title: Greenland

text: Education is governed by Regulation No. 10 of 25 October 1990 on primary and lower secondary education. This regulation was amended by Regulation No. 8 of 13 May 1993 and Regulation No. 1 of 1 March 1994. Under Regulation No. 10 of 25 October 1990, linguistic integration in primary and lower secondary schools became compulsory for all students. The aim is to place Greenlandic-speaking and Danish-speaking pupils in the same classes, whereas previously they were placed in separate classes according to their mother tongue. At the same time, the government guarantees that Danish speakers can learn Greenlandic. In this way, the Greenlandic government wants to give the same linguistic, cultural and social education to all students, both those of Greenlandic and Danish origin. A study, which was carried out during a three-year trial period, concluded that this policy had achieved positive results. This bilingualism policy has been in force since 1994.About 100 schools have been established. Greenlandic and Danish are taught there. Normally, Greenlandic is taught from kindergarten to the end of secondary school, but Danish is compulsory from the first cycle of primary school as a second language. As in Denmark with Danish, the school system provides for "Greenlandic 1" and "Greenlandic 2" courses. Language tests allow students to move from one level to the other. Based on the teachers' evaluation of their students, a third level of courses has been added: "Greenlandic 3". Secondary education in Greenland is generally vocational and technical. The system is governed by Regulation No. 16 of 28 October 1993 on Vocational and Technical Education, Scholarships and Career Guidance. Danish remains the main language of instruction. The capital, Nuuk, has a (bilingual) teacher training college and a (bilingual) university. At the end of their studies, all students must pass a test in the Greenlandic language.


title: Greenland

text: Higher education is offered in Greenland: "university education" (regulation no. 3 of 9 May 1989); training of journalists, training of primary and lower secondary school teachers, training of social workers, training of social educators (regulation no. 1 of 16 May 1989); and training of nurses and nursing assistants (regulation no. 9 of 13 May 1990). Greenlandic students can continue their education in Denmark, if they wish and have the financial means to do so. For admission to Danish educational institutions, Greenlandic applicants are placed on an equal footing with Danish applicants. Scholarships are granted to Greenlandic students who are admitted to Danish educational institutions. To be eligible for these scholarships, the applicant must be a Danish citizen and have had permanent residence in Greenland for at least five years. The total period of residence outside Greenland may not exceed three years.


title: Greenland

text: The nomadic Inuit were traditionally shamanistic, with a well-developed religion primarily concerned with appeasing a vengeful and fingerless sea goddess called Sedna who controlled the success of the seal and whale hunts.


title: Greenland

text: The first Norse colonists worshipped the Norse gods, but Erik the Red's son Leif was converted to Christianity by King Olaf Trygvesson on a trip to Norway in 999 and sent missionaries back to Greenland. These swiftly established sixteen parishes, some monasteries, and a bishopric at Garðar.


title: Greenland

text: Rediscovering these colonists and spreading ideas of the Protestant Reformation among them was one of the primary reasons for the Danish recolonization in the 18th century. Under the patronage of the Royal Mission College in Copenhagen, Norwegian and Danish Lutherans and German Moravian missionaries searched for the missing Norse settlements, but no Norse were found, and instead they began preaching to the Inuit. The principal figures in the Christianization of Greenland were Hans and Poul Egede and Matthias Stach. The New Testament was translated piecemeal from the time of the very first settlement on Kangeq Island, but the first translation of the whole Bible was not completed until 1900. An improved translation using the modern orthography was completed in 2000.


title: Greenland

text: Today, the major religion is Protestant Christianity, represented mainly by the Church of Denmark, which is Lutheran in orientation. While there are no official census data on religion in Greenland, the Bishop of Greenland Sofie Petersen estimates that 85% of the Greenlandic population are members of her congregation. The Church of Denmark is the established church through the Constitution of Denmark.


title: Greenland

text: The Roman Catholic minority is pastorally served by the Roman Catholic Diocese of Copenhagen. There are still Christian missionaries on the island, but mainly from charismatic movements proselytizing fellow Christians. According to Operation World, just 4.7% of Greenlanders are Evangelical Christian, although the Evangelical population is growing at an annual rate of 8.4%.


title: Greenland

text: The rate of suicide in Greenland is very high. According to a 2010 census, Greenland holds the highest suicide rate in the world. Another significant social issue faced by Greenland is a high rate of alcoholism. Alcohol consumption rates in Greenland reached their height in the 1980s, when it was twice as high as in Denmark, and had by 2010 fallen slightly below the average level of consumption in Denmark (which at the time were 12th highest in the world, but has since fallen). However, at the same time, alcohol prices are far higher, meaning that consumption has a large social impact. Prevalence of HIV/AIDS used to be high in Greenland and peaked in the 1990s when the fatality rate also was relatively high. Through a number of initiatives the prevalence (along with the fatality rate through efficient treatment) has fallen and is now low, 0.13%, below most other countries. In recent decades, the unemployment rates have generally been somewhat above those in Denmark; in 2017, the rate was 6.8% in Greenland, compared to 5.6% in Denmark.


title: Greenland

text: In the 1960s and 1970s, at a time when the population was increasing, 4,500 Greenland Inuit women and girls (roughly half of all fertile females) were fitted with Intrauterine Devices (IUDs) by Danish doctors. Sometimes girls (as young as 12) were taken directly from school to have these devices inserted, without parents' permission being sought. The procedure was also carried out on some Inuit girls at boarding schools in Denmark. On 30 September 2022, the Danish Health Minister, Magnus Heunicke, confirmed that a two-year investigation would try to find out what decisions led to the practice and how it was carried out.


title: Greenland

text: Today Greenlandic culture is a blending of traditional Inuit (Kalaallit, Tunumiit, Inughuit) and Scandinavian culture. Inuit, or Kalaallit, culture has a strong artistic tradition, dating back thousands of years. The Kalaallit are known for an art form of figures called "tupilak" or a "spirit object". Traditional art-making practices thrive in the "Ammassalik". Sperm whale ivory remains a valued medium for carving.


title: Greenland

text: Greenland also has a successful, albeit small, music culture. Some popular Greenlandic bands and artists include Sumé (classic rock), Chilly Friday (rock), Nanook (rock), Siissisoq (rock), Nuuk Posse (hip hop) and Rasmus Lyberth (folk), who performed in the Danish national final for the 1979 Eurovision Song Contest, performing in Greenlandic. The singer-songwriter Simon Lynge is the first musical artist from Greenland to have an album released across the United Kingdom, and to perform at the UK's Glastonbury Festival. The music culture of Greenland also includes traditional Inuit music, largely revolving around singing and drums.


title: Greenland

text: The drum is the traditional Greenlandic instrument. It was used to perform traditional drum dances. For this purpose, a round drum (qilaat) in the form of a frame made of driftwood or walrus ribs covered with a polar bear bladder, polar bear stomach or walrus stomach was used. The drumming was not done on the membrane, but with a stick from underneath the frame. Simple melodies were sung for this purpose.


title: Greenland

text: The drum dance used to serve two functions: On the one hand, the drum was used to drive away fear on long, dark winter nights. To do this, the drum dancer would make faces and try to make others laugh until all fear was forgotten.


title: Greenland

text: Disputes were also settled with the drum. If someone had misbehaved, he was challenged with the drum. People would gather at certain powerful places and take turns beating the drum and singing to it. They tried to ridicule the other person as much as possible. The spectators expressed with their laughter who was the winner and who was therefore the guilty one.


title: Greenland

text: After the arrival of missionaries in the 18th century, the drum dance (still popular among Canadian Inuit today) was banned as pagan and shamanistic and replaced by polyphonic singing of secular and church songs. This choral singing is known today for its special sound. Church hymns are partly of German origin due to the influence of the Herrnhuter Brüdergemeinde. Scandinavian, German and Scottish whalers brought the fiddle, accordion and polka (kalattuut) to Greenland, where they are now played in intricate dance steps.


title: Greenland

text: Sport is an important part of Greenlandic culture, as the population is generally quite active. Popular sports include association football, track and field, handball and skiing. Handball is often referred to as the national sport, and the men's national team was ranked among the top 20 in the world in 2001.


title: Greenland

text: Greenland has excellent conditions for skiing, fishing, snowboarding, ice climbing and rock climbing, although mountain climbing and hiking are preferred by the general public. Although the environment is generally ill-suited for golf, there is a golf course in Nuuk.


title: Greenland

text: The national dish of Greenland is suaasat, a soup made from seal meat. Meat from marine mammals, game, birds, and fish play a large role in the Greenlandic diet. Due to the glacial landscape, most ingredients come from the ocean. Spices are seldom used besides salt and pepper. Greenlandic coffee is a "flaming" dessert coffee (set alight before serving) made with coffee, whiskey, Kahlúa, Grand Marnier, and whipped cream. It is stronger than the familiar Irish dessert coffee.


title: Greenland

text: Kalaallit Nunaata Radioa (KNR) is the public broadcasting company of Greenland. It is an associate member of Eurovision and an associate member of the Nordvision network. Nearly one hundred people are directly employed by this company, which is one of the largest in the territory. The city of Nuuk also has its own radio and television station. The city of Nuuk also has a local television channel, Nanoq Media, which was created on 1 August 2002. It is the largest local television station in Greenland, reaching more than 4,000 households as receiving members, which corresponds to about 75% of all households in the capital.


title: Greenland

text: Today only two newspapers are published in Greenland, both of which are distributed nationally. The Greenlandic weekly "Sermitsiaq" is published every Friday, while the online version is updated several times a day. It was distributed only in Nuuk until the 1980s. It is named after the mountain Sermitsiaq, located about northeast of Nuuk. The bi-weekly "Atuagagdliutit"/"Grønlandsposten" (AG) is the other newspaper in Greenland, published every Tuesday and Thursday in Greenlandic as "Atuagagdliutit" and in Danish as "Grønlandsposten". The articles are all published in both languages.


title: Greenland

text: The Inuit have their own arts and crafts tradition; for example, they carve tupilaks, sculptures of figures of avenging monsters practiced within shaman traditions. This Kalaallisut word means soul or spirit of a deceased person and today describes an artistic figure, usually no more than tall, carved mainly from walrus ivory, with a variety of unusual shapes. This sculpture actually represents a mythical or spiritual being; usually, however, it has become a mere collector's item because of its grotesque appearance for Western visual habits. Modern artisans still use indigenous materials such as musk ox and sheep wool, seal fur, shells, soapstone, reindeer antlers or gemstones.


