After a huge Friday opening, "The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey" continued to shine at the box office, making $84.7 million across 4,045 theaters this weekend. THR reports that this total makes "The Hobbit" the highest December weekend gross ever. The Peter Jackson film beat out former record holder, "I Am Legend," which made $77.2 million over its opening weekend in 2007. Starring Martin Freeman and Ian McKellen, "The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey" also received an A CinemaScore from audiences
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"Rise of the Guardians" and "Lincoln" made significantly less than "The Hobbit," but took the number two and three spots, respectively. Holiday flick "Rise of the Guardians" made $7.4 million across 3,387 theaters this weekend. The animated DreamWorks film has made $71.3 million to date. Daniel Day-Lewis' "Lincoln," saw a weekend total of $7.2 million, bringing its domestic gross to $107.8 million.

Other films that saw box office success were "Skyfall" and "Life of Pi," coming in at number four and five, respectively. "Skyfall" made $7 million this weekend, for a total domestic gross of $272.3 million. Worldwide, "Skyfall" has now made $951 million. Ang Lee's "Life of Pi" brought in $5.4 million, for a total of $69.5 million since its release.

Absent from the list is the latest "Twilight" movie, "The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part 2," which slipped out of the top five for the first time. "Twilight" made $5.1 million, making its total domestic gross $276.8 million.

 Jason Sudeikis and Olivia Wilde (above in October) had a dispute over her text messages, a source says.

Olivia Wilde and Jason Sudeikis’ relationship is better suited for a funeral pyre than a wedding aisle.

Despite rumors that the comedic couple are secretly on their way to the altar, a well-placed source tells Confidenti@l that Wilde and Sudeikis are on “a rocky road” after more than a year together.

The insider says around Thanksgiving weekend, when the couple were in New York City together for the holiday, “they got into a fight over text messages [Jason] found on [Olivia’s] phone.”

“It’s been rough,” said the source, who says the marriage rumors didn’t come from thin air: The “Saturday Night Live” stud, previously linked with “Mad Men” actress January Jones, was close to popping the question to Wilde.


“They’re still talking,” says the source, who says “it’s a rocky road.” But contact between them “has not been cut.”

In early October, Olivia, 28, confessed she was just Wilde about Sudeikis at “These Girls,” an evening of monologues by women in New York hosted by Glamour magazine.

The stunning actress confessed she was “blissfully, hopefully, wildly in love” with the 37-year-old actor, comparing the relationship to her failed marriage with ex-hubby Tao Ruspoli, an Italian prince and filmmaker Wilde married when she was 19, and divorced in 2011.

“I felt like my vagina died,” the beauty said of her failed marriage to Ruspoli. With Sudeikis, she boasted that when it comes to life between the sheets, they “have sex like Kenyan marathon runners.”

The pair, who publicly played coy about their relationship in the fall of 2011 before becoming a PDA favorite of the paparazzi, both have busy schedules in 2013 — but not separately. They’ll appear in “Relanxious,” now in preproduction, about a potential couple stricken with mental ailments.

A spokeswoman for Sudeikis did not return a request for comment. A spokeswoman for Wilde says: “They are very happy together. They are not engaged.”

Anne Hathaway forgot an important essential for her Dec. 10, 2012 "Les Miserables" premiere in New York ... underwear! The actress ended up flashing a bit too much of herself while arriving at the Ziegfeld Theatre.
She dreamed a dream all right — that she remembered to wear panties. But superstar Anne Hathaway didn’t and her “Les Misérables” premiere turned into a nightmare after the paparazzi caught an embarrassing Britney-type wardrobe malfunction.
The “Full Hathaway” revelation was a shocking break from her flawless looks, and came hours after the actress left a taping of the “Late Show with David Letterman” looking stunning in red. During a luncheon Tuesday at the Four Seasons, Hathaway was overheard moaning about her mishap in the black taffeta Tom Ford gown.

“I was getting out of the car and my dress was so tight that I didn’t realize it until I saw all the photographers’ flashes,” she told Vanity Fair writer Ingrid Sischy.
“It was devastating. They saw everything. I might as well have lifted up my skirt for them.”

The “Devil Wears Prada” beauty, well on her way to being a Meryl, accidentally pulled the Britney when she attempted to seamlessly exit her black SUV with the help of a bodyguard who reached for her delicate hand upon arrival. But — oops! — as she swung both of her bondage-inspired boots toward the curb, her thigh-slit dress fell open and she flashed her lady parts.


