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Sabtu, 20 Juli 2019

A$AP Rocky latest: Trump weighs in on rapper's jail treatment, Swedish prime minister won't intervene - CNN

Trump -- in a Saturday tweet that comes one day after the Stockholm District Court decided the Grammy-nominated rapper should remain in custody for another week while prosecutors finish their investigation -- said he spoke with Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Löfven to discuss Rocky's case. A$AP Rocky, whose real name is Rakim Mayers, is being held in prison in Stockholm pending an assault investigation tied to an incident in late June.

Trump credits Melania with putting A$AP Rocky's plight on his radar

"Just had a very good call with @SwedishPM Stefan Löfven who assured me that American citizen A$AP Rocky will be treated fairly. Likewise, I assured him that A$AP was not a flight risk and offered to personally vouch for his bail, or an alternative," Trump tweeted Saturday.

Trump said the two teams agreed to speak again in the next 48 hours, but Lofven's spokesman Toni Eriksson said Saturday, "It is possible that there will be follow up calls but right now there is not one scheduled or planned."

Eriksson said the prime minister told Trump in the about 20-minute call Saturday that his government "neither can nor will" try to influence the judicial process with respect to A$AP Rocky's case.

"The Prime Minister made sure to point out that the Swedish judicial system, prosecutors and courts, are completely independent," Eriksson, who described the call as "friendly and respectful," said. "He also pointed out that everyone is equal before the law and that the government neither can nor will try to influence the judicial process.

Prosecutor Daniel Suneson said in a separate statement that the court decided the 30-year-old rapper should remain in prison because he was deemed a "flight risk."

The rapper has been detained since July 3 following a confrontation in Stockholm where he faces accusations of serious assault, according to CNN Swedish affiliate Expressen. Prosecutors are investigating a brawl that broke out on June 30, which A$AP Rocky is suspected of being involved in.

The President's involvement in the case came at the request of celebrities and the first lady -- the latest incident in which star influence has swayed Trump to make certain decisions.

Trump on Friday credited Melania Trump with bringing A$AP Rocky's plight to his attention.

The President added, "Many members of the African American community have called me -- friends of mine -- and said, 'Could you help?'"

Trump also revealed on Twitter that he spoke to Kanye West about the situation. And on Thursday, Kim Kardashian West thanked Trump, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Trump's son-in-law and senior White House adviser Jared Kushner for their efforts in trying to get A$AP Rocky released.

Kardashian West had previously appealed to the President for him to commute the sentence of Alice Marie Johnson, a first-time nonviolent drug offender.

Last year, "Rocky" actor Sylvester Stallone advised Trump to grant boxing legend Jack Johnson a posthumous pardon.

CNN's Per Nyberg in Stockholm contributed to this story.

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https://www.cnn.com/2019/07/20/politics/asap-rocky-jail-trump-sweden-prime-minister/index.html

2019-07-20 16:06:00Z
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'The Lion King' Breaks Disney Box Office Records With Massive $79 Million Friday - Forbes

Prior the 2009 J.J. Abrams-directed reboot, the biggest opening weekend for a Star Trek movie was the pre-Thanksgiving 1996 launch of Star Trek: First Contact. Buoyed by strong reviews, an usual PG-13 rating that promised a darker and more violent action melodrama and a campaign that successfully sold the flick as a combo of the two most popular Trek flicks (The Wrath of Khan and The Voyage Home), the film opened with a whopping $30 million and legged it to $90 million domestic. Just two months later, a re-release of the first Star Wars movie, celebrating its 20th anniversary, opened with $35 million in January of 1997.

The Star Wars: Special Edition debut was impressive for any number of reasons, not least of which because the old Star Wars snagged a bigger opening weekend than the biggest debut for any "new" Star Trek movie. If there was any doubt that Star Wars was still a viable IP ripe for the plundering, the "Special Edition" reissues of the Star Wars trilogy earned $471 million worldwide in early 1997. George Lucas' long-fabled prequel flicks began dropping two years later. Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith eventually earned (sans reissues) $2.425 billion combined on a total production spend of $345 million.

Flash forward to September of 2011, when Walt Disney gave The Lion King a 3-D conversion and re-released it into theaters. Despite the 1994 animated blockbuster having sold 32 million VHS tapes since 1995 and 11.9 million DVDs since 2003, The Lion King 3-D opened with $30 million on its opening weekend. It earned $94 million domestic and $91.3 million overseas and was the third-biggest movie of the season behind Paranormal Activity 3 and Puss in Boots. The Lion King 3-D's success led to a mini-surge in Disney animated theatrical re-releases, but none of them (Beauty and the Beast, Finding Nemo and Monsters, Inc. in 2012) matched The Lion King's success.

