Hey, Academy voters! Don't forget

The guilds and societies and film circles have all been lavishing their praises on a fairly predictable group of people. On Monday, the Globes will likely follow suit. We get it. "Babel" is better than we were first told, as is, allegedly, "Dreamgirls." And Helen Mirren should probably build a nice apse in her living room for the little gold man she almost certainly will be handed on Feb. 25, the night Oscar holds the world hostage.

But wait! There are still 24 hours before Academy voters submit their final ballots (end of day Saturday), and we've noticed some regrettable absences in the early season nominations and awards. Take heed, Academy, or else you could look back on 2007 with the same twinge of nausea and regret that you do 1988 ("Rain Man") or 1980 ("Ordinary People") or, god help you, 1965. We love Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer too, but really, how could you?

"Alpha Dog"

Nick Cassavetes' "Alpha Dog" opens with home-movie footage of sweet-looking little kids, circa early 1980s, splashing in wading pools and celebrating their Bar Mitzvahs as an aggressively plaintive cover -- sung by Eva Cassidy -- of "Over the Rainbow" tootles in the background. Immediately, you know that there's some heavy-duty irony going down here: These adorable middle-class moppets will grow up to be tattooed crackheads and low-level, gangsta-wannabe drug dealers. Oh, the shattered dreams of childhood! Before the movie has even begun, we're invited to feel shock, dismay and sadness at the idea that it's possible for really cute kids from seemingly normal homes to grow up to be really bad dudes -- or even just woefully misguided ones. These kids are depraved on account of they're deprived. Gee, Officer Krupke, what's a gangsta gonna do?

That opening is just the first sloppy coat of self-conscious seriousness slapped on "Alpha Dog" -- many more will follow. "Alpha Dog" was inspired by real events, yet it's sorely lacking in emotional weight, maybe because Cassavetes (who also wrote the script) doesn't know whether he's making a serious social drama or an exploitation film: "Alpha Dog" succeeds as neither. In places, the picture is wryly comic (and brutal), as if Cassavetes were going for a "Pulp Fiction" vibe. Mostly, though, it's simply unpleasant: The movie lets us know very early on that something really bad is going to happen to one of its most guileless characters; then it gives us plenty of time to enjoy that character's innocent exploits, even as we're waiting for the axe to fall. It's a cheap, dirty setup.

I Like to Watch

Now that ugly is the new pretty, white is the new black, and black is the new pink, back fat is the new six pack, crotch shot is the new boob flash, Eastwood is the new Spielberg, babies are the new handbag dogs, handbag dogs are the new shelter dogs, and George Clooney is the new George Clooney, I guess it's about time that midseason became the new fall season.

Personally, I'm always far more excited about midseason TV than I am about fall TV. First of all, there's no longer a glut of crappy pilots on the air, most of them having shriveled up and blown away like the autumn leaves, well before Thanksgiving. Remember all of those melodramatic serial traumedies about kidnappings, runaway families and elaborate heists? Yeah, neither do I.

What Oprah can't forget

The Oprah pasting that took place over the New Year's holiday, in reaction to the pressapalooza surrounding her Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy for Girls in South Africa, reveals a lot about the venality, racism and hypocrisy of the talk-show host's critics, yes. But less remarked upon and equally interesting is what the explosive news cycle -- one that notably seemed to veer free of Winfrey's usual iron-fisted control -- reveals about the talk show host's own frailties, not as a philanthropist or educator, but as one of the United States' most powerful, unlikely, anomalous and isolated success stories.

Winfrey's unguarded comments about the opening of her school revealed the degree to which arguably the most influential woman in the United States is still driven by the specter of her own beginnings as a poor, sexually abused child in Mississippi, and her seemingly endless spiral of desire to set the world right not simply for other young women, but for her own prepubescent self. For a moment, her self-spin veered out of control, and we got a brief snapshot not just of Winfrey's good intentions, but of the loneliness and solitude experienced by a woman who is historically and culturally unique in her power, wealth, life story and position in the world.

