Anthony Mackie (“Real Steel”, “Dos au mur”) serait en négociation pour incarner le personnage du Faucon dans “Captain America 2 – The Winter Soldier”.
L’acteur Anthony Mackie (Real Steel, Dos au mur) serait en négociation pour incarner le personnage de Sam Wilson alias le Faucon dans les prochaines aventures de Captain America, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, en salle en 2014. Premier vrai super-héros afro-américain et allié de Captain America, le Faucon a été créé en 1969 par Stan Lee et Gene Colan, et apparaît pour la première fois dans Captain America n°117.
C’est désormais officiel: Peter Jackson réalisera bien Bilbo Le Hobbit, adaptation du roman de Tolkien dont l’histoire si situe bien des années avant celle du Seigneur Des Anneaux.
Longtemps compromis en raison des problèmes financiers de la MGM, le projet d’adapter au cinéma Bilbo Le Hobbit, le roman de JR Tolkien, est enfin relancé et de la plus belle des manières. C’est en effet à Peter Jackson que revient le privilège de réaliser les deux films que devrait compter cette adaptation.
Et il y a là une certaine logique, finalement, puisque le réalisateur néo-zélandais avait dirigé la trilogie du Seigneur Des Anneaux, dont Bilbo Le Hobbit est le prequel, et que l’histoire se déroule plusieurs années avant, au même endroit, dans la légendaire Terre du Milieu. Peter Jackson explique d’ailleurs: «Explorer la Terre du Milieu de Tolkien est quelque chose qui va bien au-delà d’une expérience de mise en scène cinématographique classique. C’est un voyage complètement immersif dans un endroit très spécial plein d’imagination, de beauté et de drame. Nous avons hâte de revenir dans ce monde merveilleux en compagnie de Gandalf et Bilbo, avec nos amis de New Line Cinema, Warner Bros. et MGM».
Si le projet est relancé, les coulisses du film sont pour l’instant encore très agitées. Des problèmes syndicaux risquent bien de voir le tournage quitter la Nouvelle-Zélande, comme c’était prévu à l’origine, pour aller s’installer à l’étranger, probablement en Europe de l’Est. Peter Jackson l’a affirmé dans un communiqué alors que les syndicats avaient levé le boycott. Pour lui «le mal infligé à notre industrie par les syndicats est déjà fait». Sauf qu’aux dernières nouvelles, le ministre du développement économique de Nouvelle-Zélande s’est invité dans la discussion et souhaite tout entreprendre pour que le tournage reste sur ses terres.
Le tournage est censé débuter en février prochain, les deux films seront en 3D, filmés avec des caméras utilisant les technologies les plus récentes en matière de relief. Sorties prévues en 2012 et 2013.
a entraîné en Terre Inconnue pour rencontrer le peuple Tsaatan de Mongolie. Et, surprise, il y a beaucoup de chaleur dans cette région du globe.
Il en a de la chance, ce Frédéric Lopez. Il voyage souvent vers des pays merveilleux avec parfois de jolies filles aux yeux bandés. Pour son nouveau numéro de Rendez-Vous En Terre Inconnue, diffusé ce mardi 14 décembre à 20h35 sur France 2, c’est en effet Virginie Efira qui embarque pour finalement découvrir en plein vol sa destination : l’extrême Nord de la Mongolie. Le peuple Tsaatan l’y attend, au terme de quatre jours de voyage jusqu’à la région du Khövsgöl, tout près de la frontière russe.
