What’s your Academy Awards IQ?

From the Pakistani military complex that once housed the elusive Osama bin Laden depicted in Zero Dark Thirty to the fiercely divided halls of Congress brought to life in Lincoln to the poverty-stricken streets of 19th century France captured in Les Miserables, the big screen in 2012 took audiences on a wide-ranging and captivating journey through history and across genres. Now, with the Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild awards behind us and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences’ Oscars drawing ever-closer, film aficionados and casual viewers alike are beginning to reflect on the cinematic grandeur of the year just completed. Test your memory of the film cornucopia that was reeled out in 2012 with this quiz.

1.Nine-year-old Quvenzhane Wallis is the youngest nominee for Best Actress in Oscar history for her leading role in which film?

A. Beasts of the Southern Wild

B. Life of Pi

C. The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey

D. Les Miserables

2.Which of the following films has received the most Academy Awards nominations?

A. Les Miserables

B. Lincoln

C. Zero Dark Thirty

D. Argo

3. One of the nominations for the James Bond flick “Skyfall” is for Best Original Song — in this case, “ Skyfall,” performed by Adele. Which of the Bond movies was the last to receive an Academy Award nomination for its theme music?

A. The Spy Who Loved Me

B. Tomorrow Never Dies

C. For Your Eyes Only

D. Live and Let Die

4. Amour snagged five Oscar nominations, including one for Best Actress for Emmanuelle Riva. It’s also up for Best Foreign Language Film. Which country is its writer and director from?

A. France

B. Austria

C. Canada

D. Switzerland

5. Which of these films is not nominated in the category of Best Animated Feature Film?

A. Frankenweenie

B. ParaNorman

C. Hotel Transylvania

D. Wreck-It Ralph

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Hugh Grant is a Dad Again

Hugh Grant confirmed Saturday that he is a dad again.

PICS: Celebs and Their Cute Kids

The 52-year-old British actor tweeted, "In answer to some journos. Am thrilled my daughter now has a brother. Adore them both to an uncool degree. They have a fab mum."

Hugh and actress Tinglan Hong welcomed a daughter named Tabitha in 2011. No word yet on what Tabitha's little brother is named.

Related: Hugh Grant Responds to Jon Stewart Diss

Hugh told The Guardian in 2012 of being a dad, "I like my daughter very much. Fantastic. Has she changed my life? I'm not sure. Not yet. Not massively, no. But I'm absolutely thrilled to have had her, I really am. And I feel a better person."

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Latest 'Die Hard' takes top spot at weekend box office

LOS ANGELES — Bruce Willis remains a die-hard at the box office.

Willis' action sequel "A Good Day to Die Hard" debuted as the weekend's top draw with a $25 million debut from Friday to Sunday. The 20th Century Fox release raised its domestic total to $33.2 million since opening Thursday for Valentine's Day to get a jump on the long President's Day weekend.

The previous weekend's No. 1 movie, Universal's comedy "Identity Thief," ran a close second with $23.4 million to lift its haul to $70.7 million.

Debuting at No. 3 with $21.4 million was Relativity Media's romance "Safe Haven," starring Julianne Hough and Josh Duhamel in an adaptation of the Nicholas Sparks novel.

AP

Bruce Willis and Jai Courtney in "A Good Day to Die Hard"

The Weinstein Co. animated adventure "Escape from Planet Earth" opened at No. 4 with $16.1 million.

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Miami-Dade fugitive shot dead in Texas

The manhunt for escaped convict Alberto Morales ended early Saturday in a hail of gunfire as the fugitive was cornered by police and shot and killed in a small town in Texas.

Authorities said Morales, who had somehow slipped out of his handcuffs since escaping police Monday, lunged at the officers with wooden sticks, according to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.

Morales, 41, had been on the run since overpowering a Miami-Dade police detective, stab him with his eyeglasses and disappear from a Walmart in a Dallas suburb. Two Miami-Dade detectives had been escorting Morales, a violent sex offender, to a Las Vegas prison at the time of his escape.

“Obviously, we are very relieved,’’ Miami-Dade Deputy Mayor Genaro “Chip” Iglesias said Saturday. “We are relieved that he will not be able to hurt anybody else.’’

The detective, Jaime Pardinas, survived but suffered a collapsed lung.

Iglesias said he had just returned from Dallas about 1:30 a.m. Saturday when he got the calls that Morales has been killed. He and Miami-Dade police Deputy Director Juan Perez flew to Dallas on Thursday. Hundreds of law enforcement officers, including about a dozen from Miami, had been hunting Morales for days.