There's no place like Rome

At the start of the second season of HBO's "Rome," Julius Caesar lies slain in a pool of his own blood, but his murderers seem as uncertain about their fates as his allies are. Instead of having a plan or purpose beyond getting rid of Caesar, Brutus and Cicero find themselves quibbling over what the next move should be. Cicero (David Bamber) wants to kill Caesar's right-hand man, Mark Antony (James Purefoy), but Brutus (Tobias Menzies) will have no part of it. Meanwhile, Atia (Polly Walker), Caesar's niece, wants to leave the city, but her son Gaius Octavian (Max Pirkis), upon hearing that Caesar has named him his son and sole heir in his will, feels that it makes more sense to stay. Mark Antony narrowly escapes being murdered right after Caesar's death, but once he feels he is safe, he taunts Brutus, Servilia (Lindsay Duncan) and Cicero about the fragility of their position.

Mark Antony: Listen. Why so quiet? A tyrant is dead. Surely the people should be happy. Where's the cheering throng at your door? Where are the joyous cries of liberty?

Servilia: The people fear change. A somber mood is only natural.

Brutus: When they realize they are free from tyranny, the people will be glad.

Mark Antony: The people loved Caesar, and they will hate you for what you've done.

Brutus: They loved him once, as I did.

Mark Antony: Some have turned against him, no doubt. It cannot be denied he was something of a tyrant. But a great many people will worship Caesar until they die, a great many. And those people are mine now.

Beyond the Multiplex

Timberlake and Diaz no more: The rumor mill has been turning out a steady stream of stories about it, but now it's official: After four years of celebrity coupledom, Cameron Diaz and Justin Timberlake have called it quits. On Tuesday the pair issued a statement to the press: "It has always been our preference not to comment on the status of our relationship, but, out of respect for the time we've spent together, we feel compelled to do so now, in light of recent speculation and the number of inaccurate stories that are being reported by the media," it said. "We have, in fact, ended our romantic relationship, and have done so mutually and as friends, with continued love and respect for one another." And it looks like Timberlake has already been making the most of his newly single status -- the tabs have linked him with both Scarlett Johansson and Kate Hudson in the past few weeks. (BBC News, Daily Dish, E Online)

Madonna on Letterman: Madonna appeared on David Letterman's show last night to again defend her decision to adopt a child from Malawi. (Angelina Jolie criticized Madonna, or at least appeared to, in an interview earlier this week.) Telling the talk show host she saw her act of adoption as "saving a life," she said Malawi -- like most African nations except Ethiopia and Kenya -- has no clearly defined adoption rules: "We were basically creating the laws as we went." She certainly doesn't regret her decision; if anything, she wants more people to follow in her footsteps: "There's over a million orphans in Malawi, and in my opinion the laws need to change because these children need to be rescued." (Reuters via Yahoo News)

The Fix

Over the last few weeks I've aired a lot of glum Chicken Little complaints, many of them my own, about how tough it is to get American moviegoers to pay attention to "specialty titles," as arty independent films are sometimes euphemistically called. (Commercially challenged? Differently marketplaced?) But hey, guess what? There's joy in Mudville after all, and it might be time to recognize that the water in that glass is at least a teeny bit higher than half-full.

Can't get the stupid Yanks to watch subtitles unless kung fu is involved, right? Not so fast, Bucky. Two of the probable nominees for the best foreign-language film Oscars are flat-out hits. Sony Classics has been pushing Pedro Almodóvar's "Volver" out across the country in gradual increments, building on good reviews and word of mouth. It's now playing in 109 theaters and has grossed about $6 million, with plenty more to come after possible Academy nods for the film itself and star Penélope Cruz.

