Catherine Bell gets North Island NDP nomination

Following the nomination meeting in Courtenay Wednesday evening Vancouver Island North NDP riding president Jerry West said "Jack Layton and the NDP caucus in Ottawa are working hard to keep Parliament focused on helping Canadians get through these hard economic times. Not everyone shares that philosophy so they have to be ready should the government fall. They are looking forward to re-electing Catherine Bell to be our MP when the time comes."

Former Vancouver Island North MP Catherine Bell has been nominated to represent the NDP again should an election be called.

Bell was not challenged in the nomination routine. In her speech to party members they commented: "I am proud to be your candidate again and I look forward to talking to everyone in Vancouver Island North about the record of the Conservative government beginning with the Harper Sales Tax."

"I call it the Harper Sales Tax because the Conservatives announced in their 2009 budget that they would be working to convince provinces like BC that still had retail sales tax systems to move to an HST system. Harper bribed BC with $1.6 billion to do it.

"The NDP continues to be the effective opposition to the Harper Conservatives. The NDP has consistently held the government to account while at the same time providing leadership in the House of Commons by passing motions to protect pensions, finish credit card gouging, and reform the EI system so all Canadians who have paid premiums for years can use the insurance if they need to.

"What Harper's tax calls for is the most profound shift of the tax burden from corporations to average Canadians ever known in our history.

"That's what insurance is for right? Wrong! Thanks to the Liberals and Conservatives the EI system is something they all pay in to but that only four in 10 workers, three in 10 women workers, are currently able to access."

Bell, who lives in Cumberland, represented the riding in Ottawa from January 2006 to October 2008.

While in office they held the NDP caucus critic portfolios for Natural Resources and Western Economic Diversification and was deputy critic for Fisheries, with responsibility for West Coast Fisheries.

Bell narrowly lost to incumbent John Duncan in 2004, and narrowly defeated him in 2006 before losing to him roughly a year ago.

Bell was vice-chair of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Natural Resources also a member of the Canada Cuba Interparliamentary Association. In Parliament Bell introduced private members bills on: Electoral Reform, EI Reform, Oceans Day, Labour Code Amendments, the Nuclear Safety and Control Act, and amendments to the Canada Shipping Act to prohibit oil tankers in Dixon entrance, Hecate Strait and Queen Charlotte Sound.

Britney Spears Looking Good Out by The Pool

Britney Spears has been showing off her body a lot lately and she's looking hot as ever in a bikini here. She's hanging out at a hotel pool somewhere soaking in the sun. If there's one thing I love, it's a tanned curvy body, and if you add on the fact that she is a rich celebrity it makes it even better. I don't know how Britney rebounded from all that craziness she was tied up with but whatever she did it worked and she is looking sexy as hell lately. You won't find more celebrity smut anywhere else than the king of sex tapes and scandals

Audrina Patridge Shopping For Bikinis

Here is Audrina Patridge prancing around in a black bikini while shopping for more bikinis earlier this week in Los Angles. Its the middle of Decemeber and The Hills star is obssessed about bikinis. Well at least we will get to see her soon showing off those new bikinis!

Carrie Underwood gyrates in 'Cowboy Casanova' video

She seemed like such a lovely girl when they was on "American Idol" a hundred years ago, but here's Carrie Underwood in the video for "Cowboy Casanova" sporting an outfit that is a cross between something "Gunsmoke's" saloon-proprietor Miss Kitty and Lady GaGa would wear.

They only see the "Cowboy Casanova" in query lurking in the shadows and he's straight out of central casting for Michael Jackson's "Smooth Criminal"; they would not know the front finish of the horse if it bit him on the ass. (They still maintain the song's intro rips off MJ's "The Way They Makes Me Feel"). Bad casting on that finish.

In fact, the whole video is a visual feast, but seems off as after repeated viewings, they cannot figure out if it is supposed to take place in a high-placed bordello or what is going on. And, Underwood looks stunning in a variety of scanty outfits (which is, of work, the only point that matters here), but they seems uncomfortable gyrating around as they strikes three awkward pose after




By:hit fix.com

Laetitia Casta Expecting Third Child

What a belly! Model Laetitia Casta makes it abundantly clear that another baby is on the way on Saturday at the 62nd Annual Cannes Film Festival. Held at the Palais des Festivals, Laetitia, 31, posed at the Face photocall.

