WORLD
March 22, 2014 | By Lauren Frayer
MARINALEDA, Spain - It was a sweltering summer day at the height of Spain's economic crisis when the longtime mayor of this hardscrabble village decided it was time to grab the nation's attention. Most other politicians were on vacation, which looked a bit decadent to many, considering that the unemployment rate in southern Spain's Andalusia region was pushing 40%, among the highest in the nation. So Mayor Juan Manuel Sanchez Gordillo of Marinaleda - population barely 2,700 - led his trade unionist friends on a march to a supermarket in a neighboring town.
ENTERTAINMENT
March 6, 2014 | By Inkoo Kang
Urbanites have plenty of reasons to fear country folk, at least in the movies. Getting away for the weekend so often turn into a showdown with masked murderers that heading out to the country seems like a game of Russian roulette. In writer-director Jeremy Lovering's exceptional British thriller "In Fear," the needy, nebbish Tom (Iain De Caestecker) rolls the dice by booking a room at a remote hotel for himself and his maybe-kinda girlfriend, Lucy (Alice Englert), to celebrate their two-week anniversary.
SPORTS
March 5, 2014 | By Chris Foster
UCLA's basketball team won the Pac-12 Conference regular-season championship last season and Coach Ben Howland was fired. With two games left in this conference regular season, the Bruins already know they will not repeat as champions, yet all is well. The change from Howland to Steve Alford has been a mostly lateral move. Entirely horizontal, in fact, according to the records. UCLA last season had a 22-7 record at this stage. As the Bruins prepare to play at Washington on Thursday and Washington State on Saturday in their final two games before this year's conference tournament, their record is … 22-7.
SPORTS
February 21, 2014 | By Eric Pincus
The Lakers received a traded-player exception of $2,789,920 on Wednesday in their trade of Steve Blake to the Golden State Warriors for Kent Bazemore and MarShon Brooks. A traded-player exception can be used to acquire a player in trade without sending out matching salary. In the case of the Blake exception, the Lakers can deal for a player making up to $2,889,920 (including $100,000 of padding). Given the NBA's trade deadline has elapsed, the Lakers won't be able to use the exception until after the season.
CALIFORNIA | LOCAL
February 6, 2014 | By Matt Stevens and Martha Groves
Skating fans in Culver City were celebrating a temporary victory after city officials dug out an obscure document that advocates hope can keep an ice rink in the neighborhood. City officials informed the owner of Culver City Ice Arena of its findings last week. They said a use variance granted in 1960 prohibits the use of the property for anything except an ice rink. The new lessee, Planet Granite, plans to convert the 52-year-old rink into a rock climbing, fitness and yoga facility.
ENTERTAINMENT
January 28, 2014 | By Richard Verrier
Paramount Pictures reiterated to exhibitors this week its plans to embrace the digital format, but added that it would make exceptions for some movies. "In keeping with the digital direction of the studio's exhibition partners, we have moved forward with the conversion to primarily digital projection," Rob Moore, vice chairman of Paramount Pictures, wrote in a letter to exhibitors on Monday. "This resolve follows the successful release of Martin Scorsese's Academy Award-nominated film 'The Wolf of Wall Street,' and it is the first Paramount feature to be released nationwide entirely in digital.