Tag Archives: Leonardo DiCaprio

Lady Gaga Tops Good Celebrities List.

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Lady Gaga Tops DoSomething.org’s ‘Top 20 Celebs Gone Good’ List; Sophia Bush Named ‘Fan Favorite’, Bieber Shoots up the Rankings this Year; New Trend is Couples

DoSomething.org, one of the largest U.S. organizations that helps teens take action on causes they care about, it released its fourth annual ‘Top 20 Celebs Gone Good’ list.

Lady Gaga continues her reign as the star who uses her celebrity to do the most good. Known for her support of gay rights, AIDS, and poverty, she focused primarily this year on bullying, even taking her thoughts to the White House in December. She also announced the creation of her own charity, the Born this Way Foundation, which aims to empower youth and lead them to a brave new society where each individual is accepted and loved as the person they were born to be.

Making a meteoric rise to number two this year is Justin Bieber , up from number 10 last year. His fast rise is due to his prolific work with Pencils of Promise, an organization that builds schools in Laos and Guatemala. Justin is also a consistent supporter of Make-A-Wish, raised funds for charity with his fragrance and holiday album, and recently distributed $100,000 to Whitney Elementary School in Las Vegas.

“There are some interesting trends from this year’s list,” says Aria Finger, COO of DoSomething.org. “It’s dominated by young celebrities and we also see so many couples. Last year the list had its first power couple, Ashton and Demi who have now broken up, and this year there are a total of four couples. Doing good is definitely fun in groups.”

For the first time ever, DoSomething.org’s panel of social media and mobile experts incorporated Facebook voting to help them determine the impact of celebrities reaching an audience with their cause. The criteria stipulated giving money wasn’t enough to count as creating impact; instead, a celebrity needed to take an action others could emulate, like writing articles, building houses, or founding an organization. Facebook fans voted Sophia Bush as the first ‘Fan Favorite.’

The 2011 ‘Top 20 Celebs Gone Good’ list:

1. Lady Gaga
2. Justin Bieber
3. George Clooney
4. Will & Jada Pinkett Smith
5. Leonardo DiCaprio
6. Matt Damon
7. Ellen DeGeneres
8. Brad Pitt & Angelina Jolie
9. Dwight Howard
10. Demi Lovato
11. Shakira
12. Ashton Kutcher & Demi Moore
13. will.i.am
14. Blake Shelton & Miranda Lambert
15. Nick Cannon
16. Lea Michele
17. Daniel Radcliffe
18. Miley Cyrus
19. Coldplay
20. Taylor Swift

“There are a handful of other celebrities who just missed the cut-off this year,” notes Finger. “We look forward to seeing what they will do in 2012.” Current speculations and predictions from DoSomething.org include:

* Will Jay-Z and Beyonce, Rihanna, and Justin Timberlake each use their massive popularity and talent for social change next year?
* How will Zoey Dechanel use her new star power for good?
* We suspect Bieber’s good heart will rub-off on Selena Gomez and catapult her to the list next year.
* With Tim Tebow being the most talked about athlete of 2011, we’re excited to see how he uses his celebrity for good in the coming year.

To determine the rankings, DoSomething.org used its research team and an expert panel, who focused on three elements: popularity, influence, and impact. The first two were calculated using each celebrity’s number of Twitter followers and Facebook likes, as well as their IMDB Pro Scores, Billboard Social 50 ranking, and number of ChaCha inquiries.

For full list and celebrities’ individual charitable impact, visit: Celebrities doing good.

J. Edgar {Film Review}

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There have been many portrayals of J. Edgar Hoover over the past few years in both TV and film. The last time I saw someone playing Hoover was Billy Crudup in Michael Mann’s Public Enemies in 2009. Now Clint Eastwood has decided to take a personal approach to the story (which resulted on the FBI claiming Eastwood making a bad representation of the man), with the help of Dustin Lance Black (from his Oscar-Winning screenplay and the heavily acclaimed, Milk) and Leonardo DiCaprio. You’d think on paper that these three particular individuals would produce something fascinating but it unfortunately doesn’t exceed on not being more than a moderately interesting biopic.

In case you don’t know what the story is from the movie’s title, it focus’s on the life of J. Edgar Hoover (DiCaprio). First seeing him in the 1960s when he was in his late 60s, he tells about how he came to work for the department of justice and worked his way up on being director of the FBI. Also encountering with Helen Gandy (Namoi Watts) and Hoover’s protege, Clyde Tolson (Armie Hammer). It later focus’s on Hoover’s and Tolson’s personal relationship, first starting on being close friends to having something more.

The performances in this film is a bit mixed, but edging towards positive. DiCaprio reminds us why he’s the best at what he does and doesn’t show any signs of faltering. Hoover is presented to us on being authoritative but also conflicted on his social life. There’s various scenes where he spends time with his mother, played by Dame Judi Dench. Dench plays the character very well and shows where Hoover gets the commanding persona from. Though as much I love Dench (who doesn’t?), her accent is a bit hard to decipher (whether she’s from a different country or was trying but failing on putting an American accent). Naomi Watts kind of plays Hoover’s guardian angel type character, stands by Hoover no matter what situation he’s in and there’s not much else to her character. Hammer, from his brilliant performance as the Winklevoss twins from The Social Network, brings dramatic weight and nearly out-weighs DiCaprio. He’s someone that admires Hoover’s dedication and motivation but becomes conflicted when his feelings are not returned in the same way.