« J’aime l’idée d’être projetée dans un milieu car confrontée à une rencontre, à un environnement, on peut en découvrir davantage sur soi. Y compris des choses désagréables, d’ailleurs »,n explique Virginie Efira. Et elle n’a pas été déçue. D’ailleurs, elle admet avoir réévalué « la trop haute opinion (qu’elle avait) de (s)a capacité d’adaptation! » Elle résume : »La difficulté à me défaire du quotidien. Comme le besoin, parfois, d’être seule. Mais aussi le fait de se laver ou d’aller aux toilettes avec plusieurs couches de vêtements. Et — histoire de ne pas montrer mon anatomie d’emblée à tout le monde —, de trouver un moment pour sortir de la tente, par moins 20 degrés, et voir les rennes débarquer… »
Mais elle est encore émue. Par « cette nuit à la belle étoile, entre feu et neige, entourés des rennes (…), plongée dans l’imaginaire de mon enfance. Le père Noël qui croise un chamane… Loin de tout, au coeur de la Taïga, j’avais 10 ans et demi ! Tous ces instants ont rendu le voyage féerique. Comme lorsque nous nous sommes retrouvés au pied de l’arbre sacré, cet arbre toujours vert, recouvert de petits rubans bleus, symboles des rêves, promesses et prières de chacun. La beauté et la magie de ces moments font, bien heureusement, que nous ne sommes pas toujours en prise avec notre petit confort et les températures ambiantes. »
Un décor réchauffé par l’humain, comme à chaque fois dans ce génial concept de Frédéric Lopez qui a trouvé un interlocuteur de choix pour Virginie Efira en la personne de Ganbat. « Tout est devenu simple, dès que j’ai vu Ganbat arriver à dos de renne. A sa manière de se tenir – dans une position très cool – on aurait dit qu’il allait faire du reggae dans la seconde ! Le charme a été immédiat. En plus d’avoir les yeux de
, Ganbat avait cette décence du rire. Il a d’emblée su rire de notre timidité mutuelle. J’adore quand le rire devient une forme de pudeur. » Et d’évoquer Gigit un petit garçon dont elle dit être tombée raide dingue! Elle en parlera certainement après la diffusion du film, sur le plateau de Retour de terre inconnue pour répondre en direct aux questions des téléspectateurs. Sympa, car c’est un bien joli guide, cette Virginie.
Devenu un people comme les autres, le milliardaire de génie Mark Zuckerberg voit sa vie privée scrutée par le public. L’officialisation de sa relation pourrait donc se retrouver en Une des magazines.
«Mark Zuckerberg est maintenant en couple». Une petite phrase qui a fait beaucoup parler sur la planète Facebook. Le très ambitieux créateur du réseau social, s’est laissé prendre au jeu de l’amour sur Internet et a décidé de faire état de sa vie privée en public. Un choix surprenant pour celui que l’on range dans la catégorie des petits génies, plus habitués à caresser leur clavier que le corps d’une femme. Mais le printemps a visiblement ouvert les Windows de Mark à l’amour. L’heureuse élue s’appelle
Chan.
Si les deux e-tourtereaux viennent tout juste d’officialiser leur rencontre, il se fréquentent en réalité depuis 2003. Romantisme absolu: leur regards se sont pour la première fois croisés lors d’une soirée, alors qu’ils faisaient tous les deux la queue pour aller aux toilettes…La première impression de Priscilla fut que Mark était «un mec plutôt ringard, un peu ailleurs». Pas vraiment le coup de foudre dirons-nous. Mais à force de persévérance et de «pokes» en masse, Zuckerberg a finalement séduit sa belle.
Entre eux, c’est désormais l’e-mour fou! Mais pas question de dépasser certaines limites. Véritable accro au travail, peut-être même plus que le boss de Facebook, Priscilla a imposé quelques règles. Pas plus d’un rendez-vous par semaine, d’une durée de 100 minutes, ni dans l’appartement de Mark ni dans les bureaux de Facebook. Une décision drastique, qui laisse peu de place à l’improvisation, mais sûrement essentielle à la survie de ce couple qui travaille à quelques rues d’écart dans la ville de Palo Alto.
La relation entre Mark et Priscilla prenant de l’ampleur, ils se sont progressivement permis quelques petites folies. Non, pas de tatouage des prénoms respectifs sur l’épaule, mais quelques apparitions publiques ensemble. De quoi affoler les fans de Mark qui espéraient encore pouvoir séduire le plus jeune milliardaire de la planète, dont la fortune est estimée a 6,9 milliards de dollars. Sur ce point, on ne peut pas reprocher à Priscilla d’être vénale, puisqu’elle envoyait déjà des love-mails à Mark alors qu’il n’était que le geek de service à Harvard.
