The underdog Philadelphia Eagles defeated the New England Patriots 41-33 in Minneapolis, Minnesota to win the 52nd edition of the U.S. National Football League’s annual Super Bowl championship.

The win gave the Eagles, representing the National Football Conference, their first-ever Super Bowl trophy after two previous appearances. 

Eagles quarterback Nick Foles, who was a backup this season until star quarterback Carson Wentz suffered a season-ending knee injury in week 14, was named the game’s Most Valuable Player, throwing for three touchdowns and 341 meters, including a touchdown pass to receiver Zach Ertz late in the fourth quarter that gave the Eagles the lead for good. Foles even caught a touchdown pass on a trick play in the second quarter, making him the first player in Super Bowl history to both throw for and catch a touchdown in the same game.

The Eagles lost the 1981 Super Bowl to the Oakland Raiders and the 2005 game to New England. The franchise’s last NFL championship came in 1960 — seven years before the first Super Bowl game.

The Patriots, guided by future Hall-of-Fame head coach Bill Belichick and future Hall-of-Fame quarterback Tom Brady, were seeking their second consecutive Vince Lombardi trophy and their sixth overall in Brady’s 16 seasons with New England.

The 40-year-old Brady, a three-time Super Bowl MVP, shredded Philadelphia’s defensive secondary for a playoff record 462 meters and three touchdowns, and was poised to lead New England on another game-winning drive after the Eagles’s final touchdown. But Eagles defensive end Brandon Graham stripped Brady of the ball and teammate Derek Barnett recovered it.

The game saw a record 1,052 meters of offense by both teams.

After Philadelphia rookie place-kicker Jake Elliot hit a 46-yard field goal to put the Eagles ahead 41-33 with just over a minute left in regulation, Brady stepped on the field for one last drive to potentially send the game into overtime. But a final deep pass to the end zone fell incomplete as time ran out.

Brady says he plans to return next year to try for a seventh title. Foles will likely return to a backup role under Wentz, one of the game’s rising stars.
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From: MeNeedIt

The heir to “Titanic” is … “Jumanji: Welcome the Jungle”?

For the first time since James Cameron’s 1998 disaster epic, a December release has topped the weekend box office in February. Seven weeks after first opening in theaters, Sony Pictures’ “Jumanji” again took the top spot at the North American box office with an estimated $11 million in ticket sales, according to studio estimates Sunday.

On a sluggish Super Bowl weekend, that was good enough to surpass last week’s no. 1 film, “Maze Runner: The Death Cure.” The third installment in the YA trilogy slid 58 percent in its second week with $10.2 million in ticket sales. Though “The Death Cure” is behind the pace of the first two “Maze Runner” films, it’s made $142.9 million overseas, including an international-best $35.2 million this weekend.

But it’s the fourth weekend out of seven in which the “Jumanji” reboot, starring Dwayne Johnson and Kevin Hart, has led all films domestically. It has carved an unlikely path on route to its record-setting run. Met with little initial fanfare, “Jumanji” played second fiddle for its first two weeks of release to “Star Wars: The Last Jedi.”

But riding good word of mouth and relatively little family-film competition, “Jumanji” has become one of Sony’s biggest hits ever, ranking behind only its “Spider-Man” films. It has now grossed $352.6 million in the U.S. and Canada.

The Helen Mirren-led haunted-house horror film “Winchester” was the sole new wide release on a weekend that Hollywood typically cedes to football. The poorly reviewed Lionsgate-CBS Films release, about the true-life tale of the 19th-century heiress Sarah Winchester, opened with $9.3 million.

Total ticket sales were $92 million, according to comScore, a sum that falls behind recent Super Bowl weekends – always among the quietest movie weekends of the year – but above the lowest grossing ever.

Hollywood will instead be largely focused on the trailers debuting during Sunday’s NFL broadcast. About a dozen films will hope to capitalize on the largest U.S. broadcast of the year with high-priced commercial spots intended to raise the awareness of upcoming spring releases and some of the summer’s biggest would-be blockbusters.