Maya in the Thunderdome

As a scholar of the Maya civilization, I was anxious to see Mel Gibson's portrayal of the Maya in "Apocalypto." Of course, I realize the movie is not a documentary and was mindful of the director's artistic license. I was happy to see that Gibson got some details right, like personal adornment, tools, and body decoration. Although the main actors are native North Americans, I applaud Gibson's use of some Maya actors, as well his decision to have the characters speak in a native Maya language, Yukatek, still heard in Mexico. While these are brave and ambitious choices, they also imply that "Apocalypto" is a sincere depiction of Maya society. In fact, the movie is not an accurate portrayal of the Maya at all; rather, it is a reflection of Gibson's own feverish imagination.

The movie tracks a young Mayan man who is captured in a surprise raid on his village. Forced to abandon his family, he and his companions are taken to the nearby city to be sacrificed. He manages to escape and, pursued by his captors, attempts to return to his village to save his family. During his getaway, he reaches a beach where he witnesses the arrival of Spaniards.

This final scene tells us that the movie focuses on Maya society on the eve of Spanish contact in the 16th century. Yet the Maya city portrayed in the movie, central to the its plot, dates roughly to the 9th century. This is akin to telling a story about English pilgrims founding the Massachusetts Bay Colony, and showing them living in longhouses described in Beowulf. In fact, Gibson incorporates Maya images from as far back as 300 BC. Throughout the movie, these anachronisms make Maya civilization seem timeless, and undermine the idea that the Maya could and did respond to change.

Nothing but nog

What the hell is a nog anyway? Among the festive beverages of Christmas -- including the wassail bowl of warm ale bobbing with apples; the mixture of Scotch and ginger wine known as whisky mac; and the traditional Yuletide punch of rum, brandy, lemons and oranges -- eggnog reigns supreme. So far-reaching is its popularity that, come Thanksgiving, red-and-green cartons of it line the dairy cases of nearly every supermarket across the U.S.

The origins of the word "nog" are shrouded in mystery. It might be a wooden block embedded in a brick wall, into which nails are driven for mounting things. Or it could be a dark foamy ale that's been brewed in Norfolk, England, since the 1600s. But nowadays a nog rarely stands on its own, occurring mainly in compound form as eggnog. Even Webster's definition, with its elastic recipe -- "An often alcoholic drink containing beaten egg, milk, or both" -- asks more questions than it answers. And what about "noggin"? It's a waggish term for one's cranium, of course, but the dictionary lists two further meanings: 1) a small quantity of drink, or 2) a small carved mug -- which led one commentator to suggest with apparent seriousness that eggnog actually represents a shortening of the barside request, "Egg and grog in a noggin, please." Say it real fast when tipsy, and it turns into "eggnog," I guess.

Sexual healing

When it comes to sex, I've always been an overachiever. From the moment I crossed "lose virginity" off a youthful to-do list like it was taking the SATs, I relished the challenge of being good in bed. In my adventures I've experienced earth-shaking lust and utter abandon. Still, I realize now how often the thrill of sex was tinged with something else -- the triumph of conquest. I read the Kama Sutra and sex books with the steely discipline I applied to yoga class, confident there wasn't a skill I couldn't master with limberness and resolve.

Then I had a baby.

I don't know if it's true what they say about sex during pregnancy being incredibly hot. That's how I remember it, but now that I'm a mother the memory of any kind of uninterrupted, unexhausted encounter seems like the apex of ecstasy. I do know that as my belly expanded my libido went right along with it. When certain moves involving weight on my big, big midsection became logistical absurdities, I cheerfully learned new ones to compensate, flipping onto my sides, enlisting chairs and bedposts for support. My hormones were amped up to previously unimagined heights while my puzzle-solving brain relished every obstacle. It was perfect. In the back of my mind, however, I was worried about what would happen next.


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Hooray, Celexa took my sex drive away!

Dear Cary,

Recently, I began taking an antidepressant (Celexa). Like apparently many on this drug and others like it, my sex drive sank to near zero shortly after I started taking it. There's plenty of advice online for dealing with the impact that this can have on a marriage (it's certainly having an impact on mine), but nothing about my specific problem:

I like not having a sex drive.


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Thugs for puppies

It starts with a telephone call.

