Los Angeles -- "At the Movies" reviewer Ben Lyons puffs up Hollywood films of questionable quality just to make his quotes popular, his peers allege.

Chicago Film Critics Association Vice President Erik Childress said the 27-year-old E! Entertainment Network reviewer has struggled to gained respect in the industry since tabbing 2007's "I Am Legend" one of the best movies ever made, the Los Angeles Times reported Saturday.

"His integrity's out the window. He has no taste," Childress said. "Everyone thinks he's a joke."

StopBenLyons.com blogger Scott Johnson agrees, saying the son of New York film critic Jeffrey Lyons uses his position to offer quotable reviews that studios can use to promote their movies.

"It crystallizes everything that's wrong with American pop culture right now," Johnson said of Lyons' efforts. "I don't expect to agree with a critic all the time. But his approach is to throw out blurbs just so he can get on a poster."

London -- Record post-Christmas Boxing Day shopping crowds enticed by deep price cuts could not dispel the gloom gripping the British retail industry, observers said.

Department stores, fashion outlets and supermarkets slashed prices by as much as 90 percent in desperate attempts to spur spending, resulting in one of the busiest single shopping days in living memory Friday. But it did little to alleviate a growing feeling of crisis gripping the country's retailing sector, The Times of London reported Saturday.

The hefty discounting prompted thousands of bargain hunters to stand in line outside stores from the early hours of Friday morning, while many shopping centers reported higher foot traffic rates than during last year's sales, the newspaper said.

Los Angeles, United States, December 27: A federal judge, in an unusual move, has ruled in favor of 20th Century Fox, which sued Warner Brothers claiming a copyright interest in ‘Watchmen.’ The move may jeopardize the scheduled March release of the movie shot by Warner Brothers and Legendary Pictures.

Seattle, Washington, December 27: 15 years after his death, the appeal of Nirvana frontman, Kurt Cobain, refuses to die. He still has fans and can still make money; a guitar used by the grunge rocker on the band's first United States tour has been sold at auction for $100,000.

According to Helen Hall, a broker in England, it is the second-highest known price for an item of Cobain memorabilia. The most expensive sale was that of his Mosrite Gospel Mark IV guitar, which went for $131,000 at an auction in 2006.

New York, United States, December 27: Jennifer Aniston and Brad Pitt might have separated their ways on the personal front, but when it comes to profession the two are together at the top, separately though. The former couple’s individual releases did great business on Christmas, but Aniston surpassed her ex-husband when it came to gross sales.

Both films topped the expectations by 40-50 percent.

London -- British pop star George Michael says on his Web site he is offering his new single "December Song (I Dreamed of Christmas)" as a free download.

Co-written by George Michael and David Austin, the song became available on the Web site www.georgemichael.com Thursday, the Daily Telegraph said.

This is the first holiday song the singer has released since his 1984 classic "Last Christmas," which he recorded with former collaborator Andrew Ridgeley as the pop act Wham!

Copyright 2008 by United Press International.

Los Angeles -- Playwright and screenwriter Dale Wasserman has died of heart failure in Arizona, Variety.com reported Friday.

Wasserman, whose age has been stated by different sources as both 91 and 94, wrote nearly 80 plays -- including the musical, "Man of La Mancha," and the stage adaptation of "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" -- as well as magazine articles and the book, "The Impossible Musical."

Wasserman is survived by his wife of 24 years, Martha Nelly Garza, the entertainment industry trade newspaper said. He was previously married to and divorced from actress Ramsay Ames.

"I was born. That seems fairly certain," Wasserman is quoted as saying on his official Web site.

"When and where are less certain. Lacking a birth certificate, I'm not even sure of my age. Disdaining home and education I spent years jumping freight trains, graduating as a Hobo cum laude. Drifting happenstance into theater, I practiced its every art, eventually turning to writing, an act of monstrous impertinence. I have written 40 or so television plays, 15 feature films, and a dozen stage plays and musicals," the scribe said.

New York -- U.S. director Bryan Singer says he decided not to have the international cast of "Valkyrie" speak with German accents because it would be distracting.

The World War II-set movie about a plot to kill Adolf Hitler stars Hollywood actor Tom Cruise, Northern Irish star Kenneth Branagh and British thespians Eddie Izzard, Bill Nighy, Terence Stamp and Tom Wilkinson.

"We didn't want that to be what the movie was about," Singer told reporters in New York recently when asked why the German characters in his film didn't speak with German accents.

"It's a thriller," Singer explained. "It should be exciting and the audience should be taken on a ride through the film. And the actors speak wonderfully the way they do in their current dialects and the characters are all supposed to be German any way. ... We have an international cast -- American actors, Dutch, German, British. To have everyone approximating German accents when, in reality, they're supposed to be speaking German, which, I promise after the first 20 minutes, you'd be sick of it. It would ultimately sound silly. And it would distract from the drive of the plot. So, the decision was made pretty quickly."

Bloomfield, Mich. -- Officials at the Cranbrook Institute of Science in suburban Detroit said the world's oldest known bat in captivity celebrated his 23rd birthday Friday.

Rob Mies, director of the Bloomfield Hills, Mich., institute's Organization for Bat Conservation, said the 23-year-old winged mammal, Tanner, is a rare and endangered golden bat, a species found only on a 13-square-mile island in the Indian Ocean, the Detroit Free Press reported.

Mies said that instead of singing and cake for his birthday, Tanner received a papaya, mango and melon cocktail.

"He's older, so you don't want to take him by surprise too much," Mies said.

Tanner officially became the world's oldest bat in captivity earlier this year when a 23-year-old bat at Chicago's Brookfield Zoo died.

Los Angeles -- The dog story "Marley & Me" was No. 1 at the Christmas Day box office in the United States, taking in about $14.6 million, BoxOfficeMojo.com reported Friday.

Coming in at No. 2 on the popular movie-going day was the aging fable "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" with $11.7 million, followed by the family flick "Bedtime Stories" at No. 3 with $10.3 million, the World War II thriller "Valkyrie" at No. 4 with $8.4 million and the comedy "Yes Man" at No. 5 with $5.9 million.

Rounding out the top tier are "Seven Pounds" at No. 6 with $4.8 million, "The Spirit" at No. 7 with $3.8 million, "The Day the Earth Stood Still" at No. 8 with $2.7 million, "Four Christmases" at No. 9 with $2.3 million and "The Tale of Despereaux" at No. 10 with $2 million.