Was her longtime stylist Rachel Zoe behind the mishap? Or was Hathaway just trying to avoid lines under her slim-fitting gown? Alexis Bryan Morgan, executive fashion director at Lucky magazine, says the incident was “shocking and unfortunate” because Hathaway is always “very pulled together.” Morgan said Hathaway could have avoided the problem.


“It’s so much better to be caught in Spanx,” Morgan says. “If you’re not looking for shaping I recommend the Commando brand. It’s hands down the best. It’s seamless and raw cut.” She also recommends Spanx Simplicity High-Waisted Girl Short.

“The fabric is slinky and seamless, and if your dress flies up you’re not naked,” she says. “Her dress had ruching, I don’t know why she felt she needed to go commando.”

If Hathaway still prefers going pantyless, Patricia Fitzpatrick, founder and director of the Etiquette School of New York, offers a solution: “Even Kate Middleton has shown her underwear with her legs spread apart. To prevent it, before you get out, you put your knees together and then you bring them up and out and swing them over the side of the car out to the curb.”
“Knees together girls!” Fitzpatrick says. “When you’re sitting, you sit with your knees touching.”
A classy recovery helps also.

“Do like Kate Middleton. Don’t even answer questions about it and go on your way if it happens.”
And she threw in one final solution: “Wear underwear.”
Representatives for Hathaway and Zoe did not return requests for comment.

Amy Winehouse made a point of never drinking in front of her family. She knew she was an alcoholic and hated the fact. She told them she couldn’t bear how it made her feel, and what it was doing to her — but she promised them that she was going to stop.

Just as the 27-year-old-star had, in 2008, seemingly single-handedly conquered her life-threatening addiction to drugs, so she seemed determined to do the same with drink.

But she made it clear she wanted to do it on her own terms and in her own time, without interference. Taking the words of her favourite Frank Sinatra song, she told her family she wanted to do it ‘My Way’.

Amy’s mother Janis, 56, dabs at her eyes with a tissue as she remembers her daughter’s utter conviction. ‘I think Amy felt she was invincible,’ says Janis, in her first interview following last week’s inquest into the Grammy Award-winning star’s death on July 23.

‘Amy didn’t want to die; she didn’t have a death wish. She had a huge zest for life. There was so much she still wanted to achieve.

‘Amy was incredibly strong, both physically and mentally, but alcohol addiction seemed to creep up on her and then just took her by surprise.’

Three empty vodka bottles were found near Amy’s body in her bedroom, and a pathologist who examined her body said she had 416mg of alcohol per decilitre of blood — five times the legal drink-drive limit of 80mg. The inquest heard that 350mg was usually considered a fatal amount, and that Amy’s binge-drinking session had followed three weeks of sobriety. Small traces of Librium, used to treat alcohol withdrawal, were found in her blood, but no illegal drugs.

Janis, who visited her daughter at her Camden home in North London once or twice a week, adds: ‘When I left, she threw her arms around me and said, “I love you, Mummy,” and I said, “I love you too.” I never imagined for a second that would be the last time I would ever see her.’

Later that evening, at 7pm, Amy’s private GP, Christina Romete, saw the singer, who by then appeared slightly tipsy but still coherent. Ms Romete told the inquest she did not believe the star had deliberately drunk herself to death.

Amy, who won five Grammy Awards for her 2006 album Back to Black, told her GP: ‘I do not want to die . . . I have not achieved a lot of the things I wanted.’

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk

Teacher Victoria Soto used her body to shield her students from the maniacal gunman who launched a massacre at a Connecticut school, relatives said Saturday.

Soto paid for her bravery with her life. But in doing so, the 27-year-old may have saved her first-graders from the murderous wrath of Adam Lanza — and became a hero.

“The family received information she was found shielding her students in a closet,” Soto’s cousin Jim Wiltsie told the Daily News. “She put herself between the gunman and her students.”

Wiltsie said police told the family of Soto’s bravery at Sandy Hook Elementary School.

“I’m very proud to report she was a hero,” said Wiltsie, who is a police officer in Fairfield, Conn. “I would expect nothing less from Vicki. Instinctively her training kicked in. She did what she was trained to do, but also what her heart told her to do.”

 “She absolutely adored her family, a very close-knit family,” Wiltsie said. “She was the ringleader of the bunch. They had just done secret Santa. She always took charge.”