The young man on the other end of the line will sound nice enough. He will be polite, but firm. He will give his name as Kevin Kjonaas, and he will want to talk about a company called Life Sciences Research, also known as Huntingdon Life Sciences (HLS). You may never have heard of Huntingdon, he will say, but you do business with them in some way. Maybe you are a senior executive for Huntingdon's insurance company. Maybe you work for its bank. Maybe you trade its stock.

The young man will tell you that Huntingdon kills puppies, among other animals -- 500 of them every day. "Do you know what sort of company you're dealing with?" he will ask. He will offer to send you some literature and videotapes documenting Huntingdon's cruelty. He will tell you to stop dealing with Huntingdon.

Stephan Boruchin, a 61-year-old NASDAQ trader based in Edmond, Okla., got the call in June 2002. It was the last ordinary day of his life.

Topless bodies found in brainless magazine

Those of you who are not movie stars, magazine editors, fashion publicists or morning show hosts may never have heard of Tom Ford. Those of you who have may be surprised to learn that he has anything to do with Hollywood, short of deciding which frocks its inhabitants should don to walk down a red carpet.

Yet Ford, who became known in certain circles for revivifying the moribund Gucci brand in the 1990s, has gotten himself so deeply confused with the movie stars he used to dress that this month finds him on the cover of Vanity Fair's annual Hollywood issue, on sale nationally today, sniffing the ear of naked "Pride & Prejudice" star Keira Knightley. And while much has already been made of Ford's manically narcissistic decision to appear clothed next to nude starlets Knightley and Scarlett Johansson on the magazine's cover, that over-the-top orgy of self-love, misogyny and outright idiocy on Page One is just a preview of what Ford, the issue's guest editor, has brought to its inner pages.

"Children of Men"

"Children of Men" takes place in 2027, in the grayest London imaginable, in a world where humans have lost the ability to reproduce. (The youngest person alive is 18.) The streets are plastered with literature entreating native Britons to smoke out and turn in illegal immigrants: In a world that's gone to hell, no country can afford generosity to outsiders. Terrorism and war have destroyed whole nations. Britain soldiers on, but for those who just can't take it anymore, suicide is encouraged: There's even a special government-sanctioned drug, with its own Lunesta-style commercial presenting death as a dream state you can just drift into, a vast improvement on the suffocating present.

"Children of Men," directed by Alfonso Cuarón and based on P.D. James' 1992 dystopian novel, is the bleakest movie I've ever wanted to see twice. Coming nearly 15 years after James' novel, it takes into account world events that she could never have dreamed of. Yet the picture doesn't so much build dread as smolder with it, as if we'd landed on a scorched, broken world still desperately trying to throw off some warmth.

The man in the red suit

He was dressed all in fur from his head to his foot,
And his clothes were all tarnished with ashes and soot.

There is no Santa Claus. Not in the poem now known as "The Night Before Christmas" published anonymously in 1823 and credited to Clement Clarke Moore, whose verses feature a weirdly elvish figure named St. Nicholas. Not in Charles Dickens' 1842 "Christmas Carol," with all its sanctimonious sermonizing about Tiny Tim and the true meaning of Christmas. For all practical purposes, there is no Santa Claus before 1862, the year that Rowland H. Macy took the gift-giving gnome known around New York as Sinterklaas (from the Dutch "Sint Nicolaas"), used an Anglicized name, had him impersonated by a reassuringly full-size human, costumed him in a nice, clean cloak, and installed him in the store as a means of snaring more Christmas shoppers.

All hail Pottersville!

Dec. 22, 2001 | 'Tis the week before Christmas, and all through my house and 250 million others, people are blubbering helplessly as George Bailey overcomes despair and discovers that he really did have a Wonderful Life. I have no desire to rain on Frank Capra's heartwarming, seasonally-sanctioned parade. Let cynics deny that a brief sojourn in a counterfactual limbo conjured up by a bumbling, liver-spotted angel can really produce a life-changing epiphany. Let jaded roués deride George as an infantile weenie whose courtship of Mary comes to fruition only because she prudently massaged her scalp with Spanish Fly before he arrived. Such criticisms are mean-spirited, if not downright un-American. But even a master sometimes flubs a brushstroke, and there is a glaring flaw in Capra's great canvas.