Morales’ capture came shortly after midnight in a residential lakefront community in Grapevine, Texas, north of Dallas.

Police descended on a home, responding to a burglary call. Men’s clothes and jewelry had been taken from the residence, police said in a statement.

The neighborhood was just three miles from the Walmart where Morales was last seen, fleeing Miami-Dade police detectives.

Morales, who was on Texas’ 10-most wanted list, was spotted in a wooded area where he tried to flee but was killed by a fugitive task force which had been tracking him for days, said Grapevine police Sgt. Robert Eberling.

He did not immediately release details, saying that more information would become public later Saturday.

Morales, a schizophrenic with a long history of violence, was being transported back to Las Vegas Monday to finish a 30-years to life prison term for sexual assault. Miami-Dade police had extradited him four years ago from Las Vegas to be tried on rape charges. He was convicted of sexually assaulting and kidnapping two Miami women in 2003.

Morales’ Nevada attorney, Marc Saggese said his client suffered a severe brain injury when he was hit in the head with a baseball bat when he was 17 and told him that he has heard voices ever since.

“He said that ever since that attack and subsequent surgeries he has struggling demons in his head,” Saggese told The Associated Press.

While in a jail medical ward, Morales mutilated his genitals and scrawled words in blood on the wall. He underwent a psychological examination by doctors at a Nevada state mental hospital in Sparks, but he was found competent to stand trial, the attorney said.

Two Miami-Dade detectives, Pardinas and David Carrero, were assigned to transport Morales via commercial plane on Monday. However, when the plane made a scheduled layover in Houston, Morales was kicked off because he had been causing a disturbance by banging his head against the seats in front and behind him.

At that point, the detectives launched “Plan B” which was to transport him 15,000 miles to Las Vegas in a rental vehicle. With Morales in handcuffs attached to a belly belt, they loaded the 5-foot-7 convict into a rented SUV, headed north toward Dallas, where they planned to stop at the airport to pick up another Miami-Dade detective who was going to assist him. The plan, which was authorized by supervisors, required a third detective for a ground transport.

Pardinas and Carrero arrived at Dallas-Fort Worth Airport ahead of their colleague so they decided to drive to a nearby Walmart to use the restroom. About 11 p.m. Carrero entered the store, with Pardinas in the SUV guarding Morales.

Suddenly Morales lunged at Pardinas and stabbed him several times in the neck with the sharp end of his broken eyeglass frame. Pardinas, still reeling in pain, called 911, his breathing labored, as he described Morales. The fugitive was also captured on the store’s surveillance cameras running through the parking lot.

Iglesias said a thorough review of is under way.

“Regardless of what happened, it’s clear he escaped so something went wrong.’’

This article will be updated as more information becomes available.

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Oscars Flashback: Drew Barrymore 1983

Considering that Drew Barrymore turns 38 today, it's fascinating to think that she attended her first Oscars thirty years ago. At the 1983 Oscars, the charming, young actress is adorable as ever as she is interviewed on the red carpet.

Although she had won a Young Artist Award for best actress for her performance in E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, Barrymore didn't receive a nomination for an individual award at her first Oscars despite the majority consensus that she should have.

VIDEO: Drew Barrymore Opens Up About Motherhood

However, the film, her second feature in her young acting career, was nominated for Best Picture at that year's Academy Awards.

With her sweet and sassy personality, 8-year-old Barrymore arrives to Hollywood's biggest celebration wearing a hot pink dress designed by her "momma" with a bow in her hair and a pearl necklace that was given to her by E.T. director Steven Spielberg.

"I don't know if it will win, but I'm hoping so much!" she says enthusiastically of the Oscar-nominated film.

VIDEO: Oscars Flashback '86: 10-Year-Old Angelina Jolie

Also nominated that April evening was the film's director, Spielberg, for whom she reveals she voted in addition to voting for the film. As for the Best Actress category, which was loaded with talented actresses Meryl Streep, Julie Andrews, and Jessica Lange, Barrymore wasn't too interested.

"I'm not nominated," she replies with a smile when asked about her vote for Best Actress.

Two years later, Barrymore received her first major awards show nomination at the Golden Globes for the 1984 film Irreconcilable Differences. Despite more Globes nominations over the years, she has never been nominated for an Oscar.

VIDEO: Oscars Flashback '83: Pregnant Meryl Wins Actress

However, twenty-seven years after her first Oscars, Barrymore won her first major awards (Golden Globes, SAG Awards) for Grey Gardens.

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Playgrounds to honor Newtown massacre victims being built in communities recovering from Hurricane Sandy

TRENTON, NJ — The state's largest firefighter union is remembering the 26 victims of December's Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting massacre in Connecticut by building a playground to honor each one in a community recovering from Superstorm Sandy.