Soto lived with her parents, her sisters and a brother in Stratford, Conn. Home was a modest Cape Cod-style house in a blue-collar neighborhood. She was single, doted on her black Labrador, Roxy, and was a regular worshiper at the Lordship Community Church in Stratford.

Her mom, Donna, has worked as a nurse at Bridgeport Hospital for 30 years. Her dad, Carlos, is a crane operator for the state’s Department of Transportation.

Vicki, as everybody called her, was the apple of her father’s eye. And it was left to him to formally identify his daughter’s body.

Observing that women with the most severe form of endometriosis happen to be unusually attractive, researchers in Italy speculate that the qualities that led to the women's good looks also predisposed them to the painful gynecological condition.

In the study, independent observers rated 31 percent of women with severe endometriosis as attractive or very attractive, while just 8 percent of women with milder endometriosis, and 9 percent of women without the condition were rated that highly.
"Several researchers believe that a general phenotype exists which is associated with the disease," said study researcher Dr. Paolo Vercellini, an obstetrician and gynecologist at Universita degli Studi in Milan.

It may be that a more feminine body type is the result of the same physical characteristics that predispose women to develop severe endometriosis, Vercellini said.

Female attractiveness is linked with higher estrogen levels, and it's possible that the hormone "might favor the development of aggressive and infiltrating endometriotic lesions, particularly in the most feminine subjects," the researchers wrote in their study.

The study was published online Sept. 17 in the journal Fertility and Sterility.

A more feminine silhouette
In endometriosis, cells that normally line the uterus leave the organ and become deposited in other sites within the body, such as on the ovaries, rectum, bladder or pelvic area. These deposits respond the same way as normal uterine cells do to the hormone changes that occur over a woman's monthly cycle — they thicken, and then shrink — which can cause pain in the pelvic region, and bleeding.

Endometriosis is thought to affect 5 to 10 percent of women. The severe form, called rectovaginal endometriosis, is much less common than milder forms, Vercellini said.

In the new study, researchers looked at 100 women with rectovaginal endometriosis, 100 women with less severe endometriosis, and 100 women without endometriosis who were undergoing gynecologic surgery for other reasons. Most of the women in the studies were in their late 20s or early 30s.

Two male and two female doctors who did not know the women's diagnoses met with each woman for a few minutes, and rated her overall attractiveness on a 5-point scale.

Other researchers took measurements of the women, and calculated their body mass indexes, their waist-to-hip ratios, and their "breast-to-underbreast" ratio — a measure of breast size.

Results showed that the women with severe endometriosis had lower body mass indexes, and larger breasts, than those without the disease.

A day after the Newtown massacre, gunman Adam Lanza’s motive – and any personal demons – remained a mystery.

Lanza, 20, was identified by authorities as the black-clad killer who fatally shot his mother, gunned down 26 children and adults at Sandy Hook Elementary School, and then committed suicide on Friday.

His older brother told authorities Lanza had a history of mental problems, but the nature of them was not clear. Former classmates remembered him as a brainy and quiet teen who sometimes wore a pocket protector.

Tim Arnone told Reuters that he first met Lanza at Sandy Hook and attended Newtown High School with him, where the two were members of a technology club. He said Lanza was "driven hard" to succeed academically by his parents, particularly his mother.
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Nancy Lanza and her husband, Peter Lanza, divorced in 2008, according to public records. Peter Lanza could not immediately be reached for comment but has spoken to police.

Joshua Milas, who graduated from Newtown High School in 2009, told The Associated Press that Adam Lanza was generally a happy person but that he hadn't seen him in a few years.

"We would hang out, and he was a good kid. He was smart," Joshua Milas said. "He was probably one of the smartest kids I know."

Catherine Urso, of Newtown, told the Associated Press her college-age son knew Lanza. "He just said he was very thin, very remote and was one of the Goths," she said.

Law enforcement officials initially told NBC News that the gunman was Lanza's brother, Ryan, and they had sent out a bulletin to local and federal law enforcement agencies to that effect.

But when authorities went to Ryan's home in Hoboken, N.J., to search it, they unexpectedly found him there.

Ryan told police he was not involved and that his brother has a history of mental health issues and might have had his ID even though they had not seen each other in two years, officials said.

A senior official later said that Ryan was nowhere near the shooting, was not believed to be involved, and was cooperating with the investigation.