Geek aujourd’hui métamorphosé en prince charmant du web grâce à sa douce. Ils sont tellement amoureux, qu’ils n’ont pas hésité a créer une page Facebook pour leur bichon Beast. Le ridicule ne tue pas et donne des ailes à Mark et Priscilla. Ces deux-là sont donc officiellement, au yeux de la communauté Facebook, en couple (« in a relationship »). On leur souhaite beaucoup de bonheur, de pokes quotidiens, de cœurs sur leurs murs (walls) et de messages inbox enflammés.
The EU’s diplomatic service has had a tough start but – potentially – has a bright future
Two-and-a-half years after its creation, the European Union’s diplomatic service – the European External Action Service (EEAS) – still has a weak institutional identity. On rare occasions, such as the dialogue between Belgrade and Pristina on the level of autonomy for Serbs in northern Kosovo, it displays the leadership role of a collective EU foreign ministry. On other issues, it amounts to little more than a secretariat for foreign-policy co-ordination among the member states.
It clearly has delivered a more comprehensive approach to crisis management and aspects of neighbourhood policy, but expectations that it would serve as the central hub of effective co-ordination for all dimensions of external relations have been disappointed. Greater continuity of leadership (compared to the rotating presidency of the Council of Ministers) has led to more efficiency, but at the cost of a loss of a sense of ownership by the member states. The EEAS’s heterogeneous composition – of EU officials and member states’ diplomats – and its dependence on the European Commission have hampered efforts to build a coherent corporate culture and a shared sense of purpose.
While some of these difficulties relate to the circumstances at the creation of the new service – such as the financial crisis and the ensuing resource constraints – others reflect the ambivalence and confusion of the stakeholders. The great majority of member states certainly would desire a more effective EU foreign policy. However, for the big countries this should not come at the cost of their own freedom of manoeuvre and their ability to promote their profile and prestige through their national foreign policy. And for many of the smaller ones, rhetorical support for a stronger European foreign policy is not backed up by a willingness to assume the risks and costs this would entail.
Similarly, most agree that the EU will be able to become a global actor only if it overcomes the current fragmentation and manages to bring the various economic, political and security instruments together in a coherent fashion. Everybody supports co-ordination in principle, yet at the same time nobody wishes to be co-ordinated.
Many Commission functionaries view the EEAS as a ‘Trojan horse’ designed to ‘inter-governmentalise’ core competences of the European community, and some member states see behind every demand for co-ordination another EU power-grab.
Thus, following the Lisbon treaty of 2009, the EU’s foreign-policy structures currently reflect an uneasy compromise between aspirations and hesitations, hopes and doubts. This is probably inevitable. EU foreign policy cannot be introduced like a common currency, but has to grow incrementally through decades of experience of practical co-operation. The ongoing EEAS review can address some shortcomings in the current set-up, but it will not make a dramatic difference.
A stronger diplomatic service
However, there are three factors that could prompt a dynamic development of EU foreign policy over the coming years.
Firstly, EU member states currently employ more than 50,000 diplomats and operate more than 2,000 diplomatic missions. Many of them face severe budgetary constraints and are forced to reduce and adjust their diplomatic networks. While national diplomacies are certainly irreplaceable as a means of promoting national interests, there are still huge gains to be made by doing more together in this area. EU delegations should become the lead infrastructure for genuine EU diplomatic teamwork on the ground. There could be a stronger European role also for consular support for EU citizens. A systematic study on ‘pooling and sharing’ in diplomacy could explore the potential and modalities of this co-operation.
Secondly, the overall demand for EU foreign policy is likely to increase in the coming years. The EU’s neighbourhood is in turmoil and the US is clearly no longer ready to play its customary lead role. Important European interests are at stake. After the huge distraction of the financial crisis, tackling these external challenges will move up the agenda again. There will be a need for more strategic thinking, for more rapid and creative diplomatic action and for upgraded crisis-management capabilities. The Lisbon structures have the potential to rise to these challenges if they receive more engagement and buy-in from the member states and the Commission.