New Jersey and New York will get 10 playgrounds each, and Connecticut will get six. Each playground will link the two tragedies with the shared name Sandy to create memorials for recovery and hope.

One of the playgrounds will honor 6-year-old Catherine Hubbard, who would stretch out her legs to reach up to the clouds after pushing off on her backyard tire swing and was hopping mad about leaving her beloved swing set behind when her family moved across Newtown, Conn., in October, two months before the mass shooting there.

AP

Noah Pozner

Catherine's mom, Jenny Hubbard, said the idea for the playgrounds felt right as soon as she heard it — a playground was the "perfect" memorial for a 6-year-old.

"I immediately could think of Catherine playing and swinging," she said Friday in a telephone interview. "I know that Catherine will be there and she will love that there are kids to play with on that playground. In a way, this is like us giving her back her swing set."

Bill Lavin, president of the Firefighters' Mutual Benevolent Association, a 5,000-member union spearheading the project, said each playground will reflect the personality of the child or teacher for whom it is named. Jack Pinto's will have a football theme because he was a New York Giants fan. Chase Kowalski's will have fitness stations because he competed in children's triathlons. Others, still in the early planning stages, may incorporate a victim's fondness for a particular color, activity or symbol.

Grace McDonald's playground will be decorated with peace signs, which she habitually drew on mirrors and windows when they fogged up. Grace's mom found the outline of one on a window at home shortly after she died and had the glass etched in pink and preserved.

Catherine's playground, to be built on New York's Staten Island, will have a tire swing and be near a beach because of her fondness for sea animals. Her 8-year-old brother, Fred, is the honorary project foreman; he'll be on site with a tool belt supervising as the playground is built by volunteer first responders and members of the community.

Lavin said he's reached out to all 26 families and has heard back from 14, all supportive. He's driven to Connecticut to meet with several families personally. After visiting Noah Pozner's family, he decided Noah's playground should be in New York in the Rockaway section of Queens, where his grandfather lives.

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Sign up for Feb. 21 Miami Herald Small Business Forum

Prepare your best pitch for the Miami Herald’s Small Business Forum, Feb. 21 at the south campus of our sponsor, Florida International University.

In addition to how-to panels and inspirational stories from successful entrepreneurs, our annual small business forum will include interactive opportunities with experts to learn about financing options and polish your personal and business brands.

During our finance panel, audience volunteers will be invited to explain their financing needs to the group. During our box-lunch session, they will be invited to pitch their business or personal brand to our coaches.

Those who prefer just to listen will be treated to a keynote address by Alberto Perlman, co-founder of the global fitness craze Zumba. Panels include success stories from the local entrepreneurs who founded Sedano’s, Jennifer’s Homemade and ReStockIt.com; finance tips from experts in small business loans, venture capital, angel investments and traditional bank loans; and insiders in the burgeoning South Florida tech start-up scene.

Plus, it’s a real bargain. $25 includes the half-day seminar, continental breakfast and a box lunch.

Register here.

Program

8 a.m.

Registration and continental breakfast, provided by Bill Hansen Catering

8:30 a.m. Welcome

Host: David Suarez, president and CEO, Interactive Training Solutions, LLC

•  Jerry Haar, PhD, associate dean & director, FIU Eugenio Pino and Family Global

Entrepreneurship Center

•  Alice Horn, executive director, Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship (NFTE South Florida)

•  Jane Wooldridge, Business editor, The Miami Herald

Miami Herald Business Plan Challenge Overview:

•  Nancy Dahlberg, Business Plan Challenge coordinator, The Miami Herald

8:45 a.m. Session I – Success Stories

Moderator: Jerry Haar, PhD, associate dean & director, FIU Eugenio Pino and Family Global

Entrepreneurship Center

Speakers:

•  Jennifer Behar, founder, Jennifer’s Homemade

•  Matt Kuttler, co-president of ReStockIt.com

•  Javier Herrán, chief marketing officer, Sedano’s Supermarkets

10 a.m. Session II – All about Tech

Moderator: Jane Wooldridge, Business editor, The Miami Herald

Speakers

•  Susan Amat, founder, Launch Pad Tech

•  Nancy Borkowski, executive director, Health Management Programs, Chapman Graduate School of

Business, Florida International University

•  Chris Fleck, vice president of mobility solutions at Citrix and a director of the South Florida Tech Alliance

•  Charles Irizarry, co-founder and director of product architecture, Rokk3r Labs

11:15 a.m. Keynote

Speaker: Alberto Perlman, CEO and co-founder of Zumba® Fitness

Introduction: Jane Wooldridge, business editor, The Miami Herald

11:45 a.m. Session III – Show me the money: Financing your small business

An interactive session featuring audience volunteers who will be invited to make a short investment pitch before a panel, including experts in microlending, SBA loans, traditional bank loans, venture capital and angel investing. Audience volunteers should come prepared with a two-minute presentation that includes details about current backing, how much money they are seeking and a brief synosis of ow that money would be used.