I refer, of course, to Pottersville.

In Capra's Tale of Two Cities, Pottersville is the Bad Place. It's the demonic foil to Bedford Falls, the sweet, Norman Rockwell-like town in which George grows up. Named after the evil Mr. Potter, Pottersville is the setting for George's brief, nightmarish trip through a world in which he never existed. In that alternative universe, Potter has triumphed, and we are intended to shudder in horror at the sinful city he has spawned -- a kind of combo pack of Sodom, Gomorrah, Times Square in 1972, Tokyo's hostess district, San Francisco's Barbary Coast ca. 1884 and one of those demon-infested burgs dimly visible in the background of a Hieronymus Bosch painting.

There's just one problem: Pottersville rocks!

Pottersville makes its brief but memorable appearance during that tumultuous scene when George, who has just been bounced from Nick's Bar and is beginning to seriously freak out, rushes down the main street. A large neon sign -- the first of many -- announces "Pottersville." As sirens sound in the distance and a big band wails jazz, George staggers on, into an unfamiliar nightlife district that has replaced the town he knew. In a rapid montage, we see a neon bar sign saying "Blue Moon." Another announces "Fights." Yet another blares "Midnight Club -- Dancing." There's a pool and billiards joint and a pawnbroker shop. A large marquee announces "Girls Girls Girls -- 20 gorgeous girls -- 3 acts." The "Indian Club" gaudily sports a kitschy neon sign depicting the face of a brave. The "Bamboo Room" promises a more Oriental setting. As the disbelieving George stares at the teeming entrance of the "Dime a Dance" joint ("Welcome jitterbuggers"), a scuffle breaks out -- some floozy is resisting being thrown into the paddy wagon. "I know every big shot in this town!" she shrieks as the gendarmes manhandle her. In horror, George recognizes the floozy -- it's Violet, the town flirt from his previous existence, now apparently turned full-fledged professional. After his protests almost land him in the pokey too, he stumbles off in shock and grabs a taxi.

George's confusion, even dismay, is understandable -- it's always a shock when the laws of space and time cease to apply. But if he'd hung out for a while, had a few drinks in the Indian Club, dropped a couple dimes in the dance hall, maybe checked out the action at the burlesque, he would have gotten a whole new take on the situation. Pottersville has its problems -- its bartenders can be undeniably ill-humored, for example -- but compared to the snooze-inducing Bedford Falls, it jumps. In the immortal words of Jeffrey "Janet Malcolm" Masson, it's a place of "sex, women, fun."

The gauzy Currier-and-Ives veil Capra drapes over Bedford Falls has prevented viewers from grasping what a tiresome and, frankly, toxic environment it is. When Marx penned his immortal words about "the idiocy of rural life," he probably had Bedford Falls in mind. B.F. is the kind of claustrophobic, undersized burg where everybody knows where you're going and what you're doing at all times. If you're a Norman Rockwell collector, this mi

It's not a wonderful life

It's the crushing weight of enormous expectations that does most of us in during the holidays, the same force of nature that messes up the prom, most weddings and the vast majority of New Year's Eve celebrations. At the exact second when you're supposed to be full of love and generosity and gratefulness for each and every member of your extended family, that's when it suddenly strikes you just how deeply irritating and dysfunctional and intolerable they are. Add to that a week of shuffling around in dirty socks, listening to hopelessly cheery Christmas carols and eating unreasonable volumes of refined sugar, and you've got a recipe for the sort of flashy murder-suicide that would make an excellent Lifetime movie of the week.

