Author: NY TIMES

President Biden turned to an unlikely ally on Friday in his drive to build support for Ukraine’s war effort as U.S. aid falters, declaring during a White House visit by the far-right prime minister of Italy that the two leaders “have each other’s backs” and “have Ukraine’s back.”The warm tone, a striking departure from Mr. Biden’s assessment of Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni when she was elected, extended to a number of foreign policy fronts, as the leaders sought to portray themselves as united on topics including confronting global migration and trying to prevent a broader war in the Middle East.“As…

It might be a bit of a stretch, but not much, to say that if it weren’t for the watch company Breguet, there might be no Air France. And commercial air travel might be a bit different, too.The route between the founding of Breguet watches in 1775 on the Quai de l’Horloge in Paris and air travel as we know it today has been circuitous. But it principally involves Louis Charles Breguet, a great-great-grandson of the founder, Abraham-Louis Breguet.Given the family’s background in the watch business, Louis Charles grew up exposed to mechanical and electrical systems. He was also fascinated…

The activist investor group that is seeking to buy Macy’s increased the pressure on the department store chain on Sunday, raising its offer and disclosing additional details about its financing plans.Arkhouse Management and Brigade Capital Management said in a news release that they were now offering $24 per share, valuing the retailer at $6.6 billion. The new offer is up from the $21 a share they last put forward and a 33.3 percent premium to Macy’s closing share price of at $18.01 on Friday.Arkhouse and Brigade named additional investors they had brought on as equity partners, Fortress Investment Group and…

Since the weird, wild universe of “Dune” emerged from the pages of Frank Herbert’s novel in 1965, filmmakers have yearned to bring it to the screen. In the 1970s, Alejandro Jodorowsky was thwarted in his attempt to turn his elaborate vision into cinematic reality. In 1984, David Lynch was forced to cram volumes of lore into two hours, and the result was an ugly-beautiful disaster. In the latest foray, Denis Villeneuve has created an engrossing, believable world, smartly dividing the first book in the series into two parts. “Dune: Part One” was a critical and box office hit when it…

Days after an aid delivery in Gaza turned into a deadly disaster, Israel pushed ahead with another convoy bound for northern Gaza on Sunday, a Palestinian businessman involved in the initiative said, as the United Nations warned that deaths of children and infants are likely to “rapidly increase” if food and medical supplies are not delivered immediately.Izzat Aqel, the businessman, said the renewed aid delivery effort on Sunday came after only one of at least 16 trucks carrying supplies to the north a day earlier made it to Gaza City. The rest, he said, had been surrounded by desperate Gazans…

Vice President Kamala Harris on Sunday called for an “immediate cease-fire” in Gaza, saying that Hamas should agree to the six-week pause currently on the table and that Israel should increase the flow of aid into the besieged enclave amid a humanitarian crisis.Ms. Harris’s remarks, delivered in Selma, Ala., bolstered a recent push by the Biden administration for an agreement and came a day before she was to meet with a top Israeli cabinet official involved in war planning, potentially increasing tension after President Biden called Israel’s response to the Oct. 7 Hamas-led attack “over the top.”But Ms. Harris’ tone…

“It took a long time for her to walk again,” said Ms. Nordblad’s sister, Elina Manninen, a professional photographer who has documented Ms. Nordblad’s diving career. “The nerve pain was really bad but the cold water helped with the pain and still does.”Ms. Nordblad, who lives in Helsinki on the island of Lauttasaari, tested the watches by diving multiple times under the ice, symbolized in both models by blue Super-LumiNova accents on the dials, hands and bezels. She also advised the label on how it might better optimize crowns, clasps and bezels for diving.The first model, the Goutte d’Eau Nordblad,…

“Dune: Part Two” and its A-list cast jump-started moviegoing in North America after a dismal start to the year.The science-fiction sequel sold an estimated $81.5 million in tickets in the United States and Canada from Thursday night to Sunday, the biggest opening for a Hollywood film since “Barbie” in July. (Taylor Swift’s concert documentary arrived to $93 million in October.) “Dune: Part Two,” directed by Denis Villeneuve, collected an additional $97 million overseas. IMAX screenings were especially strong.Legendary Entertainment and Warner Bros. spent $190 million to produce “Dune: Part Two,” not including a megawatt marketing campaign that found Zendaya, Timothée…

The wacky, low-budget quest “Outlaw Posse” by the writer-director Mario Van Peebles is not a direct sequel to his innovative Black western “Posse,” from 1993. It’s a companion piece, built in the same universe, that is equally indebted to the history of Black cowboys and the need for restorative justice in America.As Chief, an outlaw hiding in Mexico, the playful Van Peebles wears a dark-colored cowboy outfit similar to the one he sported in “Posse,” and mirroring what his father, Melvin Van Peebles, wore in his 1971 Blaxploitation flick “Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song.” That film was the first father-son pairing…

The referee’s decision was, by the standards of these things, pretty straightforward. Soccer in general and the Premier League in particular have a gift for spinning controversy from whole cloth, but this did not seem an especially compelling candidate for the hot-take treatment. The evidence was too clean, too clear-cut.Early in the Premier League game between Sheffield United and Brighton last month, the Sheffield United defender Mason Holgate went careering into Kaoru Mitoma, Brighton’s dazzling winger. The referee, Stuart Attwell, showed Holgate a yellow card. A moment later, Attwell was advised by his video assistant, Michael Oliver, to take another…