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Boss of alleged Miami-Dade pot ring plans to plead guilty to conspiracy charges

Derrick Santiesteban, the boss of an alleged marijuana growhouse ring that authorities say made millions off selling potent pot between Miami and New York, faces his reckoning Friday afternoon.

He plans to plead guilty to conspiracy charges along with his wife, Yadira, in Miami federal court, according to public records.

Raul Ramirez, a growhouse caretaker for the Santiesteban family, is also expected to plead guilty.

Last week, a Santiesteban relative pleaded guilty to conspiring to distribute marijuana and to kidnap a rival gang member, admitting he witnessed the man’s murder after the target stole 50 pounds of pot from the Miami-Dade clan.

Juan Felipe Castaneda’s plea agreement signaled a major development in the federal government’s crackdown on one of South Florida’s largest suspected growhouse operations.

The Santiestebans — headed by the patriarch, Mariel boatlift refugee Gilberto Sr., and joined by sons Derrick, Gilberto Jr., Alexander and Darvis — were charged last June with operating 20 hydroponic marijuana growhouses since 2004. The operation yielded at least 1,146 potent pot plants that produced millions in profits, authorities say.

Castaneda admitted he collaborated with alleged ringleader Derrick Santiesteban, accused shooter Norge Manduley and other members of the syndicate in June 2009, when they kidnapped Fidel Ruz Moreno after carjacking his van.

While en route to one of Santiesteban’s grow houses in southwest Miami-Dade, Castaneda witnessed Manduley struggle with Ruz in the back of the van and then shoot him with a revolver, Castaneda said in a court statement.

Castaneda said that after Ruz’s body was tossed out into the street, he saw Manduley “approach [the] prone body and repeatedly strike [Ruz] about the head with the butt of revolver that Manduley was wielding,” according to a statement filed with the plea agreement in Miami federal court.

Castaneda, a growhouse caretaker who fled the area last June when FBI agents arrested most of the 16 Santiesteban-syndicate members, was the first defendant to plead guilty to the main charge of conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute more than 1,000 marijuana plants. He also pleaded guilty to the kidnapping conspiracy.

In April, he faces a minimum-mandatory sentence of 10 years for the drug charge and up to life in prison for the kidnapping. His cooperation with prosecutors William Athas and Pat Sullivan is helping them put pressure on other defendants to cut plea deals.

The Ruz kidnapping and slaying — along with the possibility of a second, unrelated homicide, as well as suspicions that a Miami-Dade police officer was working with the Santiesteban clan —elevated the case beyond a routine pot-trafficking investigation.

At a detention hearing, Athas and Sullivan described Derrick Santiesteban, the lead defendant in the case, as the “mastermind behind the [Ruz] kidnapping.”

Investigators are zeroing in on a Miami-Dade officer who is suspected of playing a role in the family’s alleged drug syndicate. The officer, Roderick Silva, worked patrol in the Hammocks area of West Kendall. He was suspended with pay in June 2009, records show. He is the brother of another of the Santiestebans’ accused growhouse caretakers, David Silva.

Homicide detectives are also trying to determine whether an unsolved April 2006 slaying of a teenager in West Kendall is linked to an alleged Santiesteban growhouse in the area.

After going to visit a girlfriend near Southwest 172nd Terrace and 153rd Place, Angelo Lopera, 17, was attacked and shot multiple times. Police believe Lopera may have been killed because he was mistakenly suspected of visiting the neighborhood to steal marijuana plants from the Santiestebans’ house at 17231 SW 153rd Pl., according to sources familiar with the probe.

The Santiesteban indictment was built around a dozen cooperating witnesses, most of whom were involved in the family’s alleged drug organization and have or will be separately charged, court records show.

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Nicole Sullivan Talks Wendell and Vinnie

Certain actors have locked in lifetime loyalty with me based on previous projects or their general fabulousness. In the case of Nicole Sullivan, both apply, and my enduring love for the comedian is leading my TV to new pastures. Namely, Nick at Nite!