Laetitia is already mom to son Orlando, 2 ½, with partner Stefano Accorsi, an Italian actor, and daughter Sahteene, 7 ½, with ex Stéphane Sednaoui.

The new baby is reportedly due in August.

Laetitia Casta and Stefano Accorsi in Givenchy by Riccardo Tisci

CANNES, France, May 23 /PRNewswire/

The actress Laetitia Casta chose the Couture House Givenchy for the Red Carpet of her new film 'Face' by Tsai Ming-Liang.

The Givenchy Haute couture by Riccardo Tisci dress was made especially for this occasion.



Long dress in black stretch silk crepe embroidered with geometric black jet stones.

Worn with matching embroidered sandals and two studded cuffs in black leather.

The actor Stefano Accorsi wore a black tuxedo outfit from Spring Summer 2009 Men's Collection Givenchy by Riccardo Tisci.

French 'Prophet' leads race at Cannes

By Emma Charlton – May 23, 2009

CANNES, France (AFP) — A gripping French prison drama led the pack of contenders Saturday for Cannes' coveted Palme d'Or as the 12-day film frenzy headed into its finale with a row over gothic thriller "AntiChrist."

As the jury set about picking the best of the 20 films from the world's top directors, festival director Thierry Fremaux denounced an "anti-prize" attributed to the film by Denmark's Lars Von Trier for alleged misogyny.

The gong, from a Ecumenical Jury which each year hands out a prize to a Cannes film celebrating spiritual values, was slammed by Fremaux as a "ridiculous decision that borders on a call for censorship."

"AntiChrist," which closes with a shot of a clitoris being sliced off with rusty scissors, provoked jeers and gasps and caused at least four people to faint at a press screening this week.

The top Palme d'Or prize was due to be awarded at a gala ceremony on Sunday.

Bleak prison drama "A Prophet" by France's Jacques Audiard, about a six-year jail sentence for an Arab youth that turns into an education in crime, remained the hottest ticket in Cannes, according to a foreign critics panel.

A win for Audiard would be a triumph for French cinema, a year after high-school docu-fiction "The Class" became the first French movie in more than two decades to pick up the Palme.

But foreign critics also gave a frontrunner slot to Austrian director Michael Haneke's "The White Ribbon", a chilling black-and-white portrait of a Protestant German village on the eve of the World War I.

Haneke's stark drama, which kept critics glued to their seats, ranks second alongside Jane Campion's ode to John Keats, "Bright Star", according to a critics' panel in trade magazine Screen.

Critics were also impressed by Pedro Almodovar's drama "Broken Embraces" and Ken Loach's feelgood football comedy "Looking for Eric."

That film scored an early goal Saturday by picking up the Ecumenical Jury's official prize.

French reviewers meanwhile had high hopes for veteran director Alain Resnais for "Wild Grass" and for Quentin Tarantino's Nazi-slaying caper "Inglourious Basterds."

Closing the official competition late Saturday, Spain's Isabel Coixet takes viewers on a trip around the Japanese capital in "Map of the Sounds of Tokyo," about a young woman's double life as contract-killer and fishmarket worker.

The seedier side of Tokyo was also on display Friday in the new film by France's Gaspar Noe, "Enter the Void," a psychedelic trip to the afterlife that provoked a love-it-or-hate-it reaction from Cannes audiences.

Seven years after a rape scene in his previous film "Irreversible" sparked walk-outs in Cannes, Noe's new work follows a young American drug dealer's journey after death.

The film takes in its stride Eastern concepts about sex and reincarnation, as the character's spirit leaves his body to retrace his life and watch over his stripper sister.

Palestinian director Elia Suleiman also unveiled "The Time that Remains," a bitter-sweet farce on his family and the history of the Israeli Arabs, inspired by the diaries and letters of his mother and resistance fighter father.

For the festival finale, the Paris Louvre offered its first foray into film production, an arthouse work by Malaysian-born Taiwan director Tsai Ming Liang, but the movie flopped at a preview ahead of its Saturday premiere.

"Visage" (Face) is about a Taiwan director making a film at the Louvre based on the myth of Salome and is intended as tribute to French New Wave cinema.

But the film's series of static tableaux -- played by a French cast including top model Laetitia Casta and Jean-Pierre Leaud, who starred in New Wave classic "The 400 blows", fell flat.