title: Greenland

text: The history of Greenlandic painting began with Aron von Kangeq, who depicted the old Greenlandic sagas and myths in his drawings and watercolours in the mid-19th century. In the 20th century, landscape and animal painting developed, as well as printmaking and book illustrations with sometimes expressive colouring. It was mainly through their landscape paintings that Kiistat Lund and Buuti Pedersen became known abroad. Anne-Birthe Hove chose themes from Greenlandic social life. There is a museum of fine arts in Nuuk, the Nuuk Art Museum.


title: Bachelor of Arts

text: Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or "") is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A bachelor of arts degree course is generally completed in three or four years, depending on the country and institution.


title: Bachelor of Arts

text: The bachelor of arts (BA) degree is an undergraduate postsecondary degree that puts a focus on liberal arts and studies. In comparison, a bachelor of science (BS) has a greater focus on science, math, and engineering. The bachelor of arts degree is a type of baccalaureate degree. A bachelor of arts degree is usually completed in four years because it requires four years of full-time coursework to earn. However, just as with other degrees, some may require a longer time period. This is due to factors such as the student's ability, motivation, and access to financial assistance to earn the degree. Just like other baccalaureate degrees, a bachelor of arts is traditionally offered only at public and private four-year universities and colleges. A bachelor of arts, just like other bachelor's degrees is an admission requirement for graduate and professional school. Beginning in the 1990s, community colleges started to confer their own baccalaureate degrees. In addition to the standard BA degrees, there are career-specific bachelor of arts degrees, including bachelor of arts in administration, bachelor of arts in interdisciplinary studies, and regents bachelor of arts.


title: Bachelor of Arts

text: The bachelor of arts degree has been prominent in academics for centuries. It influenced universities to begin focusing on broad topics such as algebra, psychology, biology, art, history, and philosophy.


title: Bachelor of Arts

text: This aspect of the BA degree has been consistent in its history. The creation of the bachelor of arts degree was formed out of the study of liberal arts. "Liberal art" is a term that was applied to the study of many branches of learning such as grammar, logic, rhetoric, arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, and music. The study of liberal arts started during the Middle Ages. During the Renaissance, the term "liberal" "art" was meant to describe general studies more broadly. This definition of liberal studies remains to this day.


title: Bachelor of Arts

text: In the United States, bachelor of arts degrees were historically given only by four-year public or private institutions and colleges. In the 1990s, other colleges like community colleges began awarding their own bachelor of arts degrees. Many online colleges now offer bachelor of arts degrees.


title: Bachelor of Arts

text: In Germany, university-level education usually happens in either a "Universität" (plural: "Universitäten") or a "Fachhochschule" (plural: "Fachhochschulen"); both can be referred to as a "Hochschule", which is the generic term in Germany for all institutions awarding academic degrees. Fachhochschule is often translated as "University of Applied Sciences". "Universitäten" place greater emphasis on fundamental science and background in theory, while "Fachhochschulen" are generally designed with a focus on teaching professional skills. Degrees earned at "Universitäten" and "Fachhochschulen" are legally equivalent.


title: Bachelor of Arts

text: In Germany, the BA course normally lasts between three and three and a half years—six or seven semesters—and the degree is awarded after the student earns between 180 and 210 ECTS.


title: Bachelor of Arts

text: In the Netherlands, the BA and Master of Arts (MA) degrees were introduced in 2002. Until then, a single program led to the "doctorandus" degree (abbreviated drs.), which comprised the same course load as the bachelor's and master's programs combined. The title "doctorandus" was used in almost all fields of study; other titles were used for legal studies ("meester", Dutch for master, abbreviated "Mr.") and engineering ("ingenieur", abbreviated ir. for academic masters level or ing. for higher vocational bachelors level). Those who had already started the "doctorandus" program could, on completing it, opt for the "doctorandus" degree (entitling them to use "drs." in front of their name) or could use the master's degree (postnominal letters) in accordance with the new standard. When attaining a master level/graduate degree, it is still customary to use either drs. pre-nominally or MA/MSc post-nominally at the discretion of the holder.


title: Bachelor of Arts

text: In the United Kingdom (excluding Scotland) and Ireland, the first degree course normally lasts three years, but nomenclature varies: 19th-century and later universities usually distinguish between arts and sciences subjects by awarding either a BA or BSc degree. However, some older or ancient universities, such as Oxford, Cambridge and Dublin traditionally award BAs to undergraduates having completed the final examinations, e.g., Part II Tripos (Cambridge), Final Honour Schools (Oxford), Moderatorship (Dublin), in most subjects including the sciences. Some new plate glass universities established in the 1960s, such as York and Lancaster originally followed the practice of Oxford and Cambridge by awarding BAs in all subjects, but have since changed to awarding BSc degrees in science subjects. At Oxford, Cambridge, and Dublin the degree of MA can be claimed, usually twenty-one terms after matriculation. For many centuries, the bachelor's degree was an intermediate step and was awarded for much of the work carried out in later times at secondary schools. The names of the final secondary school exams in France and Spain (and increasingly in the UK—the International Baccalaureate) come from this: le Baccalauréat and el "Bachillerato", respectively.


title: Bachelor of Arts

text: The ancient universities of Scotland award a master of arts degree to humanities or arts graduates, but a BSc to science graduates. This course takes four years for an honours degree and three for an ordinary. In Scotland, it is possible to opt to take an ordinary degree rather than this simply ranking below a third class honours (for example, BA with distinction, merit or pass).


title: Bachelor of Arts

text: A bachelor of arts is entitled to the designation BA for an ordinary/pass degree and BA (Hons) for an honours degree. Students who completed an honours BA sometimes style themselves by '(Hon)' or '(Hons)' after the degree abbreviation in parentheses. An honours degree is always awarded in one of four classes depending upon the marks gained in the final assessments and examinations. The top students are awarded a first-class degree, followed by an upper second-class degree (usually referred to as a 2:1), a lower second-class degree (usually referred to as a 2:2), and those with the lowest marks gain a third-class degree. An ordinary or unclassified degree (which does not give the graduate the right to add '(Hons)') may be awarded if a student has completed the full honours degree course but has not obtained the total required passes sufficient to merit a third-class honours degree. Typically these degrees lack the final year requirement of a dissertation.


title: Bachelor of Arts

text: Education in Canada is controlled by the provinces and can be very different depending on the province. While all Canadian universities offer four-year degrees, it is not uncommon, depending on the province and the university for a three-year general degree to also be offered as an option. In many universities and colleges, bachelor of arts degrees are differentiated either as BA or as honours BA degrees. Honours programs require more education than non-honours programs, typically a specialization beyond the requirements of a BA, and can often be used as a gateway to a Ph.D. program, bypassing a Masters degree.


title: Bachelor of Arts

text: Along with the BS or Bachelor of Science, the Bachelor of Arts is the most commonly granted degree in the US. A BA degree is earned after the completion of four years of undergraduate college level study. Most US colleges and universities offer undergraduate programs.


title: Bachelor of Arts

text: In colleges and universities in Australia, New Zealand, Nepal, and South Africa, the BA degree can be taken over three years of full-time study. Students must pursue at least one major area of study and units from that subject are usually studied in each year, though sometimes students may choose to complete upper-level classes in the same year and as a result, can leave space for elective subjects from a different field. At some universities, students may choose to pursue a second major; alternatively, the remainder of the degree is taken up with a minor area of study (in the first two years) and other individual or stream-based subjects. Honours is an additional year of study after the BA degree, that combines aspects of undergraduate study with those of postgraduate research. Entry to the honours program is usually highly selective.


title: 2022 FIFA World Cup qualification

text: The 2022 FIFA World Cup qualification was the qualifying process which decided the 31 teams that would join hosts Qatar, who received an automatic spot, at the 2022 FIFA World Cup.


title: 2022 FIFA World Cup qualification

text: Parallel tournaments were organised by FIFA's six confederations. Qualification started on 6 June 2019 with several matches of the AFC zone, the first being between Mongolia and Brunei, and ended on 14 June 2022 with an inter-confederation play-off between Costa Rica and New Zealand. Mongolian player Norjmoogiin Tsedenbal netted the first goal, while the last one was scored by Joel Campbell of Costa Rica. In contrast to previous editions, there was no general preliminary draw, with confederations carrying out separate draws due to their differing timelines. The qualification process suffered numerous postponements from March 2020 onwards due to the COVID-19 pandemic.


title: 2022 FIFA World Cup qualification

text: All FIFA member associations, of which there are currently 211, were eligible to enter qualification. Qatar, as hosts, qualified automatically for the tournament. However, Qatar was obliged by the AFC to participate in the Asian qualifying stage as the first two rounds also acted as qualification for the 2023 AFC Asian Cup. Qatar won their group so the fifth-best group runners-up advanced to the AFC third round instead. For the first time after the initial two tournaments of 1930 and 1934, the World Cup will be hosted by a country whose national team has never played a finals match before. The reigning World Cup champions France also participated in qualifying as normal.


title: 2022 FIFA World Cup qualification

text: The allocation of slots for each confederation was discussed by the FIFA Executive Committee on 30 May 2015 in Zürich after the FIFA Congress. The committee decided that the same allocation used in 2006, 2010, and 2014 would be kept for the 2018 and 2022 tournaments:


title: 2022 FIFA World Cup qualification

text: North Korea withdrew from the AFC second qualifying round for safety concerns related to the COVID-19 pandemic.


title: 2022 FIFA World Cup qualification

text: Other smaller island states likewise retracted their participation during the World Cup qualification: Saint Lucia, American Samoa, Samoa, Vanuatu and Cook Islands, while Tonga withdrew after the 2022 Hunga Tonga–Hunga Ha'apai eruption and tsunami.


