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200 million dollar budgets are usually reserved for Marvel or DC blockbusters. $300 million dollar budgets are typically reserved for “Avengers”-level movies. But Ridley Scott’s “Gladiator 2” sequel apparently has a budget that has ballooned up to $310 million, according to a new report in The Hollywood Reporter.

Initially budgeted at $165 million, Paramount insiders insist to THR the net cost of the 49-day shoot was under $250 million. The original “Gladiator” budget was $103 million in 2000; adjusted for inflation, that would be $188 million today.

One source told the trade about the production. “It’s a runaway. It’s not being managed.”

The strikes apparently account for some of that money; the production shutdowns starting in July reportedly cost $600,000 a week, or a total of about $10 million, until Scott resumed shooting in December. THR alleges that Scott “kept cameras rolling during the work stoppages, shooting extras at crowd scenes in Malta, where he built a Coliseum set.”

“Gladiator 2” has been plagued with issues since it began. A stunt accident in July sent four crewmembers to the hospital with non-life-threatening burn injuries, and the same month, the animal rights organization People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) alleged that the production of “Gladiator 2” engaged in the mistreatment of animals during its shoot.

An airstrike in Ethiopia's Amhara region killed at least 15 civilians, including children and elderly people, when it hit a truck carrying them to a village this week, three residents said. The strike took place on Monday around 24 km from where Ethiopian troops were fighting militiamen, according to the residents who asked not to be named for fear of reprisals.

Some of the victims were fleeing the clashes, while others were returning home from a baptism ceremony, they said.

Spokespeople for Ethiopia's government, military as well as for Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed's office did not respond to requests for comment.

A secretive committee of senior officials in Ethiopia’s largest and most populous region, Oromiya, has ordered extra-judicial killings and illegal detentions to crush an insurgency there, a Reuters investigation has found. Reuters interviewed more than 30 federal and local officials, judges, lawyers and victims of abuses by authorities. The agency also reviewed documents drafted by local political and judicial authorities.

These interviews and documents for the first time shed light on the workings of the Koree Nageenyaa – Security Committee in the Oromo language - which began operating in the months after Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed came to power in 2018. The committee’s existence has not been previously reported.

Five current and former government officials told Reuters that the committee is at the heart of Abiy’s efforts to end a years-old insurgency by the Oromo Liberation Army (OLA), which wants self-determination for the Oromo people and greater language and cultural rights. Oromos have long complained of political and social marginalisation. When new protests broke out in 2019, the government cracked down hard. The Koree Nageenyaa took the lead, the five officials said.

The violence in Oromiya has displaced hundreds of thousands of people. Ethiopia’s government and human rights officials accuse the OLA of killing scores of civilians since 2019, a charge the group denies.

One of the five sources was willing to be identified: Milkessa Gemechu, a former member of the governing Prosperity Party’s central committee. The others, including two people who have attended meetings of the Koree Nageenyaa, spoke on condition of anonymity.

The people familiar with Koree Nageenyaa's activities attributed dozens of killings to the committee's orders and hundreds of arrests. Among the killings, they said, was a massacre of 14 shepherds in Oromiya in 2021 that the government has previously blamed on OLA fighters.

A secretive committee of senior officials in Ethiopia’s largest and most populous region, Oromiya, has ordered extra-judicial killings and illegal detentions to crush an insurgency there, a Reuters investigation has found.

Reuters interviewed more than 30 federal and local officials, judges, lawyers and victims of abuses by authorities. The agency also reviewed documents drafted by local political and judicial authorities. These interviews and documents for the first time shed light on the workings of the Koree Nageenyaa – Security Committee in the Oromo language - which began operating in the months after Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed came to power in 2018. The committee’s existence has not been previously reported.

Five current and former government officials told Reuters that the committee is at the heart of Abiy’s efforts to end a years-old insurgency by the Oromo Liberation Army (OLA), which wants self-determination for the Oromo people and greater language and cultural rights. Oromos have long complained of political and social marginalisation. When new protests broke out in 2019, the government cracked down hard. The Koree Nageenyaa took the lead, the five officials said.

The violence in Oromiya has displaced hundreds of thousands of people. Ethiopia’s government and human rights officials accuse the OLA of killing scores of civilians since 2019, a charge the group denies.