Disney hasn’t announced plans, but “Star Wars” fans are hoping to see a spot for the Han Solo spinoff. More likely on tap are ads for “Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom,” Jennifer Lawrence’s “Red Sparrow,” Tom Cruise’s “Mission: Impossible – Fallout” and another potential hit for Dwayne Johnson: “Skyscraper.”

And for the first time, Fox Searchlight had films playing in 4,000 or more theaters, thanks to its Oscar favorites “The Shape of Water” and “Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri.” Guillermo del Toro’s “The Shape of Water,” which took the top honor at the Directors Guild Awards on Saturday, boosted its theater count from 1,854 to 2,341. The leading Oscar nominee with 13 nods, “The Shape of Water” still slid 21 percent with $4.3 million.

Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to comScore. Where available, the latest international numbers for Friday through Sunday are also included. Final three-day domestic figures will be released Monday.

1. “Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle,” $11 million ($12.6 million international).

2. “Maze Runner: The Death Cure,” $10.2 million ($35.2 million international).

3. “Winchester,” $9.3 million.

4. “The Greatest Showman,” $7.8 million ($16.2 million international).

5. “Hostiles,” $5.5 million.

6. “The Post,” $5.2 million ($10.3 million international).

7. “12 Strong,” $4.7 million ($2.9 million international).

8. “Den of Thieves,” $4.7 million ($6.5 million international).

9. “The Shape of Water,” $4.3 million ($4.4 million international).

10. “Paddington 2,” $3.1 million ($2 million international).

Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at international theaters (excluding the U.S. and Canada), according to comScore:

1. “Maze Runner: The Death Cure,” $35.2 million.

2. “The Greatest Showman,” $16.2 million.

3. “The Tuche 3,” $14.3 million.

4. “Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle,” $12.6 million.

5. “Coco,” $11.6 million.

6. “The Post,” $10.3 million.

7. “Secret Superstar,” $10.5 million.

8. “Till the End of the World,” $10 million.

9. “The Commuter,” $8.9 million.

10. “Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri,” $8.1 million.
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From: MeNeedIt

The second half is underway in Superbowl LII (52) and the underdog Philadelphia Eagles are leading the favored New England Patriots 22 to 12.

The game to determine the American football championship has been a lot closer than the halftime score indicates.

This year’s game is being played in Minneapolis, Minn., where the game-time temperature was around minus 17 degrees Celsius. But in the city’s indoor stadium, it is in the relatively balmy 20s.

Patriots quarterback Tom Brady could set several records during the game. He will be the oldest nonkicker to play in the Super Bowl, and could be the oldest quarterback to win, picking up his sixth title — the most of any NFL player in history.

Philadelphia is vying for its first Super Bowl win after two attempts. It lost to the Patriots in Super Bowl 39 in 2005. But the Patriots are favored in today’s game, which is expected to be viewed by more than 100 million people.

Among those watching will be No. 1 fan — President Donald Trump. He put out a pre-game statement thanking the American servicemen and women who he says are unable to watch the game with friends and family, but whose sacrifice makes such big events possible.

Advertisers are paying $5 million for a 30-second commercial during the broadcast, which is traditionally the most watched television show of the year in the United States.

Viewer ratings for this year’s Super Bowl are considered critical for the NFL. Its regular season ratings declined by 10 percent compared with the prior year.  

The drop in ratings has been attributed in part to people boycotting NFL games because of player protests, including kneeling for the national anthem. Other causes include reduced subscriptions to cable television, as online streaming services become more popular, and to some degree, declining interest.

 
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From: MeNeedIt

Recent losses on global financial markets, including those in the U.S., have some investors concerned about expectations for their holdings and plans for the future.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average declined 2.5 percent Friday, its largest percentage drop since Britain’s decision in June 2016 to leave the European Union.

The Dow and the broader U.S. Standard & Poor’s 500 Index ended the week roughly 4-percent lower, their biggest weekly drops since early 2016, amid fears of inflation and disappointing quarterly corporate earnings results.

Key stock indexes in Europe also fell Friday. Germany’s DAX index dropped 1.7-percent, while France’s CAC 40 Index declined 1.6-percent.

In Asia, Japan’s Nikkei 225 Index slid nearly 1-percent and South Korea’s Kospi fell 1.7-percent.