title: 2022 FIFA World Cup qualification

text: On 9 December 2019, the World Anti-Doping Agency initially handed Russia a four-year ban from all major international sporting events, after RUSADA was found non-compliant for handing over manipulated lab data to investigators. However, the Russia national team could still enter qualification, as the ban only applies to the World Cup proper as a world championship. The WADA ruling allowed athletes who were not involved in doping or the coverup to compete, but prohibited the use of the Russian flag and anthem at major international sporting events. An appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport was filed, but WADA's decision was upheld though reduced to a two-year ban. The CAS ruling also allowed the name "Russia" to be displayed on uniforms if the words "Neutral Athlete" or "Neutral Team" have equal prominence. If Russia had qualified for the tournament, its players would not have been able to use their country's name alone, flag or anthem at the World Cup, as a result of the nation's two-year ban from world championships and Olympic Games in all sports. On 27 February 2022, after the threat of boycotts by the Czech Republic, Poland and Sweden amid the Russian invasion of Ukraine, FIFA prohibited the Russia national football team from playing home matches in Russia; the team would have to play matches behind closed doors at neutral sites. In addition, the team would have been prohibited from competing under the name, flag, or national anthem of Russia, and had to compete under the name "Football Union of Russia" (RFU). On 28 February, however, in accordance with a recommendation by the International Olympic Committee (IOC), FIFA suspended the participation of Russia. Poland were subsequently given a walkover for their play-off semi-final match scheduled against Russia. The Russian Football Union announced they would appeal the decision to the Court of Arbitration for Sport. Their request for a temporary lift of the ban was rejected on 18 March.


title: 2022 FIFA World Cup qualification

text: The formats of the qualifying competitions depended on each confederation "(see below)". Each round might be played in either of the following formats:


title: 2022 FIFA World Cup qualification

text: In league format, the ranking of teams in each group is based on the following criteria (regulations Articles 20.4 and 20.6):


title: 2022 FIFA World Cup qualification

text: In cases when teams finishing in the same position across different groups are compared to determine which teams advance to the next stage, the criteria depend on the competition format and require the approval of FIFA (regulations Article 20.8).


title: 2022 FIFA World Cup qualification

text: In knockout format, the team that has the higher aggregate score over the two legs progresses to the next round. If aggregate scores finish level, then the away goals rule is applied. The away goals rule is again applied after extra time. If no goals are scored during extra time, the tie is decided by penalty shoot-out (regulations Article 20.10).


title: 2022 FIFA World Cup qualification

text: The opening two rounds of qualifying also served as qualification for the 2023 AFC Asian Cup. Therefore, Qatar, the 2022 FIFA World Cup host, only participated in the first two rounds of qualifying.


title: 2022 FIFA World Cup qualification

text: CAF announced on 10 July 2019 a reversion to the format used for its 2014 FIFA World Cup qualification competition.


title: 2022 FIFA World Cup qualification

text: CONCACAF initially announced on 10 July 2019 a restructured format for the qualifiers of the 2022 FIFA World Cup. However, on 25 June 2020, following FIFA's decision to postpone the September international window because of the pandemic, CONCACAF noted that "the challenges presented by postponements to the football calendar, and the incomplete FIFA rankings cycle in our confederation, means our current World Cup qualifying process has been compromised and will be changed." On 27 July, CONCACAF announced a new qualifying format for the World Cup.


title: 2022 FIFA World Cup qualification

text: The CONMEBOL Council decided on 24 January 2019 to maintain the same qualification structure used for the previous six tournaments. From October 2020 to March 2022 (previously scheduled for March 2020 to November 2021, but later postponed by the pandemic), all ten CONMEBOL teams played in a league of home-and-away round-robin matches. The top four teams qualified for the World Cup and the fifth-placed team advanced to the inter-confederation play-offs.


title: 2022 FIFA World Cup qualification

text: Qualifying was expected to begin in September 2020, but the FIFA international window in that month for the OFC was postponed by the pandemic.


title: 2022 FIFA World Cup qualification

text: Earlier in July that year, the OFC submitted a proposal to FIFA for the qualifiers in response to the pandemic, intending to organise a group stage in March and June 2021 followed by semi-finals and a final in September and October of that year. After continued delays, by September 2021 the OFC felt it was "not possible at this time to organise a qualifying competition within the Oceania region" and it was instead staged in Qatar in March 2022.


title: 2022 FIFA World Cup qualification

text: The qualifying stage was to be a single match on 13 March 2022 between the two lowest-ranked participating OFC nations in the FIFA World Rankings, with the winner advancing to the group stage. Then eight remaining teams were drawn into two groups of four, playing single leg round-robin. The top two teams from each group advanced to a single leg knockout stage. The final winner advanced to the inter-confederation play-offs.


title: 2022 FIFA World Cup qualification

text: The draw for the first round (group stage) was held in Zürich, Switzerland, on 7 December 2020, 18:00 CET (). However, because of the pandemic, the draw was held as a virtual event without any representatives of member associations present. It was originally planned to be held on 29 November. Earlier on 18 June, the UEFA Executive Committee approved the draw regulations for the qualifying group stage. The 55 teams were seeded into six pots based on the FIFA Men's World Rankings of November 2020, after the league phase of the 2020–21 UEFA Nations League.


title: 2022 FIFA World Cup qualification

text: The qualification format was confirmed by the UEFA Executive Committee during their meeting in Nyon, Switzerland on 4 December 2019. The qualification depends, in part, on results from the 2020–21 UEFA Nations League, although to a lesser degree than UEFA Euro 2020. The structure maintained UEFA's usual 'group stage/playoff stage' structure, with only the specific format of the play-offs amended.


title: 2022 FIFA World Cup qualification

text: There were two inter-confederation play-offs to determine the final two qualification spots for the finals. They were played in Qatar on 13–14 June 2022.


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: Sir Kenneth Charles Branagh (; born 10 December 1960) is a British actor and filmmaker. Branagh trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London and has served as its president since 2015. He has won an Academy Award, four BAFTAs (plus two honorary awards), two Emmy Awards, and a Golden Globe Award. He was appointed a Knight Bachelor in the 2012 Birthday Honours and knighted on 9 November 2012. He was made a Freeman of his native city of Belfast in January 2018. In 2020, he was listed at number 20 on "The Irish Times" list of Ireland's greatest film actors.


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: Branagh has both directed and starred in several film adaptations of William Shakespeare's plays, of which he is a devoted fan, including "Henry V" (1989), "Much Ado About Nothing" (1993), "Othello" (1995), "Hamlet" (1996), "Love's Labour's Lost" (2000), and "As You Like It" (2006). He was nominated for Academy Awards for Best Actor and Best Director for "Henry V" and for Best Adapted Screenplay for "Hamlet".


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: He has starred in the television series "Fortunes of War" (1987), "Shackleton" (2002), and "Wallander" (2008–2016) and in the films "Celebrity" (1998), "Wild Wild West" (1999), "The Road to El Dorado" (2000), as SS leader Reinhard Heydrich in "Conspiracy" (2001), as Professor Gilderoy Lockhart in "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets" (2002), "Warm Springs" (2005), as Major General Henning von Tresckow in "Valkyrie" (2008), "The Boat That Rocked" (2009), as Sir Laurence Olivier in "My Week with Marilyn" (2011), "Dunkirk" (2017), and "Tenet" (2020). He won an International Emmy Award for "Wallander" and a Primetime Emmy Award for "Conspiracy", and was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for "My Week with Marilyn".


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: Branagh directed and starred in the romantic thriller "Dead Again" (1991), the horror film "Mary Shelley's Frankenstein" (1994), and the action thriller "" (2014). He directed and starred as Hercule Poirot in the mystery drama adaptations of Agatha Christie's "Murder on the Orient Express" (2017) and "Death on the Nile" (2022). He also directed such films as "Swan Song" (1992), which earned an Academy Award nomination for Best Live Action Short Film, "The Magic Flute" (2006), "Sleuth" (2007), the Marvel superhero film "Thor" (2011), the live-action adaptation of Disney's "Cinderella" (2015) and "Artemis Fowl" (2020). For his semi-autobiographical comedy-drama "Belfast" (2021), Branagh was nominated for the Academy Awards for Best Picture and for Best Director, and he won the Award for Best Original Screenplay. He thereby became the first person to have been nominated in seven different categories of the Academy Awards, surpassing Walt Disney, George Clooney, and Alfonso Cuarón, each of whom have received nominations in six categories.


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: Branagh has narrated numerous documentary series, including "Cold War" (1998), "Walking with Dinosaurs" (1999), "The Ballad of Big Al" (2001), "Walking with Beasts" (2001), "Walking with Monsters" (2005), and "World War 1 in Colour" (2005).


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: Branagh, the middle of three children (he has an older brother and a younger sister), was born on 10 December 1960 in Belfast, the son of working-class Protestant parents Frances ("née" Harper) and William Branagh, a plumber and joiner who ran a company that specialised in fitting partitions and suspended ceilings. He lived in the Tiger’s Bay area of the city and was educated at Grove Primary School.


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: In early 1970, at the age of nine, he moved with his family to Reading, Berkshire, England, to escape the Troubles. He was educated at Whiteknights Primary School and Meadway School, a local comprehensive in Tilehurst, where he appeared in school productions such as "Toad of Toad Hall" and "Oh, What a Lovely War!" At school, he acquired received pronunciation to avoid bullying. On his identity today he has said, "I feel Irish. I don't think you can take Belfast out of the boy", and he attributes his "love of words" to his Irish heritage.


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: He attended the amateur Reading Cine & Video Society (now called Reading Film & Video Makers) as a member and was a keen member of Progress Theatre of which he is now the patron. After disappointing A-level results in English, History and Sociology, Branagh went on to train at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London. In 1980, the Principal of RADA, Hugh Cruttwell, asked Branagh to perform a soliloquy from "Hamlet" for Queen Elizabeth II, during one of her visits to the academy.


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: Branagh achieved early success in his native Northern Ireland for his role as Billy, the title character in the BBC's "Play for Today" trilogy known as the "Billy Plays" (1982–84), written by Graham Reid and set in Belfast.