A subset of exceptional pooches can identify by name more than 100 different objects, mostly toys

Via @fossilesque

We unpack some must-see K-dramas and Korean films for 2024, including "Parasite" star Song Kang-ho's first lead role in a drama series.

The Ethan Coen crime farce is good, but would it have been better with both siblings? Can filmmakers ever really claim to have solo projects? There are well-established dynamics to a musician splitting off from a group to make an album of their own, even when it requires a new set of supporting musicians. But while there are certain would-be purists who will insist that, say, Wes Anderson’s movies have never been the same since he stopped co-writing them with Owen Wilson, the particularly collaborative nature of filmmaking makes that line of thought sound more like conspiracy-mongering. Wilson may not have written a movie with Anderson since The Royal Tenenbaums, but he was sure on set for a lot of The Life Aquatic and The Darjeeling Limited, and Anderson has worked with so many other co-writers, recurring actors and other steady collaborators it would be difficult to describe even his most singularly Anderson-voiced movies (which is to say, all of them) as more “solo” than others.

There is an exception, though, that doubles as one of the hottest trends of the 2020s: filmmaking siblings splitting up their dual act. Josh and Benny Safie (Uncut Gems) are pursuing their own, separate projects, with Josh planning to reteam with Adam Sandler while Benny (who also acts) planning to direct another movie starring Dwayne Johnson. Lana Wachowski directed The Matrix Resurrections on her own, and her sister Lily recently announced her own debut as a solo filmmaker. The sibling duo furthest along on their divergent paths, however, are Joel and Ethan Coen. They haven’t made a movie together since 2018’s The Ballad of Buster Scruggs; Joel’s The Tragedy of Macbeth came out in 2021, and now Ethan’s Drive-Away Dolls, the first of at least two projects written with his wife Tricia Cooke, is hitting theaters. The divisions between the two films are fascinating and, at times, almost suspiciously neat...

The new Salem's Lot movie finished filming at the end of 2021: but there remains no sign of a release. If you’re keeping score, then it’s currently two films that Warner Bros has made in the last few years, that it’s elected to deleted and take the tax write-off. The fate of a third is surely about to be determined too. And now there’s a fourth film that seems stuck in limbo as well.

The movie is a fresh big screen adaptation of Stephen King’s novel Salem’s Lot, that was originally going to be released in the spring of 2022. Filming wrapped up at the end of 2021, and it’s suffered a few release date bumps since then.

Gary Dauberman – who last directed Annabelle Comes Home – has seemingly completed his cut of the movie, and it’s a case of Warner Bros deciding what to do with it. It’s had a couple of theatrical release dates so far, and there were rumours that it might go straight to Warner Bros’ Max streaming service.

The website JoBlo has gone digging into the current state of things here, and it’s a good summation of an odd situation...

Via @UKFilmNerd

Adam Sandler is a lonely astronaut whose strained marriage is helped by an alien spider, voiced by Paul Dano. The occasionally spotty quality of his filmography means it’s easy to forget that Adam Sandler is one of the most talented actors of his generation. Though there have been some dramatic turns over the years, Sandler is first and foremost a comedian, the mind behind some genuinely hilarious comic classics. There’s none of that signature humour in his latest project, which sees the Sandman morph into the Spaceman, the titular Czech cosmonaut of Chernobyl director Johan Renck’s sci-fi drama. It’s a tale about love, loneliness and connection that is by turns weird, introspective, and beautiful...

Forest communities in southwestern Ghana use 70 species of medicinal trees to treat up to 83 ailments, according to a recent study. These plants contain high levels of bioactive compounds with pharmacological benefits, but many are also threatened by factors including overharvesting and agricultural expansion in the area that drives large-scale deforestation. Due to a lack of access to Western medicine and cultural perceptions, traditional medicine is the primary source of treatment for many forest-fringe communities.

The authors say government-led conservation programs and preserving traditional knowledge is important to conserving these medicinal tree species.

Azerbaijan is not adhering to the principles needed to clinch a long-term peace treaty, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said in an interview with France 24. He suggested Azerbaijan was preparing to launch another attack.

A few days after a meeting with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, Nikol Pashinian said that the promises of a peaceful resolution of the crisis between the two countries are belied on the ground by the actions from Azerbaijan.

Every prize at the British Academy Film awards from the Royal Festival Hall in London