Snow

Two frostbitten, emaciated horses were recovering inside a warm barn thanks to volunteers who spent the week before Christmas digging the animals out of snow in the mountains of northeastern British Columbia. Birgit Stutz said the rescuers cheered when they finally finished digging a half-mile escape route through the snow for the animals. The horses had been abandoned by a hunter and faced almost certain death. Over the course of a week, a growing number of residents trudged up the mountain with shovels in hand to dig out the escape pathway through 6-foot-deep snow.

Moviegoers may be impressed by "Snow White and the Huntsman's" computer-generated trolls, flying fairies and mythical beasts. But it could be Colleen Atwood's complicated, handmade costumes that really steal the show. The film's Queen Ravenna (Charlize Theron) may be losing her grip on the title of fairest of them all, but she nevertheless tops the cast's best-dressed list. In some cases, some of Ravenna's 20 outfits (counting several multiple versions of the same gowns) took weeks to construct, though they might appear on screen for only a few seconds.

You look fat in that. Of course I'll be late. Your baby reminds me of Gollum's uncle. This is what the 2013 Subaru BRZ might say if it could talk. The all-new, rear-wheel-drive sports car starts at $26,265, and boy is it honest - perhaps more so than any other car on the market today, save for its mechanical twin, the Scion FR-S. The two were jointly developed by Subaru and Scion's parent company, Toyota, with both assembled by Subaru in Japan. The question about the BRZ is, can you handle the honesty?

MARLOES SANDS, Wales - Nearly a hundred soldiers on horseback sprinted across the beach here last fall, dodging arrows and catapulted fire balls. Despite many casualties, the charging "Snow White and the Huntsman" army was determined to storm the castle of the evil Queen Ravenna, who not only can suck the beauty out of young women but also transmogrify into a murder of crows. Assessing the battle from an all-terrain vehicle was Rupert Sanders, a commercial director making his first feature film.

Tioga Road, the east-west ribbon of roadway that accesses Yosemite National Park 's back country, will open for the season at noon Monday, the earliest opening date for the road since 1987. Last year, the road that leads to Tuolumne Meadows didn't open until June 18 because of higher-than-average snow pack, thwarting Me m orial Day plans for hikers and backpackers. But this year it's the complete opposite. California is experiencing a very dry year , with snow pack about 50% of normal, according to a park statement.

'The Snow Queen' Where: Glendale Community College Performing Arts Theater, 1500 N. Verdugo Road, Glendale When: 7:30 p.m. today and Saturday, 2:30 p.m. Sunday Price: $20 to $30 Contact: (818) 790-7924 or www.ccballet.net

About three inches of snow fell overnight in southern Indiana, slowing cleanup efforts and compounding the misery in areas hard hit by tornadoes in recent days, a state official said Monday morning. The snow creates problems such as hiding nails, screws, boards and other debris on roads, making it a bit more difficult to move in cleanup help, State Police Sgt. Ray Poole, public information officer for the state's joint information center, said in a telephone interview. The cleanup "hasn't come to a complete, screeching halt," Poole said, "but it does hide nails and screws, and we don't want people stepping on them.

The blizzard that has shut down the East Coast calls for some warnings about playing in or even walking on  snow and ice. The American Assn. of Orthopedic Surgeons (and really, those docs should know) has some advice to share with the hundreds of thousands of Americans who will get injured this year. An association report on winter sports found snowboarding the No. 1 injury sport (164,002) and sledding, snow tubing and tobogganing a close second (160,020) in 2007. Here are some safety tips from the Health Notes blog of the Newport News Daily Press and practical advice on avoiding snow sport injuries from the AAOS.

Bring on the snow (and indeed there's already snow at Lake Tahoe and Mammoth ) to cash in on this foul-weather deal. Cottonwood Restaurant & Bar in Truckee, Calif., discounts eats and drinks each time a bona fide storm warning is issued in the Lake Tahoe area. It's a nice way to meet the locals and take a break from the slopes -- provided you can get there and back.  The deal: Stormy Weather Get-Togethers, a kind of happy hour that goes into effect when the stormy weather blows, feature $3 microbrews, $1 off a glass of wine and $6 margaritas as well as discounts on appetizers, salads and entrees.

Gas prices in the United States have fallen more than 5 cents over the last two weeks, the Lundberg Survey finds. Prices are down a total of 24 cents over the last six weeks. The city with the lowest average price in the latest survey was Albuquerque, N.M., at $2.83. The highest average? San Francisco, at $3.57 . . . . Snow is anticipated from New Mexico into Kansas through Tuesday, with blizzard conditions possible. The National Weather Service has issued blizzard warnings across portions of northeastern New Mexico, southeastern Colorado, southwestern Kansas, the Oklahoma panhandle, and northern Texas . . . . Southern California mountains are expecting clear skies and typical temps for this time of year, through Christmas Day . . . . The sailing schooner America is offering a “No Seasickness Guarantee” for whale watching trips from the Maritime Museum of San Diego.

