Entertainment - AFP

CHICAGO (AFP) - A tearful Oprah Winfrey on Friday announced that she will take her iconic talk show off the air in 2011 at the end of its 25th season, prompting an outpouring of emotional tributes from devoted fans.

LOS ANGELES (AFP) - The hotly anticipated sequel to vampire romance "Twilight" scored a monster hit at the North American box office on Friday, shattering previous records for midnight openings, reports said.

NEW YORK (AFP) - Manny Pacquiao's 12th-round TKO of Miguel Cotto was the top-drawing pay-per-view bout of 2009 with 1.25 million purchases worth 70 million dollars in revenue, Home Box Office Sports said Friday.

PARIS (AFP) - Thousands of French Internet users flooded video sharing websites Friday to enjoy a lampoon of their glamourous first couple, almost a week after they appeared on the US show the Simpsons.

MANILA (AFP) - A bruised but smiling Manny Pacquiao enjoyed a hero's welcome as he returned home to the Philippines on Friday, with masses of people taking to the streets and hailing him as the best boxer of all time.

LONDON (AFP) - Glamour model Katie Price warned she may quit I'm A Celebrity... Get Me Out Of Here! on Friday after she was nominated by viewers to take part in another gruesome trial.

CHICAGO (AFP) - US television superstar Oprah Winfrey, who rose from a childhood of abuse and poverty to become a global star, will announce on Friday that her talk show will end in 2011, her production firm said.

MUMBAI (AFP) - Promotional posters for a new Bollywood thriller, showing leading actress Kareena Kapoor from behind and apparently naked from the waist up, have got some people's backs up in India.

LOS ANGELES (AFP) - Fittingly for a director who has scored cinematic hits in Hong Kong and Hollywood, John Woo says his next film will depict Chinese and Americans working side-by-side successfully.

MANILA (AFP) - Newly crowned WBO welterweight king Manny 'Pacman' Pacquiao said he was in no rush for a mega-bucks fight with American Floyd Mayweather as he landed back in his native Philippines Friday.

TAIPEI (AFP) - Leading Taiwanese movie director Chu Yen-ping plans a black comedy titled "Assassinating Chen Shui-bian" about a plot to kill the island's former president, a report said Thursday.

WASHINGTON (AFP) - A group of China's famed terracotta warriors are going on display at the National Geographic Society in Washington, on the last stop of a four-city US tour.

BERLIN (AFP) - Oscar-nominated German director Werner Herzog will lead the international jury at the 60th Berlin Film Festival from February 11-21, organisers said on Thursday.

JAKARTA (AFP) - Hollywood's latest doomsday offering "2012" has caused a storm in Indonesia, with conservative clerics condemning it Thursday as a "provocation against Islam".

BRASILIA (AFP) - Audiences wept at the first screening of a movie charting the rise of Brazil's President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva from a childhood of poverty to a union leader on the verge of glittering political career.

PARIS (AFP) - Two years before she was killed in the stairwell of her Moscow apartment, Anna Politkovskaya mused about life as the Kremlin's number one enemy and pronounced it a "miracle" that she was still alive.

LOS ANGELES (AFP) - Films about subjects as varied as dolphin-hunting and high fashion are among documentaries hoping to be nominated for an Oscar, according to a shortlist released Wednesday.

LOS ANGELES (AFP) - Oscar-winning actress Jennifer Hudson is to play Winnie Mandela in a film charting the turbulent life and times of the ex-wife of South Africa's first black president, it was reported Wednesday.

WASHINGTON (AFP) - "Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2," the new videogame from Activision Blizzard, keeps blowing away sales records.

BRASILIA (AFP) - The premiere of a new movie about the early life of Brazil's phenomenally popular president, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, left an audience in tears -- and some critics on Wednesday predicting Oscar glory.

MUMBAI (AFP) - First came offshore locations, then foreign special effects experts, fashion designers and movie titles. Now the songs that drive Bollywood and the country's music industry have gone international.

MOSCOW (AFP) - US President Barack Obama sings a rap song and dances round the White House, shouting out "Respect, girl" to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in a scene from a new animated show on Russia's state-run television, which parodies foreign politicians but steers clear of Russia's leaders.

NEW YORK (AFP) - Sarah Palin dropped a heavy hint Tuesday that she might seek to run for the White House in 2012 as champion of America's Republican right.

LOS ANGELES (AFP) - Rising Canadian star Ryan Reynolds is getting in the know after signing up for romantic comedy "TMI," entertainment industry press reported Tuesday.

HONG KONG (AFP) - The Chinese author behind Oscar-nominated film "Raise the Red Lantern" has won a major Asian literary prize with his latest novel, set during the Cultural Revolution, organisers said Tuesday.

JOHANNESBURG (AFP) - Dressed in identical orange uniforms, inmates at South Africa's maximum-security Pollsmoor prison sing and act for the cameras in a new reality series where they vie to be crowned "Jail Star".

FERICY, France (AFP) - The perfect notes soaring out of the village hall were not produced by your local amateur musicians. They were the sound of world-famous musicians performing in this unlikely venue for an audience new to classical music but drawn by very low prices and proximity to their homes.

DUBLIN (AFP) - Fans of the musician formerly known as Cat Stevens rallied round Tuesday after he was booed by a small number of people at the first gig of a long-awaited comeback tour.