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: He received acclaim in the UK for his stage performances, first winning the 1982 SWET Award for Best Newcomer, for his role as Judd in Julian Mitchell's "Another Country", after leaving RADA. Branagh was part of the 'new wave' of actors to emerge from the Academy. Others included Jonathan Pryce, Juliet Stevenson, Alan Rickman, Anton Lesser, Bruce Payne and Fiona Shaw. In 1984, he appeared in the Royal Shakespeare Company production of "Henry V", directed by Adrian Noble. The production played to sold-out audiences, especially at the Barbican in the City of London. It was this production that he adapted for the film version of the play in 1989. He and David Parfitt founded the Renaissance Theatre Company in 1987, following success with several productions on the London 'Fringe', including Branagh's full-scale production of "Romeo and Juliet" at the Lyric Studio, co-starring with Samantha Bond. The first major Renaissance production was Branagh's Christmas 1987 staging of "Twelfth Night" at Riverside Studios in Hammersmith, starring Richard Briers as Malvolio and Frances Barber as Viola, and with an original score by actor, musician, and composer Patrick Doyle, who two years later was to compose the music for Branagh's film adaptation of "Henry V". This "Twelfth Night" was later adapted for television.


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: Branagh became a major presence in the media and on the British stage when Renaissance collaborated with Birmingham Rep for a 1988 touring season of three Shakespeare plays under the umbrella title of "Renaissance Shakespeare on the Road", which also played a repertory season at the Phoenix Theatre in London. It featured directorial debuts for Judi Dench with "Much Ado About Nothing" (starring Branagh and Samantha Bond as Benedick and Beatrice), Geraldine McEwan with "As You Like It", and Derek Jacobi directing Branagh in the title role in "Hamlet", with Sophie Thompson as Ophelia. Critic Milton Shulman of the London "Evening Standard" wrote: "On the positive side Branagh has the vitality of Olivier, the passion of Gielgud, the assurance of Guinness, to mention but three famous actors who have essayed the role. On the negative side, he has not got the magnetism of Olivier, nor the mellifluous voice quality of Gielgud nor the intelligence of Guinness."


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: A year later, in 1989, Branagh co-starred with Emma Thompson in the Renaissance company's revival of "Look Back in Anger". Judi Dench directed both the theatre and television productions, presented first in Belfast then at the London Coliseum and Lyric Theatre.


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: In 1990, he wrote his autobiography "Beginning", recounting his life and acting career up to that point. In the book's introduction, he admits that the main reason for producing the book was "money" and that "The deal was made, and a handsome advance was paid out. The advance provided the funds to buy accommodation for the Company's offices, this moving Renaissance out of my flat and bringing me a little closer to sanity."


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: In 2002, Branagh starred at the Crucible Theatre, Sheffield as Richard III. In 2003, he starred in the Royal National Theatre's production of David Mamet's "Edmond". Branagh directed "The Play What I Wrote" in England in 2001 and directed a Broadway production in 2003. From September to November 2008, Branagh appeared at Wyndham's Theatre as the title character in the Donmar West End revival of Anton Chekhov's "Ivanov" in a new version by Tom Stoppard. His performance was lauded as the "performance of the year" by several critics. It won him the Critics' Circle Theatre Award for Best Male Performance but did not get him a Laurence Olivier Award nomination, to the surprise of critics.


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: In July 2013, he co-directed "Macbeth" at Manchester International Festival with Rob Ashford. With Branagh in the title role, Alex Kingston played Lady Macbeth and Ray Fearon featured as Macduff. The final performance of the completely sold-out run was broadcast to cinemas on 20 July as part of National Theatre Live. He repeated his performance and directorial duties opposite Ashford and Kingston when the production moved to New York City's Park Avenue Armory in June 2014. The production marked his Broadway stage debut.


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: In April 2015, Branagh announced his formation of the Kenneth Branagh Theatre Company, in which he would appear as actor-manager. With the company, he announced he would present a season of five shows at London's Garrick Theatre from October 2015 – November 2016. The shows were "The Winter's Tale", a double bill of "Harlequinade" and "All On Her Own", "Red Velvet", "The Painkiller", "Romeo and Juliet" and "The Entertainer". Branagh directed all but "The Entertainer", in which he starred. Branagh also starred in "The Winter's Tale", "Harlequinade" and "The Painkiller". Kenneth Branagh Theatre Company also includes Judi Dench ("The Winter's Tale"), Zoë Wanamaker ("Harlequinade/All On Her Own"), Derek Jacobi, Lily James and Richard Madden ("Romeo and Juliet") and Rob Brydon ("The Painkiller"). In September 2015, it was announced that "The Winter's Tale", "Romeo and Juliet," and "The Entertainer" would be broadcast in cinemas, in partnership with Picturehouse Entertainment.


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: Branagh is known for his film adaptations of William Shakespeare, beginning with "Henry V" (1989), followed by "Much Ado About Nothing" (1993), "Othello" (1995), "Hamlet" (1996), "Love's Labour's Lost" (2000) and "As You Like It" (2006). "As You Like It" premiered in theatres in Europe but premiered on television in the U.S., where it aired on HBO in August 2007.


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: Notable non-Shakespeare films in which Branagh has appeared include "Dead Again" (1991) and "Mary Shelley's Frankenstein" (1994), both of which he also directed, "Wild Wild West" (1999), provided the voice of Miguel, a con artist in the DreamWorks Animation film "The Road to El Dorado" (2000), "Rabbit-Proof Fence" (2002) and as Major General Henning von Tresckow in "Valkyrie" (2008). He starred as Gilderoy Lockhart in "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets" (2002). He also played the Minister, Dormandy (a parody of PMG Tony Benn), in the film "The Boat That Rocked" (2009).


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: Although he had a notable uncredited role as SS-Sturmbannführer Knopp in director Thomas Carter's 1993 film "Swing Kids", between 1989 and 1996 Branagh mostly directed his own films, including "Peter's Friends," with a cast including former student friends Emma Thompson, Hugh Laurie, Tony Slattery and Stephen Fry, as well as Imelda Staunton and Rita Rudner; but the commercial and critical failure of "Love's Labour's Lost" paused his directorial career. In 2006, the same year that Branagh's film version of "As You Like It" was released, he also directed a film version of Mozart's opera "The Magic Flute". Branagh has also directed the thriller "Sleuth" (2007), a remake of the 1972 film. At a film promotion for "Valkyrie" in 2008, Branagh confirmed that he would be directing "Thor", a film based on the Marvel superhero. "Thor", Branagh's return to big-budget directing, was released on 6 May 2011. In 2011, Branagh portrayed Laurence Olivier in "My Week with Marilyn", which won him a Best Supporting Actor nomination at the 84th Academy Awards. Branagh directed Disney's live-action adaptation of "Cinderella" (2015). Branagh played a Royal Navy Commander in Christopher Nolan's 2017 action-thriller "Dunkirk", based on the British military evacuation of the French city of Dunkirk in 1940 during World War II.


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: Branagh directed and starred in a film adaptation of Agatha Christie's detective novel "Murder on the Orient Express" (2017) as Hercule Poirot. Production began in London in November 2016. Like Branagh's "Hamlet" in 1996, it is among the very few to use 65mm film cameras since 1970. In 2018, he directed the film "All Is True", in which he starred as William Shakespeare. Branagh also directed the fantasy adventure film "Artemis Fowl", which was released on Disney+ in June 2020.


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: In May 2019, Branagh was cast in Christopher Nolan's "Tenet" in which he portrayed the villain Andrei Sator and was praised for his performance. Branagh's semi-autobiographical 2021 film "Belfast" earned him Academy Award nominations for Best Picture, Best Director and Best Original Screenplay (winning the latter). He reprised his role as Hercule Poirot in 2022's "Death on the Nile", a sequel to "Murder on the Orient Express" which he also directed. In March 2021, Branagh signed on to direct a biopic of music group the Bee Gees. In March 2022, it was revealed that Branagh left the project due to scheduling conflicts and was replaced by John Carney. In October 2022, it was announced that Branagh would direct and star in a third Poirot film titled "A Haunting in Venice", based on Christie's "Hallowe'en Party".


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: Branagh has frequently reused actors, including Brian Blessed, Judi Dench, Robin Williams, Derek Jacobi, Nonso Anozie, Nicholas Farrell, Richard Briers, Stellan Skarsgård, Helena Bonham Carter, John Gielgud, Josh Gad, Ian Holm, and Emma Thompson. He also works frequently with composer Patrick Doyle.


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: Branagh has been involved in several made-for-TV films. Among his most acclaimed portrayals is that of US President Franklin D. Roosevelt in the film "Warm Springs" (2005), for which he received an Emmy Award nomination. The film received 16 Emmy nominations, winning five (including Outstanding Made for Television Movie); Branagh did not win the award for his portrayal. He received an Emmy for his portrayal of SS leader Reinhard Heydrich in the TV film "Conspiracy" (2001), a depiction of the Wannsee Conference, where Nazi officials decided on the Final Solution. In 2002, Branagh starred in the two-part television movie "Shackleton", a dramatization of the 1914 Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition's battle for survival, for which he was nominated for a BAFTA award and an Emmy. In 1998, he narrated the 24-episode documentary series "Cold War". Branagh also narrated the BBC documentaries "Walking with Dinosaurs", "World War I in Colour", "Walking with Beasts" and "Walking with Monsters", and the BBC miniseries "Great Composers".


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: Branagh is the star of the English-language "Wallander" television series, adaptations of Henning Mankell's best-selling "Wallander" crime novels. Branagh plays the eponymous Inspector Kurt Wallander and also serves as the executive producer of the series. The first series of three episodes was broadcast on BBC One in November and December 2008. Branagh won the award for best actor at the 35th Broadcasting Press Guild Television and Radio Awards (2009). It was his first major television award win in the UK. He received his first BAFTA TV on 26 April 2009 for the British Academy Television Award for Best Drama Series. For his performance in the episode "One Step Behind", he was nominated in the Outstanding Actor, Miniseries, or Movie category of the 61st Primetime Emmy Awards. The role also gained him a nomination for Best Actor at the 2009 Crime Thriller Awards. The second "Wallander" series of three episodes aired initially in January 2010 on the BBC, and the third season aired in July 2012. The fourth and final series was shot from October 2014 to January 2015 and premiered on German TV, dubbed into German, in December 2015; it aired in the UK, with its original English soundtrack, in May and June 2016.


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: Branagh has played the title role in BBC radio broadcasts of "Hamlet" and "Cyrano de Bergerac", and the role of Edmund in King Lear.


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: Branagh has narrated several audiobooks, such as "The Magician's Nephew" by C. S. Lewis and "Heart of Darkness" by Joseph Conrad.


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: Branagh participated in the 2012 Summer Olympics opening ceremony portraying Isambard Kingdom Brunel during the Industrial Revolution segment "Pandemonium" where he performed one of Caliban's speeches from Shakespeare's "The Tempest".