Since you're not about to put down the chocolate-covered cherries or that bottle of red wine until sometime in the new year, the only way to avoid a teary-eyed, insult-hurling outburst that it'll take years of therapy to undo is to escape into an alternative reality that's almost as dark as your current one. So here it is, a holiday viewing guide for the whole dysfunctional family, one that gracefully sidesteps anything remotely wholesome or heartwarming, dodges any and all gratefulness and hand-holding, and veers recklessly into the realm of bad attitudes, heavy drinking, filthy sex, gratuitous violence and tragic endings, preferably peppered with a glib disdain for all that is sweet and lovely and joyful in the world. What could be more festive?

My 13-year-old still believes in Santa Claus

Hi Cary,

I will be the first to admit that this may seem like a lame problem in the full scheme of things, but I would love for you to weigh in on this. My nearly 13-year-old stepdaughter believes in Santa Claus. Completely.

To give some background, her father was widowed when she was an infant, so we are her only living parents. I also have two small children from my first marriage who are still very much in the Santa target demographic. So you might assume she's going along with the game for the younger kids, but it's truly not the case.

Last Christmas, our first as a family, I was stunned when she asked me how Santa would know to find her at her new address. And just yesterday she admitted to wondering how Santa could truly go down everyone's chimney at midnight. ("That would be impossible, even for Santa.")

Her comments and questions have all come at times when the other children are not around. She's not pretending.

Ask the pilot

Before moving on to the fun stuff, we need to revisit last week's column and its discussion of September's midair collision in Brazil. The article brought in a flurry of responses, a number of which, in expressing their displeasure with my analysis, seemed not to understand the basic circumstances of the accident, leading me to believe my explanations were less than clear.

If you're totally new to the topic, I'd recommend starting here. For those of you already familiar, here's a new and hopefully cogent rundown of what went wrong:

On Sept. 29, a Gol Transportes Aéreos 737 collided head-on with a U.S.-registered executive jet, an Embraer Legacy, at 37,000 feet over the Amazon jungle. The Legacy landed safely; the 737 did not. Brazilian authorities say the Legacy wasn't supposed to be at 37,000 feet. The evidence says otherwise.

In the minutes before the accident, air traffic control had lost radio (voice) communication and radar contact with the Legacy crew. Actually, radar contact had become intermittent, though controllers could no longer see the airplane's speed or height on radar, or talk to its crew. Last they knew, the Legacy was cruising at 37,000 feet, 460 nautical miles northwest of Brasília.

The shopping news

I'm really working on striking a balance, myself. I tend to want to "get by" with the cheapest possible computer, apartment, phone service, or whatever. There are cases in which this is good; there are cases in which it's better to pay a bit more to get what you really want. I'm really trying to learn the difference. All spending, even some frivolous spending, is not inherently bad, but for a long time I've acted as though it is.

DH and I got rid of a ton of stuff in October when we moved from a two-bedroom to a small one-bedroom apartment: a loveseat, two desks and chairs, a computer, one of two cars, a ton of old papers and books and magazines. Learning to live compactly is a challenge for us, but we're finding we like it for reasons beyond the practical. We think a lot about whether we have room for things before we buy them, we buy more fresh food more often rather than stockpiling storable stuff, and we go to the library a LOT more than the bookstore these days.

The Pittsburgh Penguins fiasco: Another bad day for the NHL.

Wednesday was a great day to be a Pittsburgh Penguins fan. If you live in Kansas City, Mo. Maybe Houston.

Those two cities, each boasting a ready arena and a rich guy interested in buying an NHL team and moving it there, are the two most likely destinations for the beleaguered Pens if they aren't able to put a new arena deal together soon. That effort took a major hit Wednesday.

Another sad record

We've already heard, this week, that the number of attacks in Iraq was at an all-time high over the past few months. Today comes news of another disturbing milestone: 76 bodies were found over a 24-hour period in Baghdad Wednesday. That's a record number of the kind of anonymous murders that now plague the war-torn city. The best news the Los Angeles Times can muster out of that sad story is that "only a few [of the discovered bodies] showed signs of torture." And there was other bad news out of Iraq yesterday -- 26 other Iraqis and two American soldiers were killed.

