Showing posts with label angelina jolie. Show all posts
Showing posts with label angelina jolie. Show all posts

July 13, 2008

Angelina Jolie gives birth to twins


The obstetrician who delivered the twins, Dr. Michel Sussmann, told The Associated Press that the actress, the babies and Jolie's partner, Brad Pitt, "are doing marvelously well."

Sussmann said Jolie gave birth to a boy, Knox Leon, and a girl, Vivienne Marcheline, by Caesarean section on Saturday night.

He told the AP on Sunday morning that the boy weighed just over 5 pounds and the girl 5 pounds. The 33-year-old actress gave birth at around 8 p.m. on Saturday night, the doctor told the AP by telephone.

Pitt was there during the operation, said the doctor, who delivered the twins at the seaside Lenval hospital in Nice in southern France.

"Everything is going well," said Sussmann. "The mother, the babies, the father are doing marvelously well."

He said the Caesarean was moved forward from its originally planned date "for medical reasons" so that the babies could be born "in the best conditions." Sussman did not give details.

He said Jolie is expected to stay in the hospital for a few more days. The doctor said he believed the baby girl's middle name was chosen in honor of Jolie's mother, actress Marcheline Bertrand, who died in January 2007 after a 7 1/2-year battle with cancer.

Jolie and Pitt already have four children: Maddox, 6; Pax, 4; Zahara, 3, and Shiloh, 2.

Jolie had checked into the hospital late last month to rest and be monitored by her doctor before the birth.

Before that, she, Pitt and their children had moved into a large estate, Miraval, in the French hamlet of Correns, which is just a short helicopter ride from the hospital. Correns is about 60 miles from Nice, a resort on the Mediterranean.

Though the lenses of the world's paparazzi had been trained on maternity wards across the French Riviera, Jolie managed to slip unobserved into the clinic, which has magnificent views of the Mediterranean, reportedly arriving by helicopter on the hospital's rooftop helipad.

Pitt was seen coming and going after Jolie's hospitalization became public.

The first photos of the new twins are expected to fetch millions of dollars.

Paparazzi gathered outside the hospital in Nice on Sunday morning, hoping for a shot of Pitt.

Local newspaper Nice Matin, which first broke news of the birth, reported Sunday that the couple have sold rights for the first photo of their newly enlarged family to a U.S. publication, which it did not name, and that the proceeds would go to charity.

The newspaper gave no source for that information. But the doctor told the AP the couple decided to announce the birth to Nice Matin first because of its links to Nice. The newspaper called the twins "the most famous babies in the world." Read More......

June 30, 2008

Angelina Jolie's Wanted: No. 2 at the Box Office


Angelina Jolie's action thriller Wanted had the best opening ever for an R-rated film released in June and the 6th best opening of all the time for any R-rated film, according to Variety.

But Wanted didn't open at No. 1. WALL-E, the Pixar Animation tale about a robot, opened with $62.5 million in ticket sales, while Jolie's assassin thriller Wanted raked in $51.1 million, the Associated Press reported Sunday.

(See photos of Angelina's most memorable action roles.)

According to the AP, WALL-E drew moviegoers of all ages.

"The real secret is they're not children's movies. They're movies for everybody. Children absolutely adore them, but parents enjoy them on a different level," Mark Zoradi, president of Disney's motion-picture group told the AP.

Nikki Rocco, head of distribution for Universal, told the AP, "We knew WALL-E would be huge, but it's not the same audience as Wanted."

The same New York Times critic who dissed the Sex and the City movie gave Jolie a rave review.

"With her mean smiley-sneer and snug clothes, her heels and hieroglyphics, she cuts the kind of disciplinarian figure who can bring antsy boys of all ages to their knees or at least into their theater seats," Manohla Dargis wrote. Read More......

June 29, 2008

Disney's "WALL-E" wows North American box office




Animation giant Pixar scored its ninth consecutive No. 1 on Sunday with its robot love story "WALL-E," while Angelina Jolie achieved a personal best with her violent assassination thriller "Wanted."

"WALL-E," bolstered by near-unanimous critical praise, sold an estimated $62.5 million of tickets in its first three days, said Pixar's Walt Disney Co parent.

It tied with 2001's "Monsters, Inc." to become Pixar's third-best opener. Pixar has gone to No. 1 with all nine of its movies, an unprecedented run that begin in 1995 with "Toy Story."

The company record of $70.5 million was set in 2004 by "The Incredibles." Industry pundits had forecast an opening for "WALL-E" in the $50 million to $60 million range.

"Anything north of 60 (million dollars), we were going to be ecstatic," said Mark Zoradi, president of Walt Disney Studios Motion Picture Group.

Meanwhile Jolie, whose career has been overshadowed in recent years by breathless tabloid coverage of her personal life, kicked off at No. 2 with "Wanted." The Universal Pictures release earned about $51.1 million, easily beating forecasts of an opening in the mid- to high-$30 million range.

Her previous record for a live-action movie was 2005's "Mr. & Mrs. Smith," which opened to $50 million. The General Electric Co-owned studio said "Wanted" ranks as the third-highest opening for an R-rated action film, behind "The Matrix Reloaded ($91.7 million) and "300" ($70.9 million).

SALES SOAR

"WALL-E" and "Wanted," clearly aimed at disparate audiences, helped pushed overall sales to their highest level of the year, said tracking firm Media By Numbers. The top 12 films grossed $179 million, up 29 percent from last weekend, and up 20 percent from the year-ago period, when Pixar's "Ratatouille" opened at No. 1 with $47 million on its way to $206 million.

Last weekend's champion, the Warner Bros spy comedy "Get Smart," slipped to No. 3 with $20 million, taking its 10-day haul to $77.3 million. The film, which stars Steve Carell as the inept hero Maxwell Smart, should finish up with about $130 million, said the Time Warner Inc-owned studio.

Rounding out the top five, Pixar rival DreamWorks Animation SKG Inc's "Kung Fu Panda" slipped one to No. 4 with $11.7 million, taking its total to $179.3 million. The film opened four weeks ago to $60.2 million.

Marvel Entertainment Inc's "The Incredible Hulk" fell three to No. 5 with $9.2 million. The superhero adaptation has earned $115.5 million after three weeks, roughly on par with its unloved 2003 predecessor "The Hulk."

"WALL-E," a space adventure mixing an unusual love story with somber messages about the future of Earth and humankind, was directed by Andrew Stanton, who won an Academy Award for Pixar's 2003 hit "Finding Nemo."

The title character, or Waste Allocation Load Lifter Earth-Class, is the last of a cadre of robots tasked with cleaning up piles of trash discarded by humans who abandoned the planet centuries before.

The human race set off on a luxury space cruise during a planned five-year clean-up that lasts much longer and results in unfortunate changes in the human physique and psyche.

The arrival of a sleek girl robot named Eve, sent to Earth by the orbiting humans to look for plant life, sends Wall-E on an adventure that changes his own and humanity's destinies.

Critics heaped praise on the film. According to Rotten Tomatoes, a Web site that collects reviews, an astonishing 96 percent of critics liked the film.

Disney's Zoradi said "WALL-E" was not a conventional cartoon, but the studio was "confident from the get-go" that it would work. He declined to reveal the film's budget, in line with Disney's policy.

"WALL-E" also opened at No. 1 in six small foreign markets, led by Brazil with $1.6 million, Zoradi said. It will reach Russia and Mexico next weekend, followed by the U.K. in mid-July, timed with the school holidays in each market. Read More......