Thfire.com – iNews

Twilight tops box office!

Vampires and werewolves ruled at the box office this Fourth of July weekend, with Summit Entertainment’s third installment of “The Twilight Saga” taking in $161.7 million since opening Wednesday.

That’s one of the biggest five-day debuts in Hollywood history, previously surpassed by just a handful of films including “The Dark Knight” and last summer’s sequel to “Transformers.”

After Monday, “Eclipse” is expected to gross around $181 million for the six-day holiday total.

The teen vampire franchise has pulled in major profits for its studio, Summit. A small independent studio in Hollywood, Summit spent just $68 million making “Eclipse,” far less than what many rival studios spend on summer blockbusters, which can cost as much as $150 million or $200 million.

“Eclipse” also helped boost the summer box office, which has trailed behind last year’s record-shattering revenue after a series of movies opened tepidly or flopped at the box office. Still, even with “Eclipse’s” performance, attendance continues to be down nearly 7% compared with last summer and revenue stands slightly lower, too.

Paramount Pictures’ “The Last Airbender,” a 3-D live-action adaptation based on a popular Nickelodeon cartoon, took the second spot at the box office this weekend, grossing $53.2 million since opening Thursday.

That figure stands in line with expectations after the film received poor reviews, but the movie has a long way to go before Paramount can recoup the roughly $150 million it spent on the movie, which the studio also paid to convert into 3-D earlier this year.

The film is, however, estimated to take in more than $70 million after Monday, significantly upping its total.

Source : WSJ.com.

Abby Sunderland may have just set the country on fire by being lost at sea. We all know how important it is for an AMERICAN like her to go missing. The 16-yr old is trying to become the youngest to ever sail around the world:

TV satellite trucks were beginning to gather outside the modest Thousand Oaks home…… where teen sailor Abby Sunderland lives with her parents. Occasionally, reporters would knock on the front door of the home covered with ivy and geranium. But no one answered.

Students from nearby Thousand Oaks high school walked down the street wondering why news trucks were here. Gage Guzman, 17, said he hoped that Abby would be found safe. “She’s younger than me and she’s sailing around the world, and by herself, that’s even crazier,” he said. “She’s brave, I don’t even go into the ocean by myself.”

Guzman’s younger brother, Shawn, 15, said he didn’t think her attempt to sail around the world was reckless. “If it’s her dream to sail, and she wants to follow her dream, that’s courageous. “

Sunderland, out of necessity, abandoned her quest to become the youngest person to sail around the world alone, nonstop and unassisted. However, the 16-year-old was continuing her mission to become the youngest person to sail around the world.

Sailing experts said the Southern Indian Ocean where Sunderland was sailing when she apparently signaled emergency beacon locating devices on Thursday is known to be a difficult challenge. Charlie Nobles, executive director of the American Sailing Assn., said that winter storms in the Southern Hemisphere are fast approaching, creating rough waves that can reach dozens of feet high. He also said that there are fewer hours of light during the day, which can make navigating the waters difficult.

“There’s just not a lot of land in that part of the world,” Nobles said. “You have to follow certain patterns because you need the trade winds. Where she is right now is in between Australia and South Africa.”

Sailors had criticized Sunderland for leaving so late in the year for her journey. She departed from Marina del Rey on Jan. 23, later than she had wanted to because of equipment issues. She also had to make a stop in Mexico to make repairs, which wasted precious time before the approaching winter southern storms.

Nobles said that sailing around Cape Horn between South America and the Antarctic Peninsula was speculated to be Sunderland’s greatest challenge. But she rounded the cape in April without many issues, he said.

“A lot of people talk about the Horn because that’s what you hear about in National Geographic specials,” Nobles said. “But it wasn’t that big of a deal, fortunately, for her.”

Shortly after setting sail, Sunderland abandoned her quest to become the youngest person to sail around the world alone, without any stops or assistance.

“I don’t know enough facts to know whether this is something she necessarily could have avoided or if it was a bad decision,” Nobles said. “My hope was that if she was at a certain point in her journey, she would say, ‘I’m less concerned about a record than to try to make it through safely.’ “

Abby Sunderland’s brother, Zac, last year completed his solo sail around the world at age 17.

Sunderland’s latest entry on her blog Wednesday described hitting rough weather and winds at 45 knots. “Wild Eyes was great through everything, but after a day with over 50 knots at times, I had quite a bit of work to do,” she wrote about her vessel.

Her parents have said in news reports that they had persuaded Abby to get to the nearest port in the event that dangerous conditions arose.

Someone better get Obama on the phone…

Source

The Guild Season 3

The Glide is back! Yep, your favorite web series is back on a whole new season. It premieres today on Xbox Live. It will be avaiable for download next week!

The prevous two seasons were a huge success as fans were able to enjoy the shows from the comfort of their Xbox anytime they want to even if they missed the episodes. The Season 3 will also be the same, you can watch them on you Xbox Gaming Console.

You can download and watch all the previous episodes from http://www.watchtheguild.com/. Ofcourse from the infamous YouTube too. You can also buy the DVDs online.

‘The Guild,’ created by Felicia Day, follows a group of online gamers who end up interacting with each other in hilarious and sometimes heartbreaking ways “offline”, i.e. in the real world.  The show recently created huge buzz by releasing a music video to the Felicia Day/Jed Whedon-penned song ‘(Do You Wanna Date My) Avatar,’ which, as of this writing, has received over 2 million views in less than one week.