Thirdly, the logic of globalisation is likely to drive member states closer together. One effect is the convergence of foreign-policy interests among EU member states. As a result of growing interdependence, developments in faraway places can have a greater effect on European interests than ever before. But on many of the items that now make up the agenda it is difficult to identify differences in the specific national interests of member states. As the world is shrinking, so are the differences in the interests of EU member states.
Many of the foreign-policy challenges arising today also have in common that, individually, member states can do little about them. Increasingly, only collective action at a regional and sometimes at a global level can have a significant impact. As power and economic dynamism shifts to other continents, the ability of European countries – even of the bigger ones among them – to remain relevant players in their own right will further diminish. They will be faced with a choice: either to resign themselves to a more modest role on the international stage, accepting that the decisions regarding the future global order will be taken by others; or to combine efforts, pool resources and empower common institutions to act on their behalf.
Stefan Lehne is a visiting scholar at Carnegie Europe in Brussels. A former Austrian diplomat, he was also an adviser to Javier Solana when he was high representative for the European Union’s common foreign and security policy.
Iceland’s new centre-right government has agreed to let ordinary voters decide whether accession talks with the European Union should continue.
The decision to freeze talks on joining the EU until a referendum was a central element in an agreement approved late on Tuesday (21 May) by the two parties that will make up the government.
The date of the referendum has not been set. Before the referendum, the government would submit a review of Iceland’s relationship with the EU to parliament, but the referendum would not be contingent on that review.
The outgoing left-wing government decided in January not to take political decisions related to the EU in the run-up to the elections, which were held on 27 April. However, lower-level, technical discussions continued.
The European Commission said yesterday that it is prepared to continue with the same dual-track approach unless the new government notifies it otherwise.
The short and generally-worded agreement among the coalition partners suggests that all talks will be halted.
Iceland began membership talks in 2010 and has made rapid progress in the accession process. It has sent the Commission its negotiating position on all but four of the 33 ‘chapters’ of EU law.
However, there has been no hint of a breakthrough on fisheries – the issue that is a touchstone for Icelandic voters.
The government will be headed by Sigmundur Davíð Gunnlaugsson, the leader of the Progressive Party. At 38, he is the world’s youngest prime minister. Bjarni Benediktsson, the leader of the junior coalition party, the Independence Party, will hold the finance and economics portfolio.
The Independence Party won the popular vote, but the two parties each gained 19 seats in the 63-member parliament.
Independents will occupy five ministries, plus the position of speaker of parliament, while the Progressives will have four posts in cabinet, including the premiership.
Significantly, the Independence Party, the winner of every election between 1929 and 2009, traded away the two offices most closely related to the EU talks: the ministers of foreign affairs and fisheries will both be Progressives. The cabinet will be named today (23 May).
Lithuania’s presidency of the Council of Ministers just got complicated.
Lithuania’s six months in the European Union spotlight, as holder of the presidency of the Council of Ministers, has become a little hotter of late, with Russia creating a trade dispute that has variously been blamed on plans for next month’s Eastern Partnership summit in Vilnius and on a Lithuanian case against Gazprom.
The Russian authorities last week banned certain Lithuanian dairy products and imposed protracted inspections of Lithuanian trucks at border entry-points.
The European Union’s response has so far been restrained because it does not want to inflame the dispute further, but the European Commission’s department for health and consumer policy has become involved. The head of the EU’s delegation in Moscow has also protested to the head of the Russian customs service that the intrusive inspections of Lithuanian trucks are discriminatory.
As luck or design would have it, the head of the EU’s delegation in Moscow is a Lithuanian. Vygaudas Ušackas, a former foreign minister, took up the post in September, having spent three years as the EU’s special envoy to Afghanistan. Disputes about Lithuanian milk products and trucks are only the beginning. Difficulties over visa restrictions (on both sides) are expected to increase in the run up to the Sochi Winter Olympics in February.
Ušackas has personal experience of such matters. He is the son of Lithuanians who were deported for five years to Siberia by the Soviet authorities. In 2006, Russia denied him a visa to visit Lithuanian graves in Siberia.
Rules designed to help customs officials enforce intellectual property rights at EU borders were approved by MEPs in Strasbourg on Tuesday (11 June). The regulation clarifies when destruction of counterfeit products entering or passing through the EU is allowed, but does not change intellectual property protection rules and does not concern non-commercial goods carried by people who are travelling.
