The self-confessed German cannibal who killed a consenting man and ate his body parts is to seek a legal ban on a low-budget feature film telling the story, a lawyer said on Monday, three days before a retrial is due to begin in Frankfurt, Germany.
Armin Meiwes, 44, is serving an eight-and-a-half year prison term after being convicted two years ago of manslaughter. Prosecutors obtained a retrial after complaining that he should have been convicted of murder. The case attracted worldwide attention.
The unauthorized movie is reportedly set for release in Germany on March 9 and is entitled Rohtenburg, similar, but with a letter H added, to the name of the small town where Meiwes lived and carried out the bizarre act in a ramshackle manor house.
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Lawyer Harald Ermel said Monday in Rotenburg that Meiwes had not consented to the making of the film, where he is played by Hollywood-based German actor Thomas Kretschmann. The lawyer said his client resented his portrayal as a "bestial killer."
An award-winning Indian documentary-maker sued New York City this week because police ordered him to stop filming in public last year and held him for four hours, apparently suspecting he was plotting an attack.
The New York Civil Liberties Union, acting as lawyers for filmmaker Rakesh Sharma, believes it is the first suit to challenge police restrictions on taking pictures in public following the Sept. 11 attacks.
It alleges Sharma's constitutional rights to free speech and against unreasonable search and seizure were violated.
Sharma has won numerous international film awards for the documentaries Final Solution, on the killing of Muslims in the northwest Indian state of Gujarat in 2002 and 2003, and for Aftershocks, on the 2001 earthquake in Kutch, Gujarat.
He was taking video with a hand-held camera in midtown Manhattan for a project about New York taxi drivers last May when he was stopped by a plainclothes officer, questioned on the sidewalk, taken in for more questioning and had his camera damaged, the federal lawsuit alleges.
Oscar-winning actress Angelina Jolie is pregnant with a child fathered by movie co-star Brad Pitt, his spokeswoman said on Wednesday, finally confirming a romance that has become one of Hollywood's most talked-about open secrets.
Publicist Cindy Guagenti also confirmed reports that Pitt has filed papers to become the legal adoptive father of Jolie's two adopted children, son Maddox, four, and daughter Zahara, who is about 11 months old.
Guagenti acknowledged Jolie's pregnancy but declined to give further details, including when the baby was due.
Representatives for Jolie were not available for comment.
News of Jolie's pregnancy was first reported on Wednesday by People magazine, which quoted the actress as telling a charity worker in the Dominican Republic, where she is working on a movie, "Yes, I'm pregnant."
Acclaimed Hollywood and Broadway stage actors Matthew Broderick and Nathan Lane were this week honored with twin stars laid into the pavement on Hollywood's prestigious Walk of Fame.
The pair, who starred in the stage version as well as the new film remake of Mel Brooks' The Producers, were awarded the 2,299th and 2,300th stars on the famous strip of sidewalk in front of about 100 of the comedy duo's fans.
Mel Brooks, who wrote the original 1968 film version of The Producers, then adapted it into a hit Broadway musical in 2001, and then remade it again for the newest film version, also spoke at the glittering unveiling ceremony.
The musical tells the story of two theatrical producers who plan to produce the biggest flop ever, believing they can make more money from a failure than a success. The plan backfires, however, when their play becomes an unexpected hit.
Lane last month won a Golden Globe nomination for his portrayal of producer Max Bialystock in the new film, a role which won him a Tony Award on Broadway.
Double Oscar-winner Hilary Swank has separated from her husband of more than eight years, actor Chad Lowe, the actress's publicist said.
"Hilary and Chad have decided to separate but they are hopeful they'll be able to get through this tough time," Swank's spokesman Troy Nankin said in a statement.
In late October of 1873 the government of Japan decided against sending a military expedition to Korea to force that nation to open trade relations. Across the government supporters of the expedition resigned immediately. The spectacle of revolt by disaffected samurai began to loom over Japanese politics. In January of 1874 disaffected samurai attacked a senior minister in Tokyo. A month later, a group of pro-Korea expedition and anti-foreign elements from Saga prefecture in Kyushu revolted, driven in part by high food prices stemming from poor harvests. Their leader, according to Edward Drea’s classic Japan’s Imperial Army, was a samurai
Located down a sideroad in old Wanhua District (萬華區), Waley Art (水谷藝術) has an established reputation for curating some of the more provocative indie art exhibitions in Taipei. And this month is no exception. Beyond the innocuous facade of a shophouse, the full three stories of the gallery space (including the basement) have been taken over by photographs, installation videos and abstract images courtesy of two creatives who hail from the opposite ends of the earth, Taiwan’s Hsu Yi-ting (許懿婷) and Germany’s Benjamin Janzen. “In 2019, I had an art residency in Europe,” Hsu says. “I met Benjamin in the lobby
April 22 to April 28 The true identity of the mastermind behind the Demon Gang (魔鬼黨) was undoubtedly on the minds of countless schoolchildren in late 1958. In the days leading up to the big reveal, more than 10,000 guesses were sent to Ta Hwa Publishing Co (大華文化社) for a chance to win prizes. The smash success of the comic series Great Battle Against the Demon Gang (大戰魔鬼黨) came as a surprise to author Yeh Hung-chia (葉宏甲), who had long given up on his dream after being jailed for 10 months in 1947 over political cartoons. Protagonist
A fossil jawbone found by a British girl and her father on a beach in Somerset, England belongs to a gigantic marine reptile dating to 202 million years ago that appears to have been among the largest animals ever on Earth. Researchers said on Wednesday the bone, called a surangular, was from a type of ocean-going reptile called an ichthyosaur. Based on its dimensions compared to the same bone in closely related ichthyosaurs, the researchers estimated that the Triassic Period creature, which they named Ichthyotitan severnensis, was between 22-26 meters long. That would make it perhaps the largest-known marine reptile and would