Whatever a massive debut for a reanimated remake of The Lion King means in a macro sense, the micro of it is that folks just really like watching The Lion King in theaters. The mixed-negative reviews that argued that this Jon Favreau-directed version was essentially a re-painted and buttoned down version of the same movie you saw in 1994 and then bought in 1995, weren't so much pans as reassurances. This is a slightly new version of The Lion King, with a new cast comprised of the likes of Donald Glover, Beyonce Knowles-Carter and Seth Rogen, complete with James Earl Jones reprising his role as Mufasa. But it was still The Lion King.

Just as the 1997 "Special Edition" reissues of Star Wars underlined the potential value of "new" Star Wars content, so too did the 2011 3-D reissue of The Lion King highlight the potential encased in this specific animated IP. And once Favreau proved with The Jungle Book that you could essentially make an animated movie filled with animals and wildlife that looked "photo real," it was only a matter of time before Simba, Mufasa and Scar got the same treatment. Walt Disney's remake of The Lion King opened yesterday with a boffo $78.5 million Friday gross, including $23 million in Thursday previews. Including overseas grosses, it has already earned $270.5 million worldwide.

That $78.5 million Friday gross is Walt Disney's biggest single-day gross ever, even accounting for inflation, for anything that wasn't an MCU flick or a Star Wars movie. It's the second-biggest single-day July gross behind Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part II, which opened with $92 million in 2011 but then front-loaded to $169 million, which is still (until tomorrow) the biggest opening weekend ever for the month of July. Accounting for inflation, it's fourth behind Harry Potter 7.2 and Chris Nolan's Dark Knight sequels ($67 million in 2008 and $75 million in 2012), all of which opened on this exact weekend. Will The Lion King be less frontloaded this weekend than those three blockbusters?

Legs merely as "long" as The Dark Knight (a mere 2.36x multiplier for a then-record $158 million debut weekend) gets The Lion King to $184 million, which would be (sans inflation) the biggest July launch of all time and (including inflation) Disney's second-biggest non-MCU/non-Star Wars opening weekend ever behind Johnny Depp's Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest ($135 million in July of 2006/$187 million adjusted). If it legs like Pirates 2 (2.42x) or The Simpsons Movie ($74 million from a $30 million Friday in July of 2007), The Lion King will end Sunday night with $190 million. Even Dark Knight Rises/Harry Potter 7.2 legs (over/under 2x) gets it to between $145 million and $171 million.

The optimistic scenario is that this indeed plays like either a genuine animated flick or a general audiences blockbuster. An over/under 2.6x multiplier, think Austin Powers: Goldmember ($76 million from a $30 million Friday in July of 2002) or The Secret Life of Pets ($104 million/$38 million in July of 2016) gets this one over $200 million for the weekend. Conversely, a frontloaded weekend like Ant-Man and the Wasp and Spider-Man: Homecoming (both of which legged out after their debuts, natch), would give it a "mere" $177 million debut weekend. When your $200 million animated remake nabs a $78.5 million domestic Friday gross, there aren't a lot of pessimistic scenarios.

As far as the whole "What does this mean for cinema?" thing, well, I'm less annoyed at folks flocking to The Lion King (it's a new production of an old play) than I am at folks not also flocking to other stuff playing everywhere else. But The Lion King is, for good reason, an incredibly popular animated movie. Audiences seem to like this one more than critics (an A Cinemascore and an average 4.49/5 score in Rotten Tomatoes verified-user ratings). I wish we snobby film critics liked it more, but I just hope all of those families are buying lots of concessions to help subsidize the other movies playing to comparatively empty auditoriums.

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https://www.forbes.com/sites/scottmendelson/2019/07/20/lion-king-beyonce-star-wars-star-trek-harry-potter-dark-knight-johnny-depp-spider-man-disney-marvel-box-office/

2019-07-20 15:00:26Z
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Donald Trump Will Guarantee Bail for A$AP Rocky - TMZ

TMZ

Well this is a twist ... Donald Trump just said he's personally guaranteeing bail for A$AP Rocky if Swedish authorities release him ... meaning the President would be on the hook if Rocky skips out.

It's a bizarre turn in the case. Trump just tweeted, "Just had a very good call with @SwedishPM Stefan Lofven who assured me that American citizen A$AP Rocky will be treated fairly. Likewise, I assured him that A$AP was not a flight risk and offered to personally vouch for his bail ..."

Trump didn't use the word, but it sounds like he's saying he's willing to become a guarantor on Rocky's bail application.

As we reported, a judge ruled Friday A$AP is a flight risk and therefore can't be let out of jail while the case grinds on.

So, he's now spoken to the Swedish Prime Minister who really promised nothing ... especially if he views what's going on as fair. As we reported, A$AP has been jailed for more than 2 weeks and not a single criminal charge has been filed against him. Prosecutors say they need another week to investigate -- even though any lawyer out of school for a year could process this one quickly, since there's video -- and they convinced a judge to hold Rocky in custody while they figure it out.