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: From 1989 to 1995, Branagh was married to actress Emma Thompson. They appeared together in "Fortunes of War", "Look Back in Anger", "Henry V", "Much Ado About Nothing", "Dead Again", and "Peter's Friends". More recently, they both appeared in "The Boat That Rocked", and the "Harry Potter" series, though with no shared scenes in either. During their marriage, and while directing and co-starring with Helena Bonham Carter in "Mary Shelley's Frankenstein", he began an affair with Bonham Carter. After Thompson divorced him, he and Bonham Carter were in a well-publicised relationship until 1999. In 2003, he married film art director Lindsay Brunnock, whom he met during the shooting of "Shackleton".


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: Branagh has said he became "much more religious" after listening to Laurence Olivier's dramatic reading of the Bible every morning, in preparation for his role as Olivier in "My Week With Marilyn".


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: He is a fan of English football club Tottenham Hotspur, the Northern Irish football club Linfield, and Scottish football club Rangers.


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: Branagh has been nominated for eight Academy Awards and is the first individual to be nominated in seven different categories. His first two nominations were for "Henry V" (one each for directing and acting). He also received similar BAFTA Award nominations for his film work, winning one for his direction. His first BAFTA TV award came in April 2009, for Best Drama Series ("Wallander"). Branagh received two other Academy Award nominations for the 1992 film short subject "Swan Song" and for his work on the screenplay of "Hamlet" in 1996. His 5th nomination came for his portrayal of Laurence Olivier in "My Week With Marilyn" in 2012. This was followed by three nominations in 2022 for "Belfast" – his first nominations for Original Screenplay and Best Picture, winning for Original Screenplay.


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: He is Honorary President of NICVA (the Northern Ireland Council for Voluntary Action). He received an honorary Doctorate in Literature from Queen's University of Belfast in 1990. He is also a patron for the charity Over The Wall. Branagh was the youngest actor to receive the Golden Quill (also known as the Gielgud Award) in 2000. In 2001, he was appointed an honorary Doctor of Literature at the Shakespeare Institute of The University of Birmingham; the Shakespeare Institute Library keeps the archive of his Renaissance Theatre Company and Renaissance Films.


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: He was appointed a Knight Bachelor in the 2012 Birthday Honours for services to drama and to the community in Northern Ireland. He received the accolade at Buckingham Palace on 9 November 2012; afterwards, Branagh told a BBC reporter that he felt "humble, elated, and incredibly lucky" to be knighted.


title: Kenneth Branagh

text: In October 2015, it was announced that Branagh would be the new President of the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA), succeeding the late Richard, Lord Attenborough. As the President of RADA and one of the highest profile actors and filmmakers in contemporary British popular culture, Branagh appeared on Debrett's 2017 list of the most influential people in the UK. In October 2017, it was announced that Branagh would be conferred with the Freedom of the City of Belfast. The honour was officially conferred on him by the Lord Mayor of Belfast, Councillor Nuala McAllister, at a ceremony in the Ulster Hall in Belfast on 30 January 2018. He was awarded the Freedom of the Town of Stratford-upon-Avon on 22 April 2022.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: Interstellar is a 2014 epic science fiction film co-written, directed, and produced by Christopher Nolan. It stars Matthew McConaughey, Anne Hathaway, Jessica Chastain, Bill Irwin, Ellen Burstyn, Matt Damon, and Michael Caine. Set in a dystopian future where humanity is struggling to survive, the film follows a group of astronauts who travel through a wormhole near Saturn in search of a new home for mankind.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: Brothers Christopher and Jonathan Nolan wrote the screenplay, which had its origins in a script Jonathan developed in 2007. Caltech theoretical physicist and 2017 Nobel laureate in Physics Kip Thorne was an executive producer, acted as a scientific consultant, and wrote a tie-in book, "The Science of Interstellar". Cinematographer Hoyte van Hoytema shot it on 35 mm movie film in the Panavision anamorphic format and IMAX 70 mm. Principal photography began in late 2013 and took place in Alberta, Iceland and Los Angeles. "Interstellar" uses extensive practical and miniature effects and the company Double Negative created additional digital effects.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: "Interstellar" premiered on October 26, 2014, in Los Angeles, California. In the United States, it was first released on film stock, expanding to venues using digital projectors. The film had a worldwide gross over $677 million (and $773 million with subsequent re-releases), making it the tenth-highest grossing film of 2014. It received acclaim for its performances, direction, screenplay, musical score, visual effects, ambition, themes, and emotional weight. It has also received praise from many astronomers for its scientific accuracy and portrayal of theoretical astrophysics. Since its premiere, "Interstellar" gained a cult following, and now is regarded by many sci-fi experts as one of the best science-fiction films of all time. "Interstellar" was nominated for five awards at the 87th Academy Awards, winning Best Visual Effects, and received numerous other accolades.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: In 2067, ex-NASA pilot Joseph Cooper is forced to work as a farmer due to a global famine caused by blight. The famine is severe enough that it has had major effects on human society, including the abandonment of any scientific pursuit that is not directly related to solving the world's food problem. Government-run schools actively discourage students from studying subjects such as space exploration, claiming that historical events like the moon landing were a political hoax and that scientific organizations such as NASA were shut down due to a belief that it was a waste of money and resources.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: Cooper ignores his daughter, Murph, when she claims a ghost is communicating to her through her bookshelf, but later finds dust particles forming an inexplicable pattern on Murph's bedroom floor. He investigates, and is led to a secret government facility where Professor Brand explains that NASA was not actually shut down, but rather has been secretly tasked by the government to explore the possibility of finding humanity a new home away from Earth. Blight, dust storms, and failing crops have rendered humans incapable of surviving. Brand claims to be working on a gravity equation to make this mission possible, and asks Cooper to pilot an exploratory spacecraft. Cooper agrees, promising a distraught Murph that he will return. He pilots a shuttle carrying scientists Romilly, Doyle, and Brand’s daughter Amelia to dock with the spacecraft "Endurance". The ship is headed towards a wormhole that mysteriously appeared near Saturn decades ago.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: The "Endurance" passes through the wormhole into another galaxy with a planetary system orbiting a supermassive black hole called Gargantua. The crew intends to investigate three planets, each previously explored by NASA volunteers, who shared positive reports for habitability. The first planet is an aqua planet with massive tidal waves and no dry land. Doyle drowns after failing to get into the probe and getting knocked off by one of the waves, and Amelia and Cooper fly back to the "Endurance", only to find that decades have passed due to the time slippage caused by the planet's proximity to Gargantua. Romilly, having remained onboard, has aged 23 years. Cooper replays messages from Earth, learning that Murph is now his age and has become a scientist working with Brand.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: The crew journeys to the second planet to find the previous NASA explorer, Mann, is still alive and has established a base. On Earth, Murph learns from a dying Professor Brand that he gave up on solving his gravity equation years ago, because it would take data from inside a black hole to reconcile, which is impossible to achieve. He reveals that he never intended for their mission to evacuate humanity from Earth to succeed, and was instead planning for Cooper and his fellow astronauts to try to establish their own colony and hopefully restart the human race themselves. He dies, and a distraught Murph relays this information to the crew. As they explore the second planet, they discover that Mann falsified the data in his reports so that the NASA mission would come rescue him. Romilly is killed by Mann's booby trap when he tries to access the logs, and Mann attempts to hijack the "Endurance", but fails to dock properly, blowing out the hatch and killing himself in the process. Cooper and Amelia catch up with the damaged "Endurance" and dock safely.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: With limited resources available to use their engines, Cooper proposes a slingshot move around Gargantua, using its gravity to propel them toward the final planet. To shed mass, Cooper sacrifices himself at the last minute, dropping into the black hole and leaving Amelia to complete the journey. Falling past the event horizon, Cooper finds himself inside a five-dimensional tesseract. He deduces that it was placed there by future humans with access to higher dimensions, as was the wormhole. He realizes that by using gravity, he is able to send messages to Murph and his past self. On Earth, Murph visits her childhood house after Professor Brand's death. She finds her father's old watch on her bookshelf, and notices the seconds-hand moving irregularly. She initially believes her "ghost" is back, only to realize that it was Cooper all along, sending her messages from a higher dimension. Cooper feeds Murph scientific data about the black hole's singularity, which she eventually uses to solve the gravity equation, helping humanity escape Earth.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: His mission is now complete, and Cooper is ejected by future beings from the tesseract. He is sent back through the wormhole and picked up by a ranger orbiting Saturn. Due to the time slippage around Gargantua, almost 90 years have passed in Earth time since Cooper left, though he has barely aged. He awakens on a cylindrical space station and reunites with Murph, now a celebrated scientist who helped humans survive extinction. Nearing death, she advises Cooper not to wait around to see her die, and urges him to find Amelia, who may have settled on the other planet that could become their new home. Cooper steals a spacecraft and sets off on his new journey. On the other planet, Amelia is building a new colony for future humans to inhabit. She removes her helmet and breathes the air, showing that the planet is capable of supporting life.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: The premise for "Interstellar" was conceived by producer Lynda Obst and theoretical physicist Kip Thorne, who collaborated on the film "Contact" (1997), and had known each other since Carl Sagan set them up on a blind date. The two conceived a scenario, based on Thorne's work, about "the most exotic events in the universe suddenly becoming accessible to humans," and attracted filmmaker Steven Spielberg's interest in directing. The film began development in June 2006, when Spielberg and Paramount Pictures announced plans for a science-fiction film based on an eight-page treatment written by Obst and Thorne. Obst was attached to produce. By March 2007, Jonathan Nolan was hired to write a screenplay.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: After Spielberg moved his production studio DreamWorks from Paramount to Walt Disney Studios in 2009, Paramount needed a new director for "Interstellar". Jonathan Nolan recommended his brother Christopher, who joined the project in 2012. Christopher Nolan met with Thorne, then attached as executive producer, to discuss the use of spacetime in the story. In January 2013, Paramount and Warner Bros. announced that Christopher Nolan was in negotiations to direct "Interstellar". Nolan said he wanted to encourage the goal of human spaceflight, and intended to merge his brother's screenplay with his own. By the following March, Nolan was confirmed to direct "Interstellar", which would be produced under his label Syncopy and Lynda Obst Productions. "The Hollywood Reporter" said Nolan would earn a salary of against 20% of the total gross. To research for the film, Nolan visited NASA and the private space program at SpaceX.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: Warner Bros. sought a stake in Nolan's production of "Interstellar" from Paramount, despite their traditional rivalry, and agreed to give Paramount its rights to co-finance the next film in the "Friday the 13th" horror franchise, with a stake in a future film based on the television series "South Park". Warner Bros. also agreed to let Paramount co-finance an indeterminate "A-list" property. In August 2013, Legendary Pictures finalized an agreement with Warner Bros. to finance approximately 25% of the film's production. Although it failed to renew its eight-year production partnership with Warner Bros., Legendary reportedly agreed to forgo financing "" (2016) in exchange for the stake in "Interstellar".


