The Malaysian Insider :: Features
The Malaysian Insider :: Features |
| Scientists unearth unique long-necked dinosaur in Argentina Posted: 14 May 2014 11:11 PM PDT Scientists in Argentina announced the discovery of the fossilized remains of a unique member of the famous long-necked, plant-munching dinosaurs known as sauropods, the largest land creatures in Earth's history. The dinosaur, named Leinkupal laticauda, may be the smallest of the sauropod family called diplodocids, typified by the well-known Diplodocus, which lived in North America, they said. It also is the first of them found in South America. It lived about 140 million years ago, millions of years after scientists had previously thought diplodocids had disappeared, according to Argentine palaeontologist Pablo Gallina, one of the researchers. "Finding Leinkupal was incredibly exciting since we never though it possible. A diplodocid in South America is as strange as finding a T. rex in Patagonia," added another of the scientists, Argentine palaeontologist Sebastián Apesteguía, referring to the North American dinosaur predator Tyrannosaurus rex. Apesteguía called Leinkupal "a very small guy in a lineage of giants." "We don't know the weight but considering that many of its bones were very delicate and light and most of its body was formed by neck and tail, the weight could not be impressive, actually no more than an elephant," Apesteguía said. Sauropods, one of the most successful dinosaur groups, were recognisable for their long necks and tails, huge bodies and pillar-like legs. Some sauropods like Argentinosaurus, which also lived in Argentina but 50 million years later, weighed up to 90 tons and measured more than 100 feet (30 m) long. The last sauropods lived until the very end of the age of dinosaurs, about 65 million years ago. Diplodocids lived in North America, Europe and Africa during the Jurassic period, the middle of the three acts of the age of dinosaurs, Gallina said. Until now, they were thought to have gone extinct by the end of the Jurassic, about 145 million years ago. But Leinkupal shows that this family lived on at least into the earliest stages of the Cretaceous period. Diplodocids were more slender than some other families of sauropods. Their back legs were longer than their front legs, and they boasted extremely long necks and whip-like tails that they may have used to fend off predators. At the time, North America was completely isolated from South America, and the Atlantic Ocean was beginning to open and separate South America from Africa. Leinkupal lived in a semiarid environment south of a large desert, the researchers said. Its incomplete remains were found in Patagonia – a region renowned for its dinosaur finds – in 2010 and 2012 in Argentina's Neuquen province, they added. Its genus name, Leinkupal, means "vanishing family" in the region's indigenous Mapuche language – signifying the disappearance of this family of dinosaurs. Its species name, laticauda, means "wide tail" in Latin. The findings were published in the journal Plos One. – Reuters, May 15, 2014. |
| Women directors struggle as men ‘eat all the cake’ in movie world Posted: 14 May 2014 08:11 PM PDT "I think you would have to say that there's some inherent sexism in the industry," the New Zealand screenwriter and director told reporters on the first day of the Cannes Film Festival yesterday. "It does feel very undemocratic and women do notice. Time and time again we don't get our share of representation," she said, adding that men seemed to "eat all the cake". Campion's forthright comments followed equally frank words from Amy Pascal, co-chair of Sony Pictures, who last year told Forbes magazine "the whole system is geared for them (women) to fail". French-American actress and director Julie Delpy put it another way, joking in an interview with entertainment magazine Variety earlier this year that studios just wanted "a guy in a baseball cap who will finish the movie even if their family dies". Campion, whose New Zealand-set movie "The Piano" about a mute pianist and her daughter won the Palme d'Or in 1993, is also one of only four women film-makers ever to have been nominated for a best director Oscar. Another of the four, Sofia Coppola, nominated in 2003 for "Lost in Translation", is also on this year's Cannes jury. Campion made her name portraying complex, strong-willed female protagonists. She said there were so few women working in movies today that it tended to come as a surprise to the world when a woman film-maker did come along with "a more feminine vision". Her latest work, the television mini-series "Top of the Lake" about a woman detective who returns to her home town and finds herself investigating a child abuse case, was a hit with audiences and also won a string of awards. Martha Lauzen, of the US's Centre for the Study of Women in Television and Film, told AFP that despite lots of talking, the problem of lack of women behind the camera was getting worse not better. "There has been an active and substantial dialogue on the issue at grassroots level for more than a decade but there has been a profound lack of leadership on women's under-employment among the film studio heads and union leaders," she said. Research by the centre, at San Diego University in California, has showed that women made up just 6% of directors working on the top 250 grossing US films last year, down from 9% in 1998. She said the idea that women chose lower-key projects because they were not interested in working on blockbuster movies was nonsense. "There may be some women film-makers, just as there are men film-makers, who are not interested in working on these high-profile often career-making features. "But plenty of women directors have gone on the record in interviews as saying that they would like to have these opportunities but that they are not available to them," she said. The 18 films competing for this year's Palme d'Or include only two by women directors – Japan's Naomi Kawase ("Still the Water") and Italy's Alice Rohrwacher ("The Wonders"). Last year there was one, while in 2012 there was not a single film made by a woman and only 7% of the 1,700-odd films submitted to Cannes this year were by women. Festival organisers say they recognise the problem but that doing anything other than selecting on merit would be an insult to the very people they were trying to help. Artistic director Thierry Fremaux last year told entertainment industry website ScreenDaily the lack of women was a "fundamental problem". But he added that it was not a battle he could "wage as a Cannes selector". – AFP, May 15, 2014. |
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