Entertainment [5]

Tony Soprano cheats on his wife, runs several shady businesses and has little compunction about offing competitors.

If Hollywood is the land of illusion, would it be possible for a down-and-out director like Viktor Taransky (Al Pacino) to replace a human actress with one that's been computer generated?

Most people who love good music hate the Grateful Dead. They're wrong, of course, but it isn't hard to see their point. A flawed band even at its best, the Dead was capable of maddening laziness and ineptitude. Then there were the hardcore fans, a certain highly visible segment of whom formed an irksomely conformist cult composed mostly of obsessives and dysfunctionals.

More than ever, Clint Eastwood's acting is all squint, rasp, sinew, and bone, but damned if he doesn't have a few tricks left in him.

''Blue Crush'' is a surfer-babe movie so tactile it practically dunks the audience in the water.

Thirteen years, a Best Director Oscar, and the publicly expressed devotion of Julia Roberts separate Steven Soderbergh's breakthrough debut, ''sex, lies and videotape,'' from ''Full Frontal,'' a post-''Ocean's Eleven'' lark in which the influential and voraciously gifted filmmaker rewards himself for having changed all the rules of indie-versus-studio movies by messing around with a camera.

Before her family moved to Tokyo, Maria Shirakawa lived in a seaside town in Japan, where her uncle ran a hotel and her cousin Tsugumi grew from a sickly girl into an energetically nasty one: ''It wasn't narcissism. And it wasn't exactly an aesthetic.... Tsugumi had this perfectly polished mirror, and she only believed in the things she saw reflected there.''

The narrator dies on the 15th page. She's a 14-year-old girl who is brutally murdered. Her death devastates her family and traumatizes her community. The killer is never caught.

Who knew that beating in the hirsute chest of filmmaker Neil LaBute -- who brought us the highly cynical and hard-edged films In The Company Of Men (1997) and Your Friends and Neighbors (1998) -- was the trembling heart of a true romantic?

The ballot box that floats down by parachute, dropped from a plane in the red dawn, is the first mystery in Babak Payami's entrancing, inexplicable film ''Secret Ballot.''

Is she real? Or is she digital? Does anyone really care?

Having proved in last year's delightful live-action adventure ''Spy Kids'' that they have the underage mojo necessary to join the top secret family business, Carmen Cortez (Alexa Vega) and her younger brother, Juni (Daryl Sabara), are officially on the job in Spy Kids 2: The Island of Lost Dreams.

What was Marie Antoinette thinking as she faced the guillotine?

By Paul Clinton

Here's a word you don't see very often in book reviews: Wow!

Robin Williams, it has been reported, decided to change his career strategy in the aftermath of being critically accused of playing the same warm-and-fuzzy characters time and again in such sappy films as Patch Adams (1998) and Jack (1996). It got to the point where insulin shots should have been sold along with the tickets to his films.

Despite their girly name, there is a toughness to the Dixie Chicks, an artfully controlled yet implacable firmness, that shows up the bluff braggadocio of -- to name just the most ubiquitous country-music example right now -- the regrettable Toby Keith.

No military engagement in American history has given rise to more speculation, legend and mythology than the Civil War battle at Gettysburg. The events of early July 1863 lend themselves to interpretation, re-examination and embroidery. The stakes were enormously high, the price was staggering and the outcome remains debatable nearly a century and a half later.

Nothing is quite as satisfying as reading the work of an author hitting full stride, and Blood of Victory, the seventh historical espionage novel from Alan Furst, offers such satisfaction in spades.

Avril Lavigne's not kidding about that title, ''Complicated.''

As a follow-up to ''Hybrid Theory,'' the album that somehow outsold all others last year, rap-metal darlings Linkin Park have released...''Hybrid Theory.'' Actually, it's called ''Reanimation,'' and it comprises remixes of every song from the preceding album (along with a few extra cuts and between-track filler).

Peter Larson found the world's finest specimen of Tyrannosaurus rex in a South Dakota hillside and lost it in a federal courtroom. He also nearly lost his livelihood during a protracted criminal and civil legal battle that ultimately sent him to prison.

