Author: NY TIMES

When I first encountered an image of the popcorn bucket that AMC Theaters is selling to promote Denis Villeneuve’s “Dune: Part Two,” I stared at it for a beat trying to process what I was looking at. The item is supposed to represent a giant sandworm, the beasts that slither under the desert planet Arrakis. On top of the normal container sits a lid that depicts the cylindrical body of the creature emerging from the ground. The opening where you are ostensibly supposed to reach in to snatch some kernels is fashioned like the worm’s maw with its many tendril-like…

Vice President Kamala Harris is scheduled to meet with Benny Gantz, a member of the Israeli war cabinet, in Washington on Monday, according to a White House official and a spokesman for Mr. Gantz.During the meeting with Mr. Gantz, Ms. Harris is expected to discuss the urgency of securing a hostage deal, which would allow for a temporary cease-fire, and the need to significantly increase aid into Gaza, according to the White House official, who provided details on the condition of anonymity.The meeting, which is scheduled to take place at the White House, comes as the Biden administration faces pressure…

Pakistan’s newly elected Parliament approved Shehbaz Sharif as prime minister on Sunday, ushering in his second term in that role and capping weeks of upheaval — as well as setting into motion a government facing economic and political challenges that are likely to leave the country in turmoil for years to come.His selection also brings to a crossroads the role of Pakistan’s powerful military, which has long been seen as an invisible hand guiding the country’s politics and has previously engineered its election results. Analysts say that public confidence in Mr. Sharif’s government is low.“The government is being seen as…

About two weeks ago, a woman who goes by the name Reesa Teesa created a 50-part series on TikTok to recount her whirlwind relationship saga with a man she began dating and quarantining with in March 2020. In the eight-hour epic, titled “Who TF Did I Marry?,” she referred to her ex-husband as a “pathological liar” and unpacked the many ways she claims he conned her.Her videos, which have received more than 300 million views, elicited thousands of comments from viewers who were not only captivated by her storytelling skills, but also those who related to being in a pandemic…

Filing your tax return serves as an annual reminder of just how tediously complex the American tax code is — and this year is no exception.It’s not as messy as the pandemic years, but there are plenty of new provisions taking effect, and some changes could potentially land midseason.Procrastination may cost you: Interest on unpaid taxes and late penalties (yes, even penalties accrue interest) have more than doubled to 8 percent from just a couple years ago.Here are some of the latest changes to keep in mind as the filing deadline — April 15, or April 17 for Maine and…

A hilariously awful collision of soap opera and horror movie, “Amelia’s Children” teeters so precariously on the cliff top of comedy that one wishes the director, Gabriel Abrantes, had dared to kick it over the edge.Sadly, that does not happen, despite a baffling scene that finds a mother and her two adult sons wiggling enthusiastically to “The Girl From Ipanema.” Witnessing this dismaying display is Riley (Brigette Lundy-Paine), a sharp New Yorker who is beginning to regret giving her boyfriend, Ed (a ruinously bland Carloto Cotta), the gift of a D.N.A. ancestry test for his 31st birthday. Having learned of…

Israel’s reluctance to fill the current leadership vacuum in northern Gaza formed the backdrop to the chaos that led to the deaths on Thursday of dozens of Palestinians on the Gazan coast, analysts and aid workers have said.More than 100 were killed and 700 injured, Gazan health officials said, after thousands of hungry civilians rushed at a convoy of aid trucks, leading to a stampede and prompting Israeli soldiers to fire at the crowd.The immediate causes of the chaos were extreme hunger and desperation: The United Nations has warned of a looming famine in northern Gaza, where the incident occurred.…

The 5-year-old looked nervously at her older brothers, scanning their faces for any sign of distress as needles were swiftly stuck into their upper arms, the syringe plungers pushed in and the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine administered. Whether it was for her benefit or not, they barely flinched.Then it was her turn. The girl, Oma Nnagbo, looked wide-eyed at the cheerful nurse who a moment later declared, “All done, very brave!”Michael Nnagbo, 40, had brought his three children to this pop-up vaccine clinic in Wolverhampton in England’s West Midlands after receiving a notice from their school about a measles…

“I always knew that I was going to do something different from the 9 to 5,” Robert Kwok said with a laugh, aware of the irony that, as the founder of Beaufort Watches, all he does is work with time.Mr. Kwok, 25 and an Auckland native, blames that perspective for the fact he barely scraped through high school. But he said he “really knuckled down” when he entered Auckland University of Technology in 2016 and his journey toward starting one of New Zealand’s few watch brands began in earnest.“My goal was to start a business before I finished uni,” he…

I have covered economics for 11 years now, and in that time, I have come to the realization that I am a statistic. Every time I make a major life choice, I promptly watch it become the thing that everyone is doing that year.I started college in 2009, in the era of all-time-high matriculation rates. When I moved to a big coastal city after graduation, so did a huge crowd of people: It was the age of millennial urbanization. When I lived in a walk-in closet so that I could pay off my student loans (“The yellow paint makes it…