European aid
MEPs voted yesterday (12 June) to maintain the budget for 2014-20 for the Fund for European Aid to the most deprived. MEPs want the fund to be kept at €3.5 billion, while member states want to shrink it.
Breastfeeding controls
MEPs on Tuesday voted to approve new controls on the marketing of food for infants and other vulnerable groups. In particular, the rules will restrict health claims to make sure that breastfeeding is not discouraged.
Mimica confirmation
MEPs yesterday gave their assent to Croatia’s nomination of Neven Mimica as the new European commissioner for consumer policy. Member states are expected to confirm Mimica when they meet later this month, and Mimica will take up his duties on 1 July.
New auditors
MEPs approved the appointment of two members to the European Court of Auditors yesterday. The two new members are Neven Mates from Hungary and George Pufan from Romania.
MEPs back biofuel cap, but fail to secure a mandate for talks
Commission proposal wins narrow approval Arguments persist over indirect land use change
MEPs voted narrowly yesterday (11 September) to insert indirect land use change (ILUC) into EU biofuel legislation, but refused a mandate for negotiations to start with the Council of Ministers.
The Parliament in Strasbourg backed a European Commission proposal to limit the type of biofuel that can be used to meet EU renewable energy quotas. MEPs went further than the Commission, agreeing – by just nine votes – to add a requirement for binding accounting for ILUC.
The result was too close to give rapporteur Corinne LePage a mandate to begin immediate negotiations with member states. European People’s Party MEPs, who oppose including ILUC factors in the legislation, successfully proposed a second reading in the Parliament. The motion, denying LePage a negotiating mandate, passed by just one vote.
The result sparked concerns that questions over ILUC will persist – possibly for years. If no decision is taken in this parliamentary term, there will be “more uncertainty for the industry, especially the second generation biofuel industry,” said Nusa Urbancic of campaign group T&E. “Nobody will invest until they know what the final outcome will be.”
Offered three possible compromise options, MEPs supported a middle option crafted by LePage that would ease attaining the Commission’s proposed ‘cap’ on first-generation biofuel – thought to cause food shortages and increased emissions. But this also inserted ILUC issues into EU legislation for the first time – in the face of claims from the biofuel industry that the science around ILUC is too unclear for lawmaking.
Raised limits
The 2009 renewable energy directive dictates that 10% of transport fuel must come from renewable sources by 2020. The Commission proposed that only half of this (5%) could be met with traditional biofuel, with the other half coming from new second-generation biofuel that causes no ILUC. The Parliament’s position would raise this to 6%.
MEPs also voted to make ILUC factors binding in the fuel quality directive from 2020, which will discourage fuel companies from producing fuel thought to displace food or cause more emissions. They also added non-binding ILUC factors to the renewable energy directive, for accounting purposes only. The Commission had proposed only non-binding factors and only in the fuel quality directive.
A sub-target inserted in the renewable energy law would require 2.5% of the total to come from second-generation biofuel. As a concession to industry concerns, MEPs also inserted a sub-target for ethanol. This was welcomed by Rob Vierhout of bioethanol industry association ePure. But he criticised the cap and the inclusion of ILUC factors, saying the restriction would “significantly reduce the market for conventional biofuels in Europe”.
Positive message
Kåre Riis Nielsen, director of European affairs for Novozymes, which makes second-generation biofuel, welcomed the 2.5% sub-target. “The report adopted by the European Parliament today is a complex package that reflects the lack of consensus on the ILUC issue,” he said. “Yet it is a good compromise that promotes best-performing biofuel while addressing ILUC concerns in a practical manner.”
Campaigners welcomed the inclusion of ILUC factors but deplored the raised cap. “A cap on biofuels of 6% is far above current levels of consumption,” said Marc Olivier Herman of Oxfam. “Whilst MEPs have avoided the worst-case scenario on the table, the European Parliament is still guilty of neglecting the needs of both the people and the planet.”