Starting this Saturday, Sullivan stars alongside iCarly's Jerry Trainor on Nick at Nite's newest series, Wendell & Vinnie. The two play siblings whose brother dies, orphaning his 13-year-old son, Wendell. That is until the court makes the immature Vinnie Wendell's legal guardian, much to the shock of all involved. I caught up with Sullivan to find out why comedy is where her heart lies and why people should be excited about her latest series!

ETonline: What appealed to you about this show?

Nicole Sullivan: Working with Jerry Trainor was the first thing. He is such a ridiculously talented guy; so funny and can mine comedy from anything. And I've been around long enough that I don't want to work with jerks anymore. I really like the people at Nickelodeon. They're kind and that's a big deal to me at this point.

PHOTOS - Celebs Snuggle Up To Their Adorable Kids

ETonline: Must also be nice to be on a show your kids can watch.

Sullivan: Yeah. Although, I've just started showing them the cartoons I do voices in and they're startlingly unimpressed [laughs]. They're very "meh" about it. I think a kids instinct is not to enjoy their parents in any capacity.

ETonline: How do you describe your character, Wilma?

Sullivan: She's a hard-nosed, successful lawyer. At one point she decided she would be successful no matter what, and that no matter what is coming back to haunt her: she's single, has no family and I think she longs for that, but it's not quite in her DNA yet. She's ticked off they left Wendell to her brother because, growing up, she always felt like their parents loved her brother more. Like she got the raw end of the deal -- but at the end of the day, she understands that their match is meant to be.

VIDEO - What Nicole Sullivan Gained From Losing Weight

ETonline: Wendell films in front of a live audience while Cougar Town (on which she has a recurring role) does not. From an acting perspective, is one superior?

Sullivan: They both have their advantages. With single camera, you can do one line 12 different ways -- just wildly different takes. But with a live audience, you want to make sure they have the coverage they need and the performance you want. But I must say, the joy of hearing an audience laugh is unequaled

ETonline: What are you excited for people to see with Wendell & Vinnie?

Sullivan: To be super simple, but super honest about it, this show is really, really funny. It's just four actors who are really good at telling jokes, so if you want a good laugh, tune in -- you won't be disappointed!

Wendell & Vinnie: "Gift of Underpants"

Wendell & Vinnie premieres February 16 at 8 p.m. on Nick at Nite.

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Month-long school bus strike could end as soon as tonight: sources

The embattled school bus drivers’ union could call off its month-long strike as early as tonight — during a member-wide conference call with top union officials, sources said.

Amid several significant setbacks, Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1181 President Michael Cordiello is expected to tell the 9,000 striking bus drivers, matrons and mechanics that the union will take steps to “live to fight another day,” according to a source close to the union.

Stephen Yang

School buses are parked in a lot in Ridgewood, Queens.

“He wouldn’t be doing this [call] to be telling everyone we’re going to fight this ‘til death,” said the source.

“There’s dissention on the picket lines. They can’t live on what they’re getting paid,” added the source. “People want to go back [to work].”

The work stoppage was launched January 16 in response to the city’s removing long-held job protections for bus workers from contracts that cover 1,100 of the school system’s 6,700 school-age bus routes.

The city said it was eliminating the protections because they were deemed illegal by the state’s highest court, and also to lower the costs of the $1 billion school bus system.

But over the past four weeks, school attendance has gradually returned to nearly normal at all schools except those serving special education students.

This week, bids for the 1,100 routes at the heart of the battle were submitted and opened without incident — many coming in at lower costs compared to current contracts.

This evening’s call comes on the same day that the union garnered political cover for ending the strike from five mayoral candidates — who signed a letter promising to seek other forms of job security for school bus workers if they’re elected.

“We pledge... to revisit the school bus transportation system and contracts and take effective action to insure that the important job security, wages and benefits of your members are protected within the bidding process, while at the same time are fiscally responsible for taxpayers,” reads the letter to the union.

It was signed by City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, Public Advocate Bill De Blasio, Comptroller John Liu, former Comptroller Bill Thompson and former City Council Member Sal Albanese.

By the time a new mayor takes over, however, Local 1181 would have lost as many as 2,300 positions for drivers, matrons and mechanics on the 1,100 routes that were rebid.

Those contracts are expected to be awarded to bus companies in coming months.

A source involved in bus strike issues said the pledge by mayoral hopefuls would likely be accomplished not by fiddling with contracts between the city and bus companies, but by asking the state legislature to insert job protections for bus workers into state law.

“This is not a serious letter,” the source said. “No one’s talking about undoing any contracts.”

The source also said the letter was organized by the ATU’s International arm — whose president will be on today’s conference call — to put pressure on the local union to get members back to work.

“They [the international] solicited people to sign it,” the source said.

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