title: Interstellar (film)

text: Screenwriter Jonathan Nolan worked on the script for four years. To learn the scientific aspects, he studied relativity at the California Institute of Technology. Jonathan was pessimistic about the Space Shuttle program ending and how NASA lacked financing for a human mission to Mars, drawing inspiration from science-fiction films with apocalyptic themes, such as "WALL-E" (2008) and "Avatar" (2009). Jeff Jensen of "Entertainment Weekly" commented: "He set the story in a dystopian future ravaged by blight, but populated with hardy folk who refuse to bow to despair." His brother Christopher had worked on other science fiction scripts but decided to take the "Interstellar" script and choose among the vast array of ideas presented by Jonathan and Thorne, picking what he felt, as director, he could get "across to the audience and hopefully not lose them," before he merged it with a script he had worked on for years on his own. Christopher kept in place Jonathan's conception of the first hour, which is set on a resource depleted Earth in the near future. The setting was inspired by the Dust Bowl that took place in the United States during the Great Depression in the 1930s. He revised the rest of the script, where a team travels into space, instead. After watching the 2012 documentary "The Dust Bowl" for inspiration, Christopher contacted director Ken Burns and producer Dayton Duncan, requesting permission to use some of their featured interviews in "Interstellar", which was granted.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: Christopher Nolan wanted an actor who could bring to life his vision of the main character as an everyman with whom "the audience could experience the story." He became interested in casting Matthew McConaughey after watching him in an early cut of the 2012 film "Mud", which he had seen as a friend of one of its producers, Aaron Ryder. Nolan went to visit McConaughey while he was filming for the TV series "True Detective". Anne Hathaway was invited to Nolan's home, where she read the script for "Interstellar". In early 2013, both actors were cast in the starring roles. Jessica Chastain was contacted while she was working on "Miss Julie" (2014) in Northern Ireland, and a script was delivered to her. Originally, Irrfan Khan was offered the role of Dr. Mann but rejected due to scheduling conflicts. Matt Damon was cast as Mann in late August 2013 and completed filming his scenes in Iceland.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: Nolan shot "Interstellar" on 35 mm film in the Panavision anamorphic format and IMAX 70 mm photography. Cinematographer Hoyte van Hoytema was hired for "Interstellar", as Wally Pfister, Nolan's cinematographer on all of his previous films, was making his directorial debut working on "Transcendence" (2014). More IMAX cameras were used for "Interstellar" than for any of Nolan's previous films. To minimize the use of computer-generated imagery (CGI), the director had practical locations built, such as the interior of a space shuttle. Van Hoytema retooled an IMAX camera to be hand-held for shooting interior scenes. Some of the film's sequences were shot with an IMAX camera installed in the nose cone of a Learjet.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: Nolan, who is known for keeping details of his productions secret, strove to ensure secrecy for "Interstellar". Writing for "The Wall Street Journal", Ben Fritz stated, "The famously secretive filmmaker has gone to extreme lengths to guard the script to ... "Interstellar", just as he did with the blockbuster "Dark Knight" trilogy." As one security measure, "Interstellar" was filmed under the name "Flora's Letter", Flora being one of Nolan's four children with producer Emma Thomas.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: The film's principal photography was scheduled to last four months. It began on , 2013, in the province of Alberta, Canada. Towns in Alberta where shooting took place included Nanton, Longview, Lethbridge, Fort Macleod, and Okotoks. In Okotoks, filming took place at the Seaman Stadium and the Olde Town Plaza. For a cornfield scene, production designer Nathan Crowley planted of corn that would be destroyed in an apocalyptic dust storm scene, intended to be similar to storms experienced during the Dust Bowl in 1930s America. Additional scenes involving the dust storm and McConaughey's character were also shot in Fort Macleod, where the giant dust clouds were created on location using large fans to blow cellulose-based synthetic dust through the air. Filming in the province lasted until , 2013, and involved hundreds of extras in addition to members, most of whom were local.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: Shooting also took place in Iceland, where Nolan had previously filmed scenes for "Batman Begins" (2005). The location was chosen to represent two extraterrestrial planets: one covered in ice, and the other in water. The crew transported mock spaceships weighing about to the country. They spent two weeks shooting there, during which a crew of about , including , worked on the film. Locations included the Svínafellsjökull glacier and the town of Klaustur. While filming a water scene in Iceland, Hathaway almost suffered hypothermia because the dry suit she was wearing had not been properly secured.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: After the schedule in Iceland was completed, the crew moved to Los Angeles to shoot for . Filming locations included the Westin Bonaventure Hotel and Suites, the Los Angeles Convention Center, a Sony Pictures soundstage in Culver City, and a private residence in Altadena, California. Principal photography concluded in December 2013. Production had a budget of , less than was allotted by Paramount, Warner Bros., and Legendary Pictures.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: "Interstellar" features three spacecraft— a ranger, the "Endurance", and a lander. The ranger's function is similar to the Space Shuttle's, being able to enter and exit planetary atmospheres. The "Endurance", the crew's mother ship, is a circular structure consisting of 12 capsules, laid flat to mimic a clock: Four capsules with planetary settling equipment, four with engines, and four with the permanent functions of cockpit, medical labs, and habitation. Production designer Nathan Crowley said the "Endurance" was based on the International Space Station: "It's a real mish-mash of different kinds of technology. You need analogue stuff, as well as digital stuff, you need backup systems and tangible switches. It's really like a submarine in space. Every inch of space is used, everything has a purpose." Lastly, the lander transports the capsules with settling equipment to planetary surfaces. Crowley compared it to "a heavy Russian helicopter."


title: Interstellar (film)

text: The film also features two robots, CASE and TARS, as well as a dismantled third robot, KIPP. Nolan wanted to avoid making the robots anthropomorphic and chose a quadrilateral design. The director said: "It has a very complicated design philosophy. It's based on mathematics. You've got four main blocks and they can be joined in three ways. So, you have three combinations you follow. But then within that, it subdivides into a further three joints. And all the places we see lines—those can subdivide further. So you can unfold a finger, essentially, but it's all proportional." Actor Bill Irwin voiced and physically controlled both robots, but his image was digitally removed from the film, and actor Josh Stewart's voice replaced his voicing for CASE. The human space habitats resemble O'Neill cylinders, a theoretical space habitat model proposed by physicist Gerard K. O'Neill in 1976.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: Gregg Landaker and Gary Rizzo were the film's audio engineers tasked with audio mixing, while sound editor Richard King supervised the process. Christopher Nolan sought to mix the sound to take maximum advantage of theater equipment and paid close attention to designing the sound mix, like focusing on the sound of buttons being pressed with astronaut suit gloves. The studio's website stated that the film was "mixed to maximize the power of the low-end frequencies in the main channels, as well as in the subwoofer channel." Nolan deliberately intended some dialogue to seem drowned out by ambient noise or music, causing some theaters to post notices emphasizing that this effect was intentional and not a fault in their equipment.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: Composer Hans Zimmer, who scored Nolan's "The Dark Knight Trilogy" and "Inception" (2010), returned to score "Interstellar". Nolan chose not to provide Zimmer with a script or any plot details for writing the film's music but instead gave the composer a single page that told the story of a father leaving his child for work. It was through this connection that Zimmer created the early stages of the "Interstellar" soundtrack. Zimmer and Nolan later decided that the 1926 four-manual Harrison & Harrison organ of the Temple Church, London, would be the primary instrument for the score. Zimmer conducted 45 scoring sessions for "Interstellar", three times more than for "Inception". The soundtrack was released on November 18, 2014.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: Visual effects company Double Negative, which worked on "Inception", was brought back for "Interstellar". According to visual effects supervisor Paul Franklin, the number of effects in the film was not much greater than in Nolan's "The Dark Knight Rises" (2012) or "Inception". However, for "Interstellar", they created the effects first, allowing digital projectors to display them behind the actors, rather than having the actors perform in front of green screens. Ultimately, the film contained 850 visual-effect shots at a resolution of 5600 × 4000 lines: 150 shots that were created in-camera using digital projectors, and another 700 were created in post-production. Of those, 620 were presented in IMAX, while the rest were anamorphic.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: The ranger, "Endurance", and lander spacecraft were created using miniature effects by Nathan Crowley in collaboration with effects company New Deal Studios, as opposed to using computer-generated imagery, as Nolan felt they offered the best way to give the ships a tangible presence in space. 3D-printed and hand-sculpted, the scale models earned the nickname "maxatures" by the crew due to their immense size; the 1/15th-scale miniature of the "Endurance" module spanned over , while a pyrotechnic model of part of the craft was built at 1/5th scale. The Ranger and Lander miniatures spanned and over , respectively, and were large enough for van Hoytema to mount IMAX cameras directly onto the spacecraft, thus mimicking the look of NASA IMAX documentaries. The models were then attached to a six-axis gimbal on a motion control system that allowed an operator to manipulate their movements, which were filmed against background plates of space using VistaVision cameras on a smaller motion control rig. New Deal Studio's miniatures were used in 150 special effects shots.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: The director was influenced by what he called "key touchstones" of science fiction cinema, including "Metropolis" (1927), "" (1968), "Blade Runner" (1982), "Star Wars" (1977), and "Alien" (1979). Andrei Tarkovsky's "The Mirror" (1975) influenced "elemental things in the story to do with wind and dust and water", according to Nolan, who also compared "Interstellar" to "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre" (1948) as a film about human nature. He sought to emulate films like Steven Spielberg's "Jaws" (1975) and "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" (1977) for being family-friendly but also "as edgy and incisive and challenging as anything else on the blockbuster spectrum". He screened "The Right Stuff" (1983) for the crew before production, following in its example by capturing reflections on the "Interstellar" astronauts' visors. For further inspiration, the director invited former astronaut Marsha Ivins to the set. Nolan and his crew studied the IMAX NASA documentaries of filmmaker Toni Myers for visual reference of spacefaring missions, and strove to imitate their use of IMAX cameras in the enclosed spaces of spacecraft interiors. Clark Kent's upbringing in "Man of Steel" (2013) was the inspiration for the farm setting in the Midwest. Apart from films, Nolan drew inspiration from the architecture of Ludwig Mies van der Rohe.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: Regarding the concepts of wormholes and black holes, Kip Thorne stated that he "worked on the equations that would enable tracing of light rays as they traveled through a wormhole or around a black hole—so what you see is based on Einstein's general relativity equations." Early in the process, Thorne laid down two guidelines: "First, that nothing would violate established physical laws. Second, that all the wild speculations ... would spring from science and not from the fertile mind of a screenwriter." Nolan accepted these terms as long as they did not get in the way of making the film. At one point, Thorne spent two weeks trying to talk Nolan out of an idea about a character traveling faster than light before Nolan finally gave up. According to Thorne, the element which has the highest degree of artistic freedom is the clouds of ice on one of the planets they visit, which are structures that would go beyond the material strength that ice could support.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: Astrobiologist David Grinspoon criticized the dire "blight" situation on Earth portrayed in the early scenes, pointing out that even with a voracious blight it would have taken millions of years to reduce the atmosphere's oxygen content. He also notes that gravity should have pulled down the ice clouds. Neil deGrasse Tyson, an astrophysicist, explored the science behind the ending of "Interstellar", concluding that it is theoretically possible to interact with the past, and that "we don't really know what's in a black hole, so take it and run with it." Theoretical physicist Michio Kaku praised the film for its scientific accuracy and has said "Interstellar" "could set the gold standard for science fiction movies for years to come." Similarly, Timothy Reyes, a former NASA software engineer, said "Thorne's and Nolan's accounting of black holes and wormholes and the use of gravity is excellent."