L’Oreal on Ash-Sonam War

The Aishwarya Rai Bachchan – Sonam Kapoor L’Oreal-Cannes-Red Carpet War seems to have gone from bad to worse. As a quick reminder, Kapoor, who is the new youth face for L’Oreal, was scheduled to the join the likes of Aishwarya, Penelope Cruz, Naomi Lenoir, Andie MacDowell, Beyonce Knowles, Laetitia Casta, Kerry Washington, Milla Jovovich, Michelle Yeoh, Eva Longoria and Scarlett Johansson on the red carpet at the Cannes Film Festival. However, if stories are to be believed, Ash was not pleased by L’Oreal’s decision to include young and beautiful Sonam in the festival claiming that Kapoor was the “Indian representative” while Ash was the international face. And thus, Kapoor was told to stay home instead.


After careful observation, L’Oreal issued the following Press Release on the 16th of May attempting to clear all misinterpretations:

“We do not want to take part in or encourage any controversy involving our spokespeople. There were adverse reports in certain sections of media after some comments by Sonam Kapoor, which were presented out of context.

Following this, in order to avoid further escalation, we have advised Sonam not to go to Cannes as was planned earlier, bearing in mind that there would be more interesting opportunities for future appearances in Europe for her. L'Oreal is extremely mindful of protecting the image of its spokespeople, in the same way as it expects them to respect its own image. L'Oreal celebrates its 100th year of beauty this June and prides itself in the beauty and diversity of its spokespeople worldwide.”

Louvre film-making foray flops in Cannes

CANNES, France (AFP) — The Louvre's first foray into film production, "Visage" shot by Taiwan director Tsai Ming-Liang, flopped at a Cannes screening on Saturday with half the audience walking out.

The first of a new set of works produced by the Paris museum, imagined as a tribute to French New Wave cinema, "Visage" (Face) is about a Taiwanese director shooting a film at the Paris museum based on the myth of Salome.

"I make my films rather like a painter," Tsai told reporters after a preview of the movie, the 19th of 20 films running for the festival's Palme d'Or, with a star-studded French cast including the model Laetitia Casta.

"Image is always something absolutely central to me as a director," said the Malaysian-born Taiwan director, who used the Louvre's Renaissance collections as a starting point for the film, which gets a gala screening later Saturday.

But despite rich visuals and some quirky song-and-dance routines, the mostly static series of tableaux failed to impress, with much of the press audience leaving before the end and a smattering of applause from those that stayed.

"Although it occasionally sports a pretty 'Face', Tsai Ming-Liang's laborious Francophone feature winds up seriously irritating the skin without ever actually getting under it," Variety wrote.

"Only diehard fans will hark to this strictly arthouse item, which reps a shaky cinematic debut for Gaul's foremost house of art."

Much of the French press was scathing, with the exception of the left-wing Liberation which found the film and its lead actress Casta visually "dazzling".

The Louvre supported the writing and production of Tsai's "Visage," which kicks off a fiction film initiative, following similar ventures with writers and musicians, from American Toni Morrison to France's Pierre Boulez.

"In all of his works there is a real reflexion on images, on painting, on memory, themes that are closely related to the Louvre," the museum's director Henri Loyrette told AFP.

"The aim was not to make money. We would have chosen something different if it was a commercial project."

The director of "The Wayward Cloud" said the Louvre's collections were a great source of inspiration for his 10th film, but admitted the invitation to make a film for the museum was "like an enormous weight, an enormous stone."

Kardashian Ladies Chow Down with Vera Wang

Kicking off their week with a delicious dinner out, Kim, Kourtney, and Khloe Kardashian, along with mom Kris Jenner were all spotted at Mr. Chow last night (March 23).
The “Keeping Up with the Kardashians” ladies all looked excited to be out with fashion designer Vera Wang, smiling and laughing as they passed the paparazzi while saying their goodbyes.
In related news, Kim recently told press that she’s tired of people pretending to be her on Twitter. “There’s so many fake (Kims) that are going around Twittering, saying all this crazy stuff that it really bothers me. So, I’ve been e-mailing the Twitter people. I’ve had everyone I know try and get a hold of someone to have them delete it. But, no one at Twitter has gotten back to us. We’ve tried to e-mail you guys like 10 times. Why won’t anyone respond!?”
She continued, “They’re just like e-mailing messages to my friends, and my friends at first thought it was me and then they got a little inappropriate and they were like, ‘Kim would never talk like that!’”