Dustin Lance Black’s script is very well written but the story structure felt a bit of a mess. Which is a huge shame because it could’ve been better on starting from the very beginning rather than going back and forth from the past to the present. Something of a misstep from Eastwood, as he’s done some great films in the past (Unforgiven, Mystic River and Changeling). Where the latter film was gripping on wanting to know if Christine Collins’ (played by Angelina Jolie) son will ever be found. Whilst in this movie, it was interesting to see J. Edgar on establishing the finer details on conducting proof and evidence from a crime to nail on a suspect but there wasn’t much to learn from him as a person. A scene involving with Hoover and Tolson in a hotel room was probably the most interesting scene from its entirety but outside of it there’s nothing much else. Something that writer Lance Black got right in Milk (where you could see the struggle from Harvey Milk at work and socially) and wished he could’ve worked more on Hoover’s personal story than essentially establishing the FBI.

Overall; a shame all this talent was put behind it and the result was just average. The performances is what keeps this movie going (especially from DiCaprio, that might earn him a nomination) but there’s nothing that makes it memorable compared to Eastwood’s previous work.

3 out of 5

David Beckham more likely than Leonardo DiCaprio to make us act on climate change

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According to new research released to mark the launch of the Climate Week Awards, David Beckham is more likely to inspire us to save the planet than green god Leonardo DiCaprio. The Climate Week Awards will celebrate inspiring achievements by the greenest businesses, communities and people in the UK.

Climate Week commissioned Millward Brown to identify which celebrities have most influence in encouraging the public to go green. Bill Gates, Boris Johnson and David Beckham emerged as top influencers on the environment – amongst the most likely to inspire us to become greener. All figured in the top five out of a list of 20, beaten only by Al Gore and Arnold Schwarzenegger. Meanwhile, Hollywood’s most committed eco-hero, Leonardo DiCaprio, languished in 14th place.

The research found a strong correlation between familiarity and green influence, showing that celebs who are not actively ‘green’, like Beckham, still have tremendous potential to wade in on environmental issues. This also explains why, amongst female celebrities, X factor judge Cheryl Cole beat known environmentalist Gwyneth Paltrow to be the woman most likely to make people more eco-friendly.

Supported by Headline Partner, Tesco, and Supporting Partners Aviva, EDF Energy, Kelloggs and RBS, Climate Week runs from 21-27 March. Everyone will have the chance to influence the way society combats climate change by running an event for Climate Week, entering for an award or voting for their own Climate Week Hero at www.climateweek.com/awards

The full list of celebrities ranked (in order of their eco influence) is:

1. Al Gore

2. Bill Gates

3. Arnold Schwarzenegger

4. Boris Johnson

5. David Beckham

6. Ken Livingstone

7. Chris Martin

8. Cheryl Cole

9. Gwyneth Paltrow

10. Duncan Bannatyne

11. Phil Schofield

12. Robbie Williams

13. Fearne Cotton

14. Leonardo DiCaprio

15. Holly Willoughby

16. Colin Firth

17. Graham Norton

18. Sienna Miller

19. Paloma Faith

20. Gary Neville

Kevin Steele, chief executive of Climate Week, said:

“The celebrities in our survey could become award-winning climate heroes, but the survey also showed that everyone can have a big influence with the people they know. The Climate Week Awards give everyone the chance to show what they’re doing to make a difference. From young activists to innovative companies and jaw-dropping technology, these awards will recognise the best ways of combating climate change, and bring them to public attention.”

To enter the Climate Week Awards or to vote for your Climate Week Hero go to www.climateweek.com/awards

Inception Review. Leonardo Dicaprio shines. {Film}

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What people do when they are asleep eh? We all know what happens when people talk in their sleep. Some people that I know have had to come up with some insane excuses for explaining what they have said. And if you think that is bad I have even had the pleasure of knowing one young female that would be walking through her favourite high street store doing her shopping of all things. As a young kid I used to love watching my pet moggy sleep – and cackle with laughter I saw her legs kick as if she was chasing a squirrel up a tree.

The sleep state remains a mystery to most of us. It holds the happy times the bad times and even our darkest, deepest secrets. No wonder so many movies have been about it. What would happen if someone could come into your dream – not like the Freddy Krueger variety but a normal average man, a friend perhaps? What if they could steal your secrets? Take your ideas? Or even implant new ones? That is the exciting idea behind Inception.

Leonardo Dicaprio is Dom Cobb, a master dream thief who enters the dreams of others to obtain information that his targets for one reason or another keep hidden. His skills and abilities have cost him everything that is dear to him, but one day he is given a second chance to turn the situation to be turned around by doing one last job. However, it is not going to be easy. Typical of Christopher Nolan’s style of direction there are unforeseen enemies, critical moments where everything matters. In a world where reality and dream are the same this mind bending film not only pushes Cobb and his team of specialists to the limit but the viewer as well.

So how good or bad is the film? Well in my opinion the film is great. Dream films have been around for a while, check Nightmare on Elm Street, The Cell, even Supernatural has done it. But none so well, the dream world is truly expansive. Warner Bros and Legendary Pictures reportedly spent $160 million on this film and trust me – it shows.
Not since the Matrix have you been able to appreciate a virtual world like this.

Being a film by Chris Nolan you have all the tight camera shots and compelling characters that you would expect. The storyline according to some reviewers is that it is too mind boggling – and yes it is to some degree, sometimes it is just a bit too confusing, I would have had better luck trying to explain the offside rule to my girlfriend than trying to explain the film to her after wards, I think she had eyes for Caprio more than the movie itself, but thankfully being a matrix fanatic I found it amazingly easy to grasp.
For me though this is a no brainer, it is one of the must see films of the summer.

Go and watch it.

By Junior Smart.