Meanwhile, U.S. bond yields climbed and contributed to the sell-off after the U.S. government reported that wages grew last month at their fastest pace in eight years.

The wage data helped stoke investor concern that the Federal Reserve, the U.S. central bank, will respond to higher inflation by hiking its key interest rate more quickly than anticipated.

Darrell Cronk, head of the Wells Fargo Investment Institute, said an extended period of low interest rates has helped create the uncertainty.

“We’ve enjoyed low interest rates for so long, we’re having to deal with a little bit higher rates now, so the market is trying to figure out what that could mean for inflation.”

The yield on the benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasury notes rose to 2.852-percent, its highest level in more than four years. The rise in bond yields hinders stock performance in two ways: it makes corporate borrowing more expensive and it makes bonds more attractive to investors compared to riskier stocks.

Bond strategists were unwilling Friday to predict what lies ahead for interest rates this week after the markets’ unusual volatility in the past week.

Investors may get a hint of the direction of interest rates when trading resumes in Asia early Monday, and possibly more insight after the U.S. Treasury’s $66 billion in auctions of 3-, 10- and 30-year bonds from Tuesday to Thursday.
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From: MeNeedIt

Finding a cure for Alzheimer’s is an extremely complex task. Scientists still do not know what causes the disease. Once the symptoms appear, the gradual memory loss is inevitable and available drugs can only slow down the process. Researchers, however, believe the disease develops slowly, over years, so detecting it before the symptoms appear may give the patients a better chance of a longer life. VOA’s George Putic reports.
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From: MeNeedIt

For a lot of people, there’s nothing better than a piece of candy. Sweets go back to the ancient Egyptians, who ate honey with sesame seeds. In the United States, candy has a fascinating history that can be traced back centuries at the True Treats Historic Candy store in Harpers Ferry, West Virginia. The shop sells an abundance of sweets that were popular during different time periods. VOA’s Deborah Block shows us the unusual assortment, ranging from classic chocolate kisses to edible bugs.
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From: MeNeedIt

Over the last decades, growing economic hardships forced people in cities and villages around the world to leave their hometowns to find work in other countries. Dreaming of returning one day and enjoying a better life where they grew up, many invested most of their savings buying houses back home. But often, these houses remain empty, making many communities look like ghost towns. Faiza Elmasry has the story. Faith Lapidus narrates.
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From: MeNeedIt

U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s Latin American tour took him Saturday to Argentina, where he talked with officials about conservation and diplomacy.

Traveling from Mexico City after meeting with the Mexican president and other senior officials on Friday, Tillerson arrived in Bariloche, a lakeside resort town in Argentina’s Nahuel Huapi National Park.

Local news reports said Tillerson met with park rangers to discuss progress made in joint U.S.-Argentine projects on science and conservation issues. He also met with a student selected for the U.S. Fulbright scholarship program.

Tillerson was scheduled to visit the Argentine capital, Buenos Aires, to meet with his counterpart, Jorge Faurie.

On Monday, Tillerson is set to meet with Argentina President Mauricio Macri to discuss regional issues, including upcoming elections and the political crisis in Venezuela.

Before his visit, Tillerson told reporters that he hoped other countries would follow Argentina’s lead on making economic reforms and generating growth.

On Friday in Mexico, Tillerson said that immigrants bring “enormous value” to the U.S., but added the U.S. government lacked “good discipline” in regulating who enters the country to live.

‘Out of normal order’

After meeting in Mexico City with Mexican Foreign Secretary Luis Videgaray and Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland, Tillerson told reporters the U.S. had put “many mechanisms in place” over the years to control immigration, but had “never gone back to clean this up.”

“Let’s make sure we have systems in place where we understand who’s coming into the country,” Tillerson said. He said immigration in the U.S. had “gotten out of normal order,” which is why President Donald Trump is pushing Congress to “fix these defects that have risen over the years.”

The Mexican government has repeatedly expressed opposition to Trump’s proposals to curb illegal immigration and have Mexico pay for a reinforced border wall.