Boo-hoo, R.J. is going home. I'm sure there are a few prayer-loving teens who are weeping their eyes out, but the rest of us know what Simon knew all along: This guy was barely good enough to be a boy-band understudy.

What's a girl to do when she needs to look groovy?

What could be sexier than sliding on a silky satin slip dress?

To give Austin Powers in Goldmember more mojo, costume designer Deena Appel turned to the platform boots and large hoop earrings of the '70s blaxploitation films.

Everyone likes a good deal -- to get something for nothing. Why else would you be reading this for free on your electronic reading receptacle?

Oh Britney, Britney, how were we supposed to know...that something isn't right? With Spears about to take a six-month break from the spotlight, we're not nearly ready to echo the New York Times Magazine's recent claim that the 20-year-old's ''star has fallen.'' But it's clear that she's reached an, um, crossroads in her career.

''Where were you when you heard Elvis died?''

Actor Josh Ryan Evans, who played a child prodigy lawyer in the hit Ally McBeal and starred in the NBC daytime drama Passions, has died at age 20 due to heart problems, his publicist said Tuesday.

A guitar which legendary rock star Jimi Hendrix famously set alight on stage is to be sold at auction in the UK.

German prosecutors have interrupted the 100th birthday celebrations of filmmaker Leni Riefenstahl by announcing they are investigating a statement she made on Gypsy film extras who perished in death camps.

Here is the track listing for Like, Omigod!: The '80s Pop Culture Box (Totally):

ABC has sealed a deal with USA Network to air episodes of the cable channel's hit drama series Monk just four days after its initial run, Variety reports.

Signs ran crop circles around the competition to top an unusually strong weekend box office for August.

Jazz legend Lionel Hampton, who took the vibraphone from the world of radio broadcasts to an improvisational jazz instrument, died Saturday leaving behind a legacy that will echo in music for years to come. He was 94.

The Vin Diesel action movie XXX led the North American box office for the second consecutive weekend with a three-day haul of $23 million, while Eddie Murphy posted one of the biggest flops of the year with his new film.

Seinfeld was one of the most watched shows in television history, and Jerry Seinfeld laughed his way all the way to the bank. Now there is an unauthorized biography about the comedian called Seinfeld: the Making of an American Icon, and he may not find it very funny.

She has wowed us on Broadway with her singing and dancing, and tormented Frasier on the small screen. Now, Bebe Neuwirth is winning raves for her role as a fortysomething woman who has a fling with a teenage boy in the film Tadpole.

Singer David Bowie's Heathen made it to the shortlist for this year's prestigious Mercury Music Prize, which recognizes the best albums by British artists across all music genres.

Twenty-five years ago, David Bowie sang Christmas song duets with Bing Crosby. Today, Bowie tours with Moby's Area2 festival and even sometimes does duets with the techno-pop maven.

In June, Britney Spears cut short a Texas concert because of a power failure. This past week, she cut short a Mexico City show, the tour's last stop, because of too much electricity -- a lightning storm in the area.

The event: The Las Vegas stop of Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band's tour in support of his new album, The Rising, plus a pre-show dinner party at Nobu and an after-party at AJ's Steakhouse, both in the Hard Rock Hotel and Casino, on August 18.

Christina Christian is tasting a bit of American-style fame, now that she's appeared on the summer's hottest show, Fox's American Idol. Though she was voted out of the competition last week, she's finding that her time in the spotlight is just beginning.

His list of bestsellers includes The Hunt for Red October, Clear and Present Danger, Patriot Games, and The Sum of All Fears.

French actress Catherine Deneuve, star of a new romantic comedy inspired by the 1957 classic An Affair to Remember, railed on Saturday against Hollywood's current love of technology over substance.

After noticing how popular her signature wrap dress had become at vintage stores, von Furstenberg relaunched her line in 1997.

Call it diva-to-diva outreach. Last September, after Mariah Carey weathered a very public emotional breakdown, fellow songbird Beyonce Knowles sent her a videotaped message.

For J.R.R. Tolkien's fan base of dorkish hippies -- or is it hippie-ish dorks? -- it's the coolest movie ever, dude.

We've heard a lot of kidding around this week about Elvis, but there is a very serious side to Elvis and his place in popular culture.