Sideshow: A lucrative 'Lorax' weekend at box office
Dr. Seuss' The Lorax raked in all kinds of green, earning $70.7 million in its first weekend to score the biggest box-office debut of the year. The 3-D animated family film, featuring the voices of Danny DeVito, Zac Efron, and Taylor Swift, is based on Seuss' cautionary fable about the importance of preserving the environment. Of its opening haul, $5.4 million, or 8 percent, came from IMAX screens, on the high side for a family film.
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Dr. Seuss' The Lorax raked in all kinds of green, earning $70.7 million in its first weekend to score the biggest box-office debut of the year. The 3-D animated family film, featuring the voices of Danny DeVito, Zac Efron, and Taylor Swift, is based on Seuss' cautionary fable about the importance of preserving the environment. Of its opening haul, $5.4 million, or 8 percent, came from IMAX screens, on the high side for a family film.
In second place was the R-rated Project X, about a trio of high school misfits who throw a raging party, which made about $20.8 million, according to studio estimates.
The Lorax, from the makers of Despicable Me, easily beat the prior best debut of 2012, The Vow, with $41.2 million. The Lorax also scored the biggest opening for a Dr. Seuss adaptation, topping the $55.1 million made in 2000 by How the Grinch Stole Christmas. - AP
Pippa skis for seven hours
Pippa Middleton completed a 56-mile cross-country ski marathon in Sweden, taking a respectable 412th place in the women's category. The sister of the Duchess of Cambridge - the former Kate Middleton - finished the Vasaloppet ski race in 7 hours, 13:36 minutes, alongside 15,800 competitors. Middleton told Swedish broadcaster SVT she had prepared for the race for "a couple of weekends" and conceded it was tiring.
Pippa and her brother James, who clocked 6:47:27, raced to raise money for a children's charity. The competition is one of the world's oldest cross-country races and is based on Gustav Vasa's attempt to gather peasants for a revolt against occupying Danes in 1522. - AP
Wounded bullfighter returns
A Spanish bullfighter who lost sight in one eye and has partial facial paralysis after a terrifying goring returned to the bullring in Olivenza on Sunday, five months after his injury. On Oct. 8, a bull's horn ripped into Juan Jose Padilla's lower jaw and caused his left eyeball to protrude as horrified spectators screamed.
Wearing an eye patch and speaking with a lisp, the 38-year-old Padilla, known as "the Cyclone of Jerez," killed three bulls and was carried out of the ring triumphantly on the shoulders of fellow bullfighters.
- AP