Differences over the issue did not preclude Videgaray from praising the U.S. He said the Mexican government’s relationship with the Trump administration was “closer” than it was under former President Barack Obama’s administration. Videgaray acknowledged the two countries “do have some differences” but said “we are working closely and we are about results.”

Tillerson later held a closed-door meeting with Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto during a time when relations have also been strained by U.S. threats to pull out of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).

NAFTA, which Trump alleges costs American jobs, was discussed at the trilateral meeting, along with energy development and drug interdiction.

Tillerson’s travels through Latin America will also take him to Peru and Colombia, with a final stop in Jamaica on February 7.
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From: MeNeedIt

Dozens of designers from Haiti and around the world showcased their spring-summer collections against a lush tropical background during the recent Haiti Fashion Week.

The January 28-31 event in Petionville focused on the theme “Innovation” and “haute couture” this year. Event founder Maguy Durce said her main goal was to show Haiti in a positive light, as opposed to negative images usually portrayed by the international media.

“Haiti Fashion Week is a cultural event. But we want to use it to respond to President [Donald] Trump — to his negative comments [about Haiti] — because we think if he saw what was happening this week at El Rancho [hotel], he would say, ‘Hey, I lied,’ or, ‘Hey, I was wrong,’ or, ‘I was misinformed,’ ” Durce said.

Trump’s reported use of a vulgar term to describe Haiti and African nations angered the Haitian-American community and sparked rallies in Port-au-Prince, New York, Palm Beach and Boston to denounce racism. Haiti’s ambassador to the United States said the comments about Haiti “hurt the country.”

The fifth edition of Haiti Fashion Week had been scheduled for November 2017, but was rescheduled after some of the designers said their collections would not be ready in time.

Young fashion designer Maille Timothee, whose fashion line is called MAE, presented her designs for the first time this year. She won applause for her colorful dresses made with unconventional textiles.

“I wanted to do something unconventional. Something unexpected. So I mixed different fabrics that people would not expect, and even what I’m wearing is an example of that,” she explained.

Timothee is the daughter of seasoned Haitian designer Immacula Pericles, who runs a highly acclaimed fashion school called Academie Verona. She also participated in Haiti Fashion Week, showcasing a collection of dresses made in the colors of the national flag and representing the natural beauty of the Caribbean country. Her collection wowed the audience.

“Well, I’ve been doing these designs for a long time now, so it’s new to some people, but we’ve been around a while,” Pericles noted. “The theme of our fashion school is Haiti will survive – so my goal is first to incorporate sustainable materials and second to make the clothing using the same international standards the big fashion houses use so that we can sell our line anywhere in the world.”

Pericles said Haiti has huge potential to excel in the fashion world.

French designer Marie-Caroline Behue flew from Paris to Port-au-Prince and went straight to work on her collection. A first-time participant in the event, she admitted to being awed by the quality and intricacy of the designs.

“I knew nothing about Haiti Fashion Week and I was amazed by the level of detail in the designs,” she admitted. “I’ve worked in the French haute couture design houses and I can tell you the designs I saw here meet the bar – and to be honest, what really piqued my interest was the men’s haute couture, because when one thinks of haute couture, they naturally think of women’s fashion, but here in Haiti, I was like, ‘Wow! They’re got couture men’s clothing.’”

Haitian-American designer Marcia Roseme, whose collection features bright colored separates matched with muted tones, traveled from New York to show her first collection at Haiti Fashion Week.

“It was a great event; there were a lot of different styles that represented many markets. There was a lot of innovation, a lot of creativity and unique styles – I really like that,” she told VOA.

Organizer Durce, who put in many long hours to pull off a culturally rich and diverse showcase of Haitian and international artistry, was pleased with the turnout and the positive reviews from the national and international press.

“Africa Fashion TV has been here all four days, broadcasting our fashion shows live, so what we’re doing here in Haiti is being seen in 29 African countries and all over the world. Each time a person tweets or posts something about Fashion Week to Facebook, it raises Haiti’s image to a higher level.”

Durce said she’s looking forward to the sixth edition of Haiti Fashion Week – to be held in 2019.