And, by the way, prosecutors blew it by sending out a press release saying they plan to indict him ... so why the charade of pretending the investigation is continuing? When we contacted them they told us they mistakenly put that info in the press release and then removed it. The mistake was clearly just that they played their hand.

The reality is this ... Trump and his State Dept. have already made a full court press to get Rocky out and it fell on deaf ears. Good that he's trying, but Swedish authorities up to this point have been immovable.

As we reported, Kanye called Trump Friday and made a plea for the President to get involved.

Rocky faces 6 years in prison if he's charged and convicted of assaulting a man who assaulted him first.

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https://www.tmz.com/2019/07/20/donald-trump-will-guarantee-bail-asap-rocky/

2019-07-20 14:07:00Z
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'Game of Thrones' cast jokes about coffee cup, talks finale backlash at Comic-Con panel - Fox News

'Game of Thrones' fans furious after series finale failed to live up to expectations

After eight seasons of dragons, sword fights, ice zombies and massive battles, 'Game of Thrones' fans finally got the answer to the question, 'Who will end up on the Iron Throne?' Unfortunately, for many fans, that answer was pretty underwhelming. With big swings being taken left and right in the series finale, it seems opinions on the HBO hit show's final season were as cold as the winter that finally came.

"Game of Thrones" may be over but the cast can't seem to get away from stray coffee cups.

Maisie Williams, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, Liam Cunningham, Isaac Hempstead Wright and others took the stage at San Diego Comic-Con Friday evening for a goodbye panel and found some waiting at their places.

It was a cheeky reference to the misplaced coffee cup that viewers spotted in an episode of the final season that subsequently went viral. Although the moderator didn't make them answer for the coffee, actor John Bradley did have to defend himself against the other out-of-place item in the finale: The water bottle by his foot.

"I am right handed. I've thought about this very strongly," Bradley said, making a case that he would have put the bottle on the other side if it was his. "I'm not trying to clear my name, but ... I think I've taken enough blame for this one."

The cast was in good spirits after years of attending Comic-Con and not being able to reveal anything at the panels. Finally they were allowed to talk about things.

Maisie Williams, from left, Jacob Anderson, Liam Cunningham and Nikolaj Coster-Waldau appear at the "Game of Thrones" panel on day two of Comic-Con (Chris Pizzello/Invision/AP)

The big Hall H audience cheered to find out some of their favorite lines: Williams chose her own character's battle cry, "Not today," while Conleth Hill went for his co-star Peter Dinklage's, "I drink and I know things."

They also indulged in some fan theories, cleared up some burning questions and speculated about what happens after the finale.

Wright said that he can't imagine Bran's new government is a "barrel of laughs."

"Westeros is probably a surveillance state," he said.

But perhaps there is more fun happening on the new small council, according to Bradley.

"It basically turns into 'The Office,'" he said.

Cunningham posited that a spinoff could be called "Better Call Davos."

As for Arya and her quest to go "west of Westeros," Williams said, "I'm sure she's having a wonderful time, like Dora the Explorer minus the bob."

And Jacob Anderson thinks Grey Worm is off starting a new society with "a Wakanda kind of vibe."

There was some discussion of the divisiveness of the eighth and final season, although likely not as much as there would have been had showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss been in attendance as originally scheduled.

"Look at the amount of people here," Hill said, gesturing to the 8,000-some people in Hall H. "We're very grateful to your fandom over the years ... this is the reality as opposed to the media-led hate campaign."

Coster-Waldau said every season of "Game of Thrones" has been divisive in its own way, from Ned Stark's fate to the "Red Wedding."

The cast of "Game of Thrones" cast talked about the divisive finale, the infamous coffee cup, and more at San Diego Comic-Con (Chris Pizzello/Invision/AP)

"Obviously when it comes to an end it's going to (expletive) you off no matter what because it's the end,"Coster-Waldau said. "Just don't call people names."

Benioff and Weiss dropped off the schedule at the last minute, as did actors Iain Glen and Nathalie Emmanuel and director Miquel Sapochnik. Their absence was not addressed during the panel.

But everyone at Hall H seemed to be enjoying the victory lap. Earlier this week, "Game of Thrones" scored 32 Emmy nominations. It was a single year Primetime Emmy nomination record.

In addition to a best drama series nod, which the show has won four times, there were a handful of acting nominations for Kit Harington and Emilia Clarke in leading performances, Dinklage, Coster-Waldau, Alfie Allen, Lena Headey, Williams, Sophie Turner and Gwendoline Christie in supporting performances, and Carice van Houten as a guest star.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Allen, Christie and van Houten all self-submitted for consideration, which involves paying a $225 entry fee,

"Game of Thrones" ended this past May after 8 seasons. Its finale brought in a series record 19.3 million viewers.

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https://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/game-of-thrones-comic-con-panel

2019-07-20 12:47:53Z
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