Tioga Road, the east-west ribbon of roadway that accesses Yosemite National Park 's back country, will open for the season at noon Monday, the earliest opening date for the road since 1987. Last year, the road that leads to Tuolumne Meadows didn't open until June 18 because of higher-than-average snow pack, thwarting Me m orial Day plans for hikers and backpackers. But this year it's the complete opposite. California is experiencing a very dry year , with snow pack about 50% of normal, according to a park statement.

Early in"Snow White and the Huntsman,"several droplets of blood fall to the frozen ground in extreme slow motion, a sample not only of the menace to follow but also of first-time director Rupert Sanders' truly painstaking attention to detail. The shot was the last sequence filmed by the veteran commercial director, and no matter how hard the crew tried, the production's artificial serum never had the proper viscosity or splatter. "It just looked like raspberry jam," Sanders said.

"Annie Hall" inspired women to learn how to tie a tie. "Flashdance" set off a craze for ripped sweat shirts. And "Pulp Fiction" made the classic white shirt a hot fashion item. But how many people know the names of the costume designers who inspired these film-to-fashion moments? (For the record, they are Ruth Morley, Michael Kaplan and Betsy Heimann, respectively.) When it comes to inspiring others, costume designers rarely gain fame or fortune, even when films and TV shows spin off commercial cosmetics and clothing lines based on their work.

It's been 84 years since there's been a Nor'easter like this one. On Monday morning, parts of Pennsylvania and New York were dealing with a springtime surprise -- a late-season storm that put some areas under a foot of snow and cut power to thousands of residents. Even more snow was expected in the higher elevations of Pennsylvania and New York state, south of Buffalo, and northeastern Ohio. The last time a big snowstorm hit so late in the season was 1928, according to Aaron Tyburski, a National Weather Service meteorologist in State College, Penn.

We headed into the weekend without much of a plan, other than taking in a Dodger game. But as things turned out, we would have written a song if Randy Newman hadn't beaten us to it. On Saturday morning, the storm had moved out, the air was crisp and the sky was mostly clear. How about a hike in the mountains? I ran this past the family and the chairwoman of the board voted yes, but the 8-year-old vice chair was a tough sell. Her questions included "What mountains?" and "What are we going to do there?"

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — They serve on a remote Himalayan glacier known as the world's highest combat zone, in a fiercely disputed region that has sparked two wars between archrivals Pakistan and India. But instead of dying in battle, 117 Pakistani soldiers were feared lost Saturday in a massive avalanche that entombed their lonely headquarters. Most of the soldiers were believed to have been in the battalion's main building when the avalanche struck about 6 a.m., burying the men under 70 feet of snow, Pakistani military officials said.

Snow coming early to SoCal Southern California ski areas are gearing up for an early season. Snow-making is already taking place at Mountain High (above, photographed last week), thanks to the October cold snap. Meanwhile, Big Bear and Mammoth are awaiting the real stuff as more storms were predicted this week. For Mountain High, where wildfires threatened just a week ago, the snow-making was the earliest ever. "We . . . will open as soon as possible," says John McColly, the resort's director of marketing.

Snow is a beautiful thing, especially when you have the right toys for playing in it. Some of these items are simple and others are high-tech, but all are innovative and are sure to make any winter wonderland even better. Ride a rocket Zipfy Freestyle Mini-Luge: Tiny plastic snow sled with an oversized handle in the middle that's reminiscent of a mechanical bull. Likes: Pure fun and exhilaration. With your rear end nestled in slight depressions and legs stretched out front, you sit upright on this 20-inch-long sled and hold on to an 11-inch central handle, which allows for great speed and surprisingly good stability and control.

Encased in a coffin, waiting to be brought back to life: That's how Snow White spends a good portion of the folk story that bears her name. There's no such downtime for the princess in the snappy retelling "Mirror Mirror," a fractured fairy tale that occupies the divide between Disney and Grimm. A booster shot of testosterone lends kinetic kick to director Tarsem Singh's visually inventive interpretation, without shortchanging the requisite froufrou or sugarcoating the story's dark Oedipal heart.

Snow White was driving hastily through West Hollywood, swerving her SUV out of a lane of cars jammed in traffic. Opportunities to make U-turns on Santa Monica Boulevard don't come frequently, so Lily Collins - who plays the classic fairy-tale princess in Friday's"Mirror Mirror" - pulled a quick illegal maneuver to minimize her time in the car. "It would have taken forever otherwise," the actress said in the parking lot of the French...