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From: MeNeedIt

A provocative film that chronicles racism and brutality in the 1920s has been released in Australia. Set in the red dust of the outback, “Sweet Country” is the story of an Aboriginal herder who goes on the run after killing a white landowner in self-defense.

The film is a historical, Western-style epic that has at its heart racist aggression between white colonialists and Australia’s indigenous population they displaced. The movie is directed by celebrated Aboriginal filmmaker Warwick Thornton, whose first film was the highly acclaimed feature “Samson and Delilah,” which was released in 2009.

Thornton says “Sweet Country” shows the brutality of Australia in the 1920s.

“It is a bit of history you will not find in your everyday high school curriculum, even though it is all based on true stories. It is important for us as a country to learn more about our history so we can make better choices about our future, I guess.  You know, it has got a lot of connotations today. Racism is still around today. It is just that people are not allowed to openly say what they feel, but they are still racist,” Thornton said.

The cast includes veteran Australian actor Bryan Brown, who came to prominence in “Gorillas in the Mist” and “Cocktail,” alongside U.S. actor Tom Cruise.

“Sweet Country” also features the New Zealand actor Sam Neill, who starred in “The Piano” and “Jurassic Park.”

Hamilton Morris plays the character of Sam Kelly, the indigenous farm worker who goes on the run with his wife after killing a white landowner. Morris had no film experience before landing the role as Kelly, although he did have a role in an Australian TV series about a remote radio station. There was also a large cast of Aboriginal extras.

Many of the reviews of “Sweet Country” have been positive with the newspaper The Australian saying it was “Australian filmmaking at its best.”

Indigenous Australians make up about 3 percent of the population and are, by far, the most disadvantaged group in the country, suffering high rates of poverty, ill health and imprisonment.

Warwick’s “Sweet Country” already was awarded a Special Jury Prize at the Venice Film Festival last September at an early screening.
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From: MeNeedIt

Researchers using a high-tech aerial mapping scanner have discovered the ruins of tens of thousands of ancient Mayan structures that have been hidden and preserved for centuries under northern Guatemala’s thick jungle.  

The 60,000 newly discovered structures include raised highways, urban centers with sidewalks, homes, terraces, industrial-sized agricultural fields, irrigation canals, ceremonial centers, a 30-meter high pyramid, fortresses and moats.

Stephen Houston, professor of archaeology and anthropology at Brown University, told the BBC that the revelation of the sprawling Central American civilization was “breathtaking.”  He said, “I know it sounds hyperbolic, but . . . it did bring tears to my eyes.”  

An alliance of U.S., European and Guatemalan archaeologists worked with Guatemala’s Mayan Heritage and Nature Foundation on the project over the past two years.  

The Mayan culture was at its peak about 1,500 years ago in what is present day southern Mexico, Guatemala and parts of Belize, El Salvador and Honduras.  

Marcello Canuto, a Tulane University archaeologist and one of the project’s top investigators, said the discoveries are a “revolution in  Maya archeology.”

The new information suggests that millions more people lived in what is now Guatemala’s Petan region than previously thought.

Researchers say they now believe that instead of five million that as many as 10 to 15 million people lived in the region.  

The researchers used a remote sensing method known as LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) to discover the hidden treasures of a civilization that National Geographic now compares to ancient Greece or China.  

LiDAR  bounced pulsed laser light off the ground, revealing contours hidden by dense foliage in the 2,100-square-kilometer mapped area.

“Now it is no longer necessary to cut through the jungle to see what’s under it,” said Canuto.   

“We’ve had this western conceit that complex civilizations can’t flourish in the tropics, that the tropics are where civilizations go to die,” Canuto told National Geographic.  “But,with the new LiDAR-based evidence from Central America and [Cambodia’s] Angkor Wat, we now have to consider that complex societies may have formed in the tropics and made their way outward from there.”
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From: MeNeedIt

After a season that started in early September, the NFL’s final game is just around the corner. Minneapolis, Minnesota, is hosting the single biggest event in American sports, despite local disappointment that the home team came one win short of a Super Bowl appearance. But that didn’t stop fans from braving brutally cold weather to check out the NFL’s Super Bowl Experience. Arash Arabasadi reports from Minneapolis.
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From: MeNeedIt