title: Interstellar (film)

text: To create the visual effects for the wormhole and a rotating, supermassive black hole (possessing an ergosphere, as opposed to a non-rotating black hole), Thorne collaborated with Franklin and a team of 30 people at Double Negative, providing pages of deeply sourced theoretical equations to the engineers, who then wrote new CGI rendering software based on these equations to create accurate simulations of the gravitational lensing caused by these phenomena. Some individual frames took up to 100 hours to render, totaling 800 terabytes of data. Thorne described the accretion disk of the black hole as "anemic and at low temperature—about the temperature of the surface of the sun," allowing it to emit appreciable light, but not enough gamma radiation and X-rays to threaten nearby astronauts and planets. The resulting visual effects provided Thorne with new insight into the gravitational lensing and accretion disks surrounding black holes, resulting in the publication of three scientific papers.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: Christopher Nolan was initially concerned that a scientifically accurate depiction of a black hole would not be visually comprehensible to an audience, and would require the effects team to unrealistically alter its appearance. The visual representation of the black hole in the film does not account for the Doppler effect which, when added by the visual effects team, resulted in an asymmetrically lit black and blue-black hole, the purpose of which Nolan thought the audience would not understand. As a result, it was omitted in the finished product. Nolan found the finished effect to be understandable, as long as he maintained consistent camera perspectives.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: As a reference, the asymmetric brightness of the accretion disk is very well visible in the first image of the event horizon of a black hole obtained by the Event Horizon Telescope team in 2019. "Futura-Sciences" praised the correct depiction of the Penrose process.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: According to Space.com, the portrayal of what a wormhole would look like is considered scientifically correct. Rather than a two-dimensional hole in space, it is depicted as a sphere, showing a distorted view of the target galaxy.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: The teaser trailer for "Interstellar" debuted , 2013, and featured clips related to space exploration, accompanied by a voiceover by Matthew McConaughey's character, Cooper. The theatrical trailer debuted , 2014, at the Lockheed Martin IMAX Theater in Washington, D.C. and was made available online later that month. For the week ending on , it was the most-viewed film trailer, with over views on YouTube.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: Christopher Nolan and McConaughey made their first appearances at San Diego Comic-Con in July 2014 to promote "Interstellar". That same month, Paramount Pictures launched an interactive website, on which users uncovered a star chart related to the Apollo 11 Moon landing.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: In October 2014, Paramount partnered with Google to promote "Interstellar" across multiple platforms. The film's website was relaunched as a digital hub hosted on a Google domain, which collected feedback from film audiences, and linked to a mobile app. It featured a game in which players could build Solar System models and use a flight simulator for space travel. The Paramount–Google partnership also included a virtual time capsule compiled with user-generated content, made available in 2015. The initiative Google for Education used the film as a basis for promoting math and science lesson plans in schools.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: Paramount provided a virtual reality walkthrough of the "Endurance" spacecraft using Oculus Rift technology. It hosted the walkthrough sequentially in New York City, Houston, Los Angeles, and Washington, D.C., from through , 2014. The publisher Running Press released "Interstellar: Beyond Time and Space", a book by Mark Cotta Vaz about the making of the film, on . W. W. Norton & Company released "The Science of Interstellar", a book by Thorne; Titan Books released the official novelization, written by Greg Keyes; and "Wired" magazine released a tie-in online comic, "Absolute Zero", written by Christopher Nolan and drawn by Sean Gordon Murphy. The comic is a prequel to the film, with Mann as the protagonist.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: Before "Interstellar"s public release, Paramount CEO Brad Grey hosted a private screening on , 2014, at an IMAX theater in Lincoln Square, Manhattan. Paramount then showed "Interstellar" to some of the industry's filmmakers and actors in a first-look screening at the California Science Center on . On the following day, the film was screened at the TCL Chinese Theatre in Los Angeles, California for over of the Screen Actors Guild. The film premiered on at the TCL Chinese Theatre in Los Angeles, and in Europe on at the Odeon Leicester Square in London. The film premiered on November 7 in Canada.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: "Interstellar" was released early on November 4 in various IMAX film, 70 mm film and film theaters, and had a limited release in North America (United States and Canada) on , with a wide release on . The film was released in Belgium, France, and Switzerland on , the United Kingdom on and in additional territories in the following days. For the limited North American release, "Interstellar" was projected from 70 mm and 35 mm film in that still supported those formats, including at least theaters. A IMAX projector was installed at the TCL Chinese Theatre in Los Angeles to display the format. The film's wide release expanded to theaters that showed it digitally. Paramount Pictures distributed the film in North America, and Warner Bros. distributed it in the remaining territories. The film was released in over 770 IMAX screens worldwide, which was the largest global release in IMAX cinemas, until surpassed by Universal Pictures' "Furious 7" (2015) with 810 IMAX theaters.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: "Interstellar" was an exception to Paramount Pictures' goal to stop releasing films on film stock and to distribute them only in digital format. According to Pamela McClintock of "The Hollywood Reporter", the initiative to project "Interstellar" on film stock would help preserve an endangered format, which was supported by Christopher Nolan, J. J. Abrams, Quentin Tarantino, Judd Apatow, Paul Thomas Anderson, and other filmmakers. McClintock reported that theatre owners saw this as "backward," as nearly all theatres in the US had been converted to digital projection.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: "Interstellar" was released on home video on March 31, 2015, in both the United Kingdom and United States. It topped the home video sales chart for a total of two weeks. It was reported that "Interstellar" was the most pirated film of 2015, with an estimated 46.7 million downloads on BitTorrent. It was released in the Ultra HD Blu-ray format on December 19, 2017.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: "Interstellar" grossed $188 million in the US and Canada, and $489.4 million in other countries, for a worldwide total of $677.4 million against a production budget of $165 million. "Deadline Hollywood" calculated the net profit of the film to be $47.2 million, accounting for production budgets, marketing, talent participations, and other costs, with box office grosses, and ancillary revenues from home media, placing it twentieth on their list of 2014's "Most Valuable Blockbusters". It sold an estimated 22 million tickets domestically.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: The film set an IMAX opening record worldwide with $20.5 million from 574 IMAX theaters, surpassing the $17.1 million record held by "" (2013), and is also the best opening for an IMAX 2D, non-sequel, and November IMAX release. It had a worldwide opening of $132.6 million, which was the tenth-largest opening of 2014, and it became the tenth-highest-grossing film of 2014. "Interstellar" is the fourth film to gross over $100 million worldwide from IMAX ticket sales. "Interstellar" was released in the UK, Ireland and Malta on November 6, 2014, and debuted at number one earning £5.37 million ($8.6 million) in its opening weekend, which was lower than the openings of "The Dark Knight Rises" (£14.36 million), "Gravity" (£6.24 million), and "Inception" (£5.91 million). The film was released in 35 markets on the same day, including major markets like Germany, Russia, Australia, and Brazil earning $8.7 million in total. Through Sunday, it earned an opening weekend total of $82.9 million from 11.1 million admissions from over 14,800 screens in 62 markets. It earned $7.3 million from 206 IMAX screens, at an average of 35,400 viewers per theater. It went to number one in South Korea ($14.4 million), Russia ($8.9 million), and France ($5.3 million). Other strong openings occurred in Germany ($4.6 million), India ($4.3 million), Italy ($3.7 million), Australia ($3.7 million), Spain ($2.7 million), Mexico ($3.1 million), and Brazil ($1.9 million). "Interstellar" was released in China on November 12 and earned $5.4 million on its opening day on Wednesday, which is Nolan's biggest opening in China after surpassing the $4.61 million opening record of "The Dark Knight Rises". It went on to earn $41.7 million in its opening weekend, accounting for 55% of the market share. It is Nolan's biggest opening in China, Warner Bros.' biggest 2D opening, and the studio's third-biggest opening of all time, behind 2014's "" ($49.5 million) and 2013's "Pacific Rim" ($45.2 million).


