SANTIAGO DE COMPOSTELA, Spain The driver of a Spanish train that derailed, killing at least 80 people, was under police guard in hospital on Thursday after the dramatic accident which an official source said was caused by excessive speed.

 The eight-carriage train came off the tracks, hit a wall and caught fire just outside the pilgrimage destination Santiago de Compostela in northwestern Spain on Wednesday night. It was one of Europe's worst rail disasters.

 The source had knowledge of the official investigation into a crash which brought misery to Santiago on Thursday, the day when it should have celebrated one of Europe's biggest Christian festivals. Authorities canceled festivities as the city went into mourning.

 The Galicia regional supreme court said in a statement the judge investigating the accident had ordered police to take a statement from the driver.

 He was being formally investigated and under police guard but not under arrest, the court said. He was in hospital but it was not clear what kind of injuries he had suffered.

 Video footage from a security camera showed the train, with 247 people on board, hurtling into a concrete wall at the side of the track as carriages jack-knifed and the engine overturned.

 One local official described the aftermath of the crash as like a scene from hell, with bodies strewn next to the tracks.

 The impact was so huge one carriage flew several meters into the air and landed on the other side of a high concrete barrier.

 Around 94 people were injured, 35 of them, including four children, in a serious condition, the deputy head of the regional government said.

 "We heard a massive noise and we went down the tracks. I helped get a few injured and bodies out of the train. I went into one of the cars but I'd rather not tell you what I saw there," Ricardo Martinez, a 47-year old baker from Santiago de Compostela, told Reuters.

 Newspaper accounts cited witnesses as saying the driver, Francisco Jose Garzon, who had helped rescue victims, shouted into a phone: "I've derailed! What do I do?".

 The 52-year-old had been a train driver for 30 years, said a spokeswoman for Renfe, the state train company.

 A court source told Reuters there was one driver on the train. Previously, a Galicia government source had said there were two.

 TRAIN HIT BEND AT SPEED

 El Pais newspaper said the driver told the railway station by radio after being trapped in his cabin that the train entered the bend at 190 kilometers per hour (120 mph). An official source said the speed limit on that stretch of twin track, laid in 2011, was 80 kph.

 "We're only human! We're only human!" the driver told the station, the newspaper said, citing sources close to the investigation. "I hope there are no dead, because this will weigh on my conscience."

 Investigators were trying to find out why the train was going so fast and why security devices to keep speed within permitted limits had not slowed the train.

 Operated by state-owned company Renfe, the train was built by Bombardier and Talgo and was around five years old. It had almost the maximum number of passengers.

 Spain's rail safety record is better than the European average, ranking 18th out of 27 countries in terms of railway deaths per kilometers traveled, the European Railway Agency said. There were 218 train accidents in Spain between 2008-2011, well below the EU average of 426 for the same period.

 Firefighters called off a strike to help with the disaster, while hospital staff, many operating on reduced salaries because of spending cuts in recession-hit Spain, worked overtime to tend the injured.

 The disaster happened at 8.41 p.m. (2:41 p.m. ET) on the eve of a festival dedicated to St. James, one of Jesus's 12 disciples, whose remains are said to rest in Santiago's centuries-old cathedral.

 The apostle's shrine is the destination of the famous El Camino de Santiago pilgrimage across the Pyrenees, which has been followed by Christians since the Middle Ages.

 "The main mass (in the cathedral) was transformed from a mass of joy into a mass of mourning," said Italian pilgrim Irene Valsangiacomo.

 KING, PM VISIT

 One U.S. citizen died in the crash and five were injured, the State Department said in Washington. Mexico said one of its nationals was among the dead.

 At least one British citizen was injured, a British embassy spokesman said. People from several other countries were believed to be among the passengers.

 People living nearby ran to the site to help emergency workers tend to the wounded. Ana Taboada, a 29-year-old hospital worker, was one of the first on the scene.

 "When the dust lifted I saw corpses. I didn't make it down to the track, because I was helping the passengers that were coming up the embankment," she told Reuters. "I saw a man trying to break a window with a stone to help those inside get out."

 Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy, who was born in Santiago de Compostela, the capital of Galicia region, visited the site and the main hospital on Thursday. He declared three days of official national mourning for the victims of the disaster.

 King Juan Carlos and Queen Sofia also went to Santiago and visited the injured in hospital.

 "All of Spain is united in grief with the bereaved families," the king said.

 Both Renfe and state-owned Adif, which is in charge of the tracks, opened an investigation into the derailment.

 Passenger Ricardo Montesco told Cadena Ser radio station the train approached the curve at high speed, twisted and the carriages piled up one on top of the other.

 "A lot of people were squashed on the bottom. We tried to squeeze out of the bottom of the wagons to get out and we realized the train was burning. ... I was in the second carriage and there was fire. ... I saw corpses," he said.

 Clinics in Santiago de Compostela were overwhelmed with people flocking to give blood, while hotels organized free rooms for relatives. Madrid sent forensic scientists and hospital staff to the scene on special flights.

 Allianz Seguros, owned by Germany's Allianz, owns the insurance contract for loss suffered by Renfe passengers, a company spokeswoman told Reuters. The contract does not cover Renfe's trains. The company had sent experts to the scene.

 The disaster stirred memories of a train bombing in Madrid in 2004, carried out by Islamist militants, that killed 191 people, although officials do not suspect an attack this time.

 Spain is struggling to emerge from a long-running recession marked by government-driven austerity to bring its deeply indebted finances into order.

 But Adif, the state railways infrastructure company, told Reuters no budget cuts had been implemented on maintenance of the line, which connects La Coruna, Santiago de Compostela and Ourense and was inaugurated in 2011.

 It said more than 100 million euros a year were being spent on track maintenance in Spain.

 (Additional reporting by Inmaculada Sanz, Sonya Dowsett, Sarah White, Andres Gonzalez, Blanca Rