Established 1961 21 Lifestyle Features Sunday, November 24, 2019 dam Sandler and Robert Pattinson Both films were made by production vie with “Uncut Gems” for the best feature saw their Oscar hopes boosted house A24, which once again dominated, prize. AThursday as “Uncut Gems” and “The earning 18 nods. The indie powerhouse is While Sandler and Pattinson will com- Lighthouse” led the Film Independent behind previous Oscar winner pete for best male lead, A-listers Renee Spirit Awards nominations with five each, “Moonlight,” as well as “Lady Bird” and Zellweger (“Judy”) and Elisabeth Moss in the unofficial start to Hollywood’s annual “The Disaster Artist.” Actresses Zazie (“Her Smell”) were nominated for best prize-giving season. While major studio Beetz (“Joker”) and Natasha Lyonne female lead, and Jennifer Lopez releases are not eligible for the Spirit (“Orange Is The New Black”) presented (“Hustlers”) will vie for the best supporting Awards, the prizes are still seen as an the nominations at a Los Angeles press female award. Five best feature winners strong indicator of the independent movies conference. this decade have gone on to best picture that could eventually be Oscar winners. Film Independent President Josh Welsh glory at the Academy Awards, including Sandler stars as a brash, larger-than-life described 2019 as “a year of bold, auda- “Moonlight,” “Spotlight” and “Birdman.” New York jewel dealer in the high-octane cious and accomplished filmmaking” The winners, selected by Film Independent drama “Uncut Gems” from the Safdie despite significant change and challenges members, will be announced at the Spirit brothers, who also earned a directing nod. affecting the movie industry. Netflix’s Awards on February 8 — the day before Former “Twilight” and “Harry Potter” star “Marriage Story” was selected to receive the Oscars. — AFP Pattinson underlined his indie credentials the Robert Altman Award, which is with a nomination for Robert Eggers’ bestowed upon one film’s director, casting Actress Zazie Beetz, right, attends the Film Independent Spirit black-and-white tale of two lighthouse director and cast. The movie, starring Awards Nominations Announcement Press Conference, in Los Actress Natasha Lyonne keepers on a remote island. Scarlett Johansson and Adam Driver, will Angeles, California. — AFP photos From Bardot to Diana, Paris ooden relics said to be from the the Nativity in Manger Square, the reputed often questionable, they are revered by the It said that the crypt was constructed by Wmanger that held the infant Jesus site of Jesus’s birth. There was no immediate Christian faithful, among whom are the Virginio Vespignani at the behest of the mid will be returned from Rome to confirmation from the Vatican. But Amira coachloads of pilgrims who squeeze through 19th century Pope Pius IX “to contain the Match photos Bethlehem in time for the Christmas season, Hanania, a member of Abbas’s Higher a narrow sandstone entrance in the Church of sacred relic of the Holy Crib”. Preparations Palestinian officials said on Friday. Committee of Churches Affairs, said the relics the Nativity all year round to visit the birth for Christmas are under way in Bethlehem, Bethlehem’s mayor, Anton Salman, told the would arrive on November 30, the day the grotto that is its centerpiece. especially for Christians who make up around to go under Palestinian news agency WAFA the move fol- Palestinian town traditionally lights its Manger The return comes amid a wider discus- one percent of the Palestinian population in lowed President Mahmoud Abbas’s most Square Christmas tree. sion over whether Western collectors and Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem. recent visit to the Vatican, when Abbas “It is an historic move. It returns to its museums should return objects to their While the security situation has eased around hammer asked Pope Francis for the return of the frag- original place, and it will be a factor of attrac- countries of origin. The website of Santa the town in recent years, Israeli checkpoints ments held in the Basilica of Santa Maria tion to believers from inside Palestine and to Maria Maggiore says the relics currently lie guard the entrances to Bethlehem, which lies Maggiore in Rome. tourists from all over the world,” she said. “To before the basilica’s main altar in a crystal just south of Jerusalem in the Israeli-occupied hey are the defining images of Salman said the relics were taken from celebrate Christmas with the presence of part reliquary shaped like a crib that “contains West Bank. — AFP newsmakers down the decades Bethlehem around 1,000 years ago, and are of the manger in which Jesus Christ was born pieces of ancient wood which tradition holds Tfrom Princess Diana to Brigitte now likely to be placed inside Saint will be a magnificent and huge event.” to be part of the manger where the Baby Bardot to Pope John Paul II. And Catherine’s Church, adjacent to the Church of Although the provenance of ancient relics is Jesus was laid”. now some 130 of the most iconic pictures taken by the French maga- zine Paris Match are to be auctioned on November 25 in Paris for prices of between 1,500-4,000 euros ($1,660-4,400). The auction of the celebrated covers and double- spreads will mark the 70th anniver- sary of a publication whose trend- ig smile flashing and pencil-thin getting arrested he would have his name setting influence has always gone moustache quivering, subversive on the headlines, he would get my obscene well beyond France. Bdirector John Waters laughs heartily phone calls, I was unlisted,” he says. The pictures include powerful as he looks back at an improbable 40-year Like a good father, Waters Sr images from nature and conflict career that made him a trash film icon. bankrolled his son’s early films-but even zones and also of politicians ranging “Humor saved me, saved my life,” the 73- that ended up blindsiding him. “I paid him from the deposed shah of Iran, year-old sharp-dresser told AFP on the back with interest and he was so shocked Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, to Charles sidelines of the Thessaloniki Film Festival, to have his money back. He was the only de Gaulle and late French president where he was a guest of honor earlier this investor that wished I hadn’t paid him Jacques Chirac. But among the most month. back,” beams Waters. From a homemade horror stage in his Like Woody Allen and New York, unforgettable are those those of per- In this file photo entrepreneur/manager Scooter Braun In this file photo singer/songwriter Taylor Swift arrives garage, Waters went on to tear down bar- Waters makes a point of including his sonalities who have shaped the zeit- attends the 6th Annual Save the Children Illumination on the red carpet for the Time 100 Gala at the Lincoln riers with transgressive fare such as “Eat home city in his movies-and he even geist of the last decades. Gala at the American Museum of Natural History in Center in New York. — AFP photos Perhaps the most famous is the New York City. Your Makeup”, “Mondo Trasho”, “Multiple enjoyed the backing of the local brass. image of Britain’s Princess Diana, Maniacs” and the scatological classic “Pink “Baltimore was a character in my sitting alone on the diving board of a Flamingos” in the late 1960s and early movies,” he says. luxury yacht as a bird flies by, just a 1970s. These films also introduced his “I still live there. I grew up there. My week before her death in a Paris childhood friend and muse Glenn Milstead, oldest friends were there, my family was road accident in 1997. “Yes, it is a aka Divine, as one of the world’s first drag there...and the politicians, even when I paparazzi photo, but it’s one that has divas. made the most insane movies, they said gone down in history. This photo is In the 1980s and 1990s, he became keep making them.” Diana, it’s Lady Di and she only had known to a wider audience with sixties Recently labelled a “national treasure” eight days to live,” said Marc musical hommage “Hairspray”. He also by the New York Times Book Review, Brincourt, former photo editor-in- gave a young Johnny Depp an early break Waters was a jury member at Cannes and chief at Paris Match and curator of as a juvenile delinquent in “Cry Baby”, and proudly shows off his Order of Arts and the exhibition at the Cornette de usic industry mogul Scooter Braun said Braun had not publicly spoken out on the matter, cast Kathleen Turner as a psychopathic Letters medal which he received from the Saint Cyr auction house in Paris. Friday his dispute with megastar Taylor but early Friday dropped a lengthy Instagram killer in “Serial Mom”. Looking back to French state in May. M that phase of his career, Waters has mixed “He’s been doing films independently “She is alone, on the diving Swift over her music catalogue has left post saying Swift’s appeal had resulted in board. And then the seagull going his family receiving “death threats.” The 29-year- “numerous death threats directed at my family.” feelings. “I became respectable... Suddenly for many many years and even when he did by,” he added. Another image, by old pop artist famous for hits like “Shake It Off” “I assume this was not your intention but it is the worst thing that can happen to a cre- Hollywood films he never lost his own photographer Jack Garofalo from began publicly sparring with Braun this summer important that you understand that your words ative person has happened to me,” the bad touch and his independent spirit,” said 1974, celebrates the 40th birthday of over his company’s purchase of her former label, carry a tremendous amount of weight,” Braun taste savant writes in his latest memoir, Thessaloniki Film Festival programmer actress Brigitte Bardot, her chest Big Machine Label Group, which gave him a wrote.