title: Interstellar (film)

text: It topped the box office outside North America for two consecutive weekends before being overtaken by "" (2014) in its third weekend. Just 31 days after its release, the film became the 13th-most-successful film and 3rd-most-successful foreign film in South Korea with 9.1 million admissions trailing only "Avatar" (13.3 million admissions), and 2013's "Frozen" (10.3 million admissions). The film closed down its theatrical run in China on December 12, with total revenue of $122.6 million. In total earnings, its largest markets outside North America and China were South Korea ($73.4 million), the UK, Ireland and Malta ($31.3 million), and Russia and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) ($19 million). "Interstellar" and "Big Hero 6" opened the same weekend (, 2014) in the US and Canada. Both were forecast to earn between and . In North America, the film is the seventh-highest-grossing film to not hit No. 1, with a top rank of No. 2 on its opening weekend. "Interstellar" had an early limited release in the US and Canada in selected theaters on November 4 at 8:00 pm, coinciding with the 2014 US midterm elections. It topped the box office the following day, earning $1.35 million from 249 theaters (42 of which were IMAX screens); IMAX accounted for 62% of its total gross. Two hundred and forty of those theaters played in 35 mm, 70 mm, and IMAX 70 mm film formats. It earned $3.6 million from late-night shows for a previews total of $4.9 million. The film was widely released on November 7 and topped the box office on its opening day, earning $17 million ahead of "Big Hero 6" ($15.8 million). On its opening weekend, the film earned $47.5 million from 3,561 theaters, debuting in second place after a neck-and-neck competition with Disney's "Big Hero 6" ($56.2 million). IMAX comprised $13.2 million (28%) of its opening weekend gross, while other premium large-format screens comprised $5.3 million (10.5%) of the gross. In its second weekend, the film fell to No. 3 behind old rival "Big Hero 6" and newcomer "Dumb and Dumber To" (2014), and dropped 39% earning $29.1 million for a two-weekend total of $97.8 million. It earned $7.4 million from IMAX theaters from 368 screens in its second weekend. In its third week, the film earned $15.1 million and remained at No. 3, below newcomer "The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1" and "Big Hero 6".


title: Interstellar (film)

text: On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, 73% of 372 critic reviews are positive, with an average rating of 7.10/10. The website's critics consensus reads, ""Interstellar" represents more of the thrilling, thought-provoking, and visually resplendent filmmaking moviegoers have come to expect from writer-director Christopher Nolan, even if its intellectual reach somewhat exceeds its grasp." Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 74 out of 100 based on 46 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B+" on an A+ to F scale.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: Scott Foundas, chief film critic at "Variety", said that "Interstellar" is "as visually and conceptually audacious as anything Nolan has yet done" and considered the film "more personal" than Nolan's previous films. Claudia Puig of "USA Today" praised the visual spectacle and powerful themes, while criticizing the "dull" dialogue and "tedious patches inside the space vessel." David Stratton of "At the Movies" rated the film four-and-a-half stars out of five, commending its ambition, effects, and 70 mm IMAX presentation, though criticizing the sound for "being so loud" as to make some of the dialogue "inaudible". Conversely, co-host Margaret Pomeranz rated the film three out of five, as she felt the human drama got lost among the film's scientific concepts. Henry Barnes of "The Guardian" scored the film three out of five stars, calling it "a glorious spectacle, but a slight drama, with few characters and too-rare flashes of humour." James Berardinelli called "Interstellar" "an amazing achievement" and "simultaneously a big-budget science fiction endeavor and a very simple tale of love and sacrifice. It is by turns edgy, breathtaking, hopeful, and heartbreaking." He named it the best film of 2014, and the second-best movie of the decade, deeming it a ""real" science fiction rather than the crowd-pleasing, watered-down version Hollywood typically offers".


title: Interstellar (film)

text: Oliver Gettell of the "Los Angeles Times" reported that "film critics largely agree that "Interstellar" is an entertaining, emotional, and thought-provoking sci-fi saga, even if it can also be clunky and sentimental at times." James Dyer of "Empire" awarded the film a full five stars, describing it as "brainy, barmy, and beautiful to behold ... a mind-bending opera of space and time with a soul wrapped up in all the science." Dave Calhoun of "Time Out London" also granted the film a maximum score of five stars, stating that it is "a bold, beautiful cosmic adventure story with a touch of the surreal and the dreamlike." Richard Roeper of "Chicago Sun-Times" awarded the film a full four stars and wrote, "This is one of the most beautiful films I have ever seen—in terms of its visuals, and its overriding message about the powerful forces of the one thing we all know but can't measure in scientific terms. Love."


title: Interstellar (film)

text: Describing Nolan as a "merchant of awe," Tim Robey of "The Telegraph" thought that "Interstellar" was "agonisingly" close to a masterpiece, highlighting the conceptual boldness and "deep-digging intelligence" of the film. Todd McCarthy of "The Hollywood Reporter" wrote, "This grandly conceived and executed epic tries to give equal weight to intimate human emotions and speculation about the cosmos, with mixed results, but is never less than engrossing, and sometimes more than that." In his review for the Associated Press, Jake Coyle praised the film for its "big-screen grandeur," while finding some of the dialogue "clunky." He described it further as "an absurd endeavor" and "one of the most sublime movies of the decade." Scott Mendelson of "Forbes" listed "Interstellar" as one of the most disappointing films of 2014, stating that the film "has a lack of flow, loss of momentum following the climax, clumsy sound mixing," and "thin characters" despite seeing the film twice in order to "give it a second chance." He wrote that "Interstellar" "ends up as a stripped-down and somewhat muted variation on any number of 'go into space to save the world' movies." Matt Zoller Seitz of RogerEbert.com gave the film three-and-a-half out of four stars, saying that despite his usual quibbles regarding Nolan's excessive dialogue and its lack of a sense of composition, "["Interstellar"] is still an impressive, at times astonishing movie that overwhelmed me to the point where my usual objections to Nolan's work melted away ... At times, the movie's one-stop-shopping storytelling evokes the tough-tender spirit of a John Ford picture, ... a movie that would rather try to be eight or nine things than just one."


title: Interstellar (film)

text: "The New York Times" columnist David Brooks concludes that "Interstellar" explores the relationships among "science and faith and science and the humanities" and "illustrates the real symbiosis between these realms." Wai Chee Dimock, in the "Los Angeles Review of Books", wrote that Nolan's films are "rotatable at 90, 180, and 360 degrees," and that "although there is considerable magical thinking here, making it almost an anti-sci-fi film, holding out hope that the end of the planet is not the end of everything, it reverses itself, however, when that magic falls short when the poetic license is naked and plain for all to see." Author George R. R. Martin called "Interstellar" "the most ambitious and challenging science fiction film since Kubrick's "2001"." In 2020, "Empire" magazine ranked it as one of the best films of the 21st century.


title: Interstellar (film)

text: At the 87th Academy Awards, "Interstellar" received nominations for Best Original Score, Best Production Design, Best Sound Editing, and Best Sound Mixing, and


title: David Beckham

text: David Robert Joseph Beckham (; born 2 May 1975) is an English former professional footballer, the current president and co-owner of Inter Miami CF and co-owner of Salford City. Known for his range of passing, crossing ability and bending free-kicks as a right winger, Beckham has been hailed as one of the greatest and most recognisable midfielders of his generation, as well as one of the best set-piece specialists of all time. He is the first English player to win league titles in four countries: England, Spain, the United States and France.


title: David Beckham

text: Beckham's professional club career began with Manchester United, where he made his first-team debut in 1992 at age 17. With United, he won the Premier League title six times, the FA Cup twice, and the UEFA Champions League in 1999. He then played four seasons with Real Madrid, winning the La Liga championship in his final season with the club. In July 2007, Beckham signed a five-year contract with Major League Soccer club LA Galaxy. While a Galaxy player, he spent two loan spells in Italy with AC Milan in 2009 and 2010. He was the first British footballer to play 100 UEFA Champions League games. He retired in May 2013 after a 20-year career, during which he won 19 major trophies.


title: David Beckham

text: In international football, Beckham made his England debut on 1 September 1996 at the age of 21. He was captain for six years, earning 58 caps during his tenure. He made 115 career appearances in total, appearing at three FIFA World Cup tournaments, in 1998, 2002 and 2006, and two UEFA European Championship tournaments, in 2000 and 2004. He held the England appearance record for an outfield player until 2016.


title: David Beckham

text: A global ambassador of football, Beckham is considered to be a British cultural icon. He was runner-up in the Ballon d'Or in 1999, twice runner-up for FIFA World Player of the Year (1999 and 2001) and in 2004 was named by Pelé in the FIFA 100 list of the world's greatest living players. He was inducted into the English Football Hall of Fame in 2008 and the Premier League Hall of Fame in 2021. He has been a UNICEF UK ambassador since 2005, and in 2015 he launched "7: The David Beckham UNICEF Fund". His allyship with the gay community, considered unprecedented in football culture, had led Beckham to be considered a gay icon—a term he embraces. However, this popular status has been subject to controversy since Beckham signed a $150m sponsorship deal with Qatar, known for its persecution of LGBT people, to become a brand ambassador for the 2022 FIFA World Cup.


title: David Beckham

text: Beckham has consistently ranked among the highest earners in football, and in 2013 was listed as the highest-paid player in the world, having earned over $50 million in the previous 12 months. He has been married to Victoria Beckham since 1999 and they have four children. In 2014, MLS announced that Beckham and a group of investors would own Inter Miami CF, which began play in 2020.


title: David Beckham

text: Beckham was born at Whipps Cross University Hospital in Leytonstone, London, England. He is the son of Sandra Georgina ("née" West; b. 1949), a hairdresser, and David Edward Alan "Ted" Beckham (b. Edmonton, London, 1948), a kitchen fitter; the couple married in 1969 in the London Borough of Hackney. He was given the middle name Robert in honour of Bobby Charlton, his father's favourite footballer. He has an older sister, Lynne Georgina, and a younger sister, Joanne Louise. He attended Chingford County High School in Nevin Drive, Chingford. In a 2007 interview, Beckham said that, "At school whenever the teachers asked, 'What do you want to do when you're older?' I'd say, 'I want to be a footballer.' And they'd say, 'No, what do you really want to do, for a job?' But that was the only thing I ever wanted to do." Beckham's maternal grandfather was Jewish, and Beckham has referred to himself as "half Jewish" and wrote in his autobiography "I've probably had more contact with Judaism than with any other religion". In his book "Both Feet on the Ground", Beckham stated that growing up he attended church every week with his parents, because that was the only way he could play football for their team.