywood and she is here to stay. With a production company that can rival any of its kind, Chineze Anyaene is bringing Nollywood what it needs: professionalism, quality, creativity and class. Anyaene is the youngest female director coming out of Nigeria, and also the first woman to film a Nollywood film on 35mm.

Genevieve Nnaji, who was recently profiled by American media mogul Oprah Winfrey as one of the most famous people in the world, and Nigeria�s sweetheart Omotola Ekeinde play lead roles in the movie, a rare occurrence which sets the tone for an incredibly captivating story full of twists and turns.

IJE is creativity, IJE is entertainment, IJE captures the essence of Nollywood and Hollywood.

Screen shots From the Movie IJE: Omotola

Screen shots From the Movie IJE

Screen shots From the Movie IJE

The exclusive screening of IJE: THE JOURNEY will be held at Warner Bros. on November 14, 2009 in Burbank, CA. For more information, interviews, sponsorship and promotional opportunities please contact ijethemovie@gmail.com.