Yesterday’s summit of European Union leaders had its gaze firmly fixed across the Atlantic. The meeting was the first time that a European Council has focused on the issue of energy prices – and it was a discussion dominated by comparisons with the United States.
EU leaders were presented with statistics from the European Commission showing that while electricity prices in Europe have risen by 40% since 2005, they have decreased during the same period in the US. Why has this happened? The main reason is the exploration and extraction of shale gas in north America since 2005.
While the US has embraced shale gas, Europe has held back because of uncertainties over the economic potential of this unconventional fuel and the environmental risks linked to its extraction.
The Commission has been keen to stress that energy is a national competence. But an increasingly vocal majority of member states wants to forge ahead with shale-gas exploration, and they want the EU to provide a clear signal to investors that it supports such a move.
Ahead of yesterday’s summit, José Manuel Barroso, the president of the Commission, wrote to member states saying that the EU needs a “Union-wide approach on using the potential of unconventional hydrocarbons” and that “we need to act swiftly”.
“The global energy equation is changing fast, and if we want to avoid losing in this race for resources, we will have to step up our joint European efforts,” Barroso said in a speech in the European Parliament on Tuesday (21 May). “While the United States is on its way to becoming a net exporter of gas instead of an importer, as a result of the shale-gas boom, Europe’s import dependence is further increasing and, for oil and gas, is set to grow to over 80% by 2035.”
But shale gas remains a controversial issue in the EU, with France and Bulg-aria having banned extraction. There was disagreement over whether the conclusions of yesterday’s summit should refer to ‘unconventional hydrocarbons’. In the end, member states chose to say that the EU should co-ordinate a more systematic recourse to “indigenous sources of energy”,
It is still not known what potential there is in Europe for shale-gas extraction. To find out there would need to be widespread exploration – a process that has barely started. The Commission is to produce an analysis of the potential of shale gas in Europe by the end of the year. “It is probable that it will be more problematic in Europe than it has been in the US,” said Pat Rabbitte, the energy minister of Ireland, which holds the presidency of the Council of Ministers. “There are member states who under no circumstances want eyes taken off the decarbonisation of energy agenda.”
What the pro-shale countries want from the Commission is analysis rather than regulation. “It would save member states a lot of time if there was a common framework for dealing with this issue,” said one EU diplomat. “Then everybody does not have to start from scratch.”
The focus on energy prices at yesterday’s Council is seen as unproductive by some MEPs, who insist that the debate is being driven by big business and energy companies in order to pressurise member states into dropping their opposition to shale-gas exploration and to their ambitions to freeze energy prices.
Claude Turmes, a Green MEP from Luxembourg, said that yesterday’s Council conclusions ignore other solutions to the problem of high energy prices: “While little attention is paid to real solutions, such as scrapping oil-price indexation, [which is] responsible for rocketing gas prices in Europe, EU leaders are opening the door to shale gas, following blindly the US myth based on a polluting and dangerous technology.”
Turmes says that the Council’s conclusions, promising low electricity-per-unit-prices, are misplaced and would undermine investors’ confidence at a time when two-thirds of EU power plants will have to be replaced.
Ahead of yesterday’s summit, the business confederation BusinessEurope wrote to EU leaders claiming that high industrial electricity prices were stretching Europe’s energy-intensive industries to breaking point.
According to the letter, the widening gap between prices in the US and Europe is not just because of shale gas but also because of the EU’s “renewable policies, carbon pricing and the structure of electricity markets”.
BusinessEurope singles out support schemes for renewable energy as being particularly disruptive to prices, and also heaps blame on the EU’s troubled emissions trading scheme.
Internal market
Environmentalists and indu- stry groups welcomed yesterday’s call for member states to finalise the internal energy market. Data shared with member states by the Commission yesterday showed that countries with more competition in the energy sector have lower prices. The internal energy market was meant to be fully operational by 2014, but that will not be the case – political resistance from national governments and complications over connections have blocked its progress.
Yesterday’s Council conclusions note that in addition to finalising the objectives of the internal market – such as adoption and implementation of the remaining network codes – interconnections should be developed to end ‘energy islands’ that are unconnected to European infrastructure, such as the Baltic states, by 2015.