We blame the media. If only it had been telling us about all the good stories coming out of Iraq months ago, then all this would be fixed by now.

The Trump vs. Rosie year-end smackdown! More Regan allegations come to light

Morning Briefing:
Rosie vs. Trump, Round 1: In the wake of this week's Miss USA scandal/public show of forgiveness, Rosie O'Donnell went on a rant against Donald Trump on Wednesday's episode of "The View," calling him a "snake-oil salesman" after he announced he would let the hard-drinkin' new Miss USA keep her crown. Questioning Trump's role as the moral arbiter in the case, O'Donnell said: "[He] left the first wife -- had an affair. [He] had kids both times, but he's the moral compass for 20-year-olds in America. Donald, sit and spin, my friend." She went on to say that Trump had once gone bankrupt (which he denies) and that he was "not a self-made man." Trump fired back, saying he plans to sue over her remarks. "You can't make false statements," Trump told People. "Rosie will rue the words she said. I'll most likely sue her for making those false statements -- and it'll be fun. Rosie's a loser. A real loser. I look forward to taking lots of money from my nice fat little Rosie." (People)

More Regan accusations: The anti-Semitic allegations against recently fired scandal-publisher Judith Regan keep coming in. Two unnamed "publishing insiders" tell Rush & Molloy they often heard Regan referring to Jews as "rodents." "I heard her say it multiple times," one of the sources told the columnists. "She thought Jews looked or acted like rats. She called them 'rodentia.'" The New York Times reports another bizarre incident -- two top HarperCollins execs confirmed for the paper that Regan was reprimanded by her employers three years ago "after an editor complained that she had boasted of removing the scrolls from her neighbors' mezuzas and replacing them with torn pieces from dollar bills." Regan's lawyer, Bert Fields, says, "She unequivocally denies saying any such thing. She never called Jews rodents or said they looked like rodents. It's absolutely false. It's a lie." As for the story about the mezuzas, he says, "it's absurd." (Rush & Molloy, N.Y. Times)

More Madonna marriage rumors: There has been speculation ever since Madonna adopted baby David earlier this year that her wish for more adopted children was a source of tension between her and her hubby, Guy Ritchie. In the most recent flare-up, Guy's dad, John, told London's Daily Mail: "They've had a difficult time. [David] is beautiful and Guy is very good with him. But I don't think he'd want to adopt again." The paper also reports that the couple was overheard bickering at dinner a few weeks ago, writing that "diners overheard Ritchie attacking the singer for being 'so controlling' while she appeared troubled as she played with her food." (Daily Mail via Page Six)

Trump spares hard-partying Miss USA. Britney's cheating heart?

Morning Briefing:
Trump says, "You're not fired!" Miss USA Tara Conner's crown-wearing days looked numbered after she was recently accused of such un-Miss USA-like activities as underage drinking (she just turned 21, but has been spotted in New York City bars for months) and "sexual misconduct" (she has been linked to a number of men over the same period, and reportedly made out with Miss Teen USA). (See Broadsheet's item from Tuesday for more on beauty contest rules.) But Miss Universe Organization co-owner Donald Trump decided to spare Conner and allow her to keep her title, provided she goes into rehab. At the press conference on Tuesday announcing his decision, Trump said Conner could be a role model as someone who could change her ways: "I believe she can do a tremendous service to young people." (Us Online)

Sony settles: Music giant Sony BMG has decided to settle a lawsuit brought against it for secretly embedding music CDs with software designed to limit the number of copies consumers could make of the discs using a computer -- the programs also made the unwitting users' computers more vulnerable to hackers. Sony has agreed to immediately stop distributing CDs with the hidden software and will pay $1.5 million in fees and fines, as well as make payments to any consumers who can document computer damage that resulted from the presence of the software. (Hollywood Reporter)

Goldman files Simpson suit: Ron Goldman's father, Fred, filed suit against O.J. Simpson on Tuesday, seeking the profits that Simpson made from his "If I Did It" TV and book deal. The suit claims Simpson tried to defraud the Goldman family by setting up a shell company to receive profits from the deal -- reportedly worth about $1.1 million -- thus avoiding a direct tie to Simpson, who still owes the Goldman family $38 million from an earlier judgment in a wrongful-death suit stemming from Ron's murder. (Associated Press)

Newt Gingrich's "outsider" act

Newt Gingrich still denies that he has made up his mind about whether or not to seek the presidency -- and if he does, it will only be because America demands it. "I am not 'running' for president," he told Fortune magazine in November. "I am seeking to create a movement to win the future by offering a series of solutions so compelling that if the American people say I have to be president, it will happen."

Gingrich is, however, running away from his former friends. As the former speaker of the House unsubtly positions himself for a shot at the nomination, his latest tactic seems to be distancing himself from the political polonium that is the Bush administration. A recent article in Insight magazine, a publication affiliated with the conservative Washington Times newspaper, describes unnamed sources "close to Gingrich" as saying the former speaker was breaking with the administration: "Newt bit his tongue for months and now feels he has to tell his base the truth: the White House does not have the will or the power to promote any agenda."

Too little, too late

Reversing his long-held opposition to increasing the permanent size of the U.S. military, President Bush is now considering calling for an addition of up to 70,000 troops. But with the Army already in an uphill battle to meet its current recruitment targets, many military experts fear Bush's expansion plans are way overdue and can be met only by lowering the standards for Army recruits -- including those with criminal records. Lawrence J. Korb, an assistant secretary of defense under Reagan and a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, summed up Bush's notion of a bigger Army this way: "Good idea, five years too late."

Sexless and loving it

As we near the annual Christian celebration of a chaste birth, it seems like a fitting time to have a conversation with a woman who has just published a book touting the joys of Christian chastity: Dawn Eden.

Thirty-seven-year-old Dawn Eden Goldstein, who dropped "Goldstein" from her byline back when she was 16 and writing for the Jersey Beat music fanzine, did not start out chaste. She started out writing music journalism and liner notes and enjoying, to hear her tell it, puh-lenty of sex. But in her late 20s, Eden began a series of religious transformations, first becoming a Christian, and by her early 30s, a devout Catholic with extremely conservative politics. Slowly but surely, she began to lay off the sex.

Eden eventually segued from her career as a freelance writer to copyediting for the New York Post, a job from which she was fired in 2005 for changing the language of a story about in vitro fertilization to reflect her extreme antiabortion, pro-fetus stance. Her dismissal made her a media circus freak of sorts: the woman too conservative for Rupert Murdoch.

"The Good Shepherd"

Sitting through boring movies is part of a critic's job, and it becomes second nature to forge ahead stolidly. But the first 20 minutes of Robert De Niro's "The Good Shepherd" were so dull -- so aggressively, brain-freezingly dull -- that I wondered how I'd make it through the remaining 140.

Thankfully, this elephantine epic, a fictitious saga (written by Eric Roth) detailing one man's role in the birth of the Central Intelligence Agency, gets slightly more interesting as it lurches forward -- either that, or the thing somehow lulled me into a state of drugged compliance. You can hear the movie's impending themes thundering through the forest before their massive heads even start poking through the trees, chief among them the idea that duplicitousness in the name of duty -- particularly when you're working for the U.S. government -- can poison not just your heart but your whole family. This is a somber, weighty, gray picture, one that pays clear tribute to the "Godfather" movies as it tries to scale some very rocky moral territory. But it's so unsatisfying to watch that even its biggest, most meditative right-and-wrong quandaries come to seem puny. De Niro can't sustain the necessary tension from scene to scene: The picture feels slack and wrinkled, even when, maybe especially when, it needs to be taut. And nearly all the characters -- not just the secretive, CIA-employed ones -- are so unformed and hard to read that it's tough to have an emotional stake in what happens to them. "The Good Shepherd," soft when it needs to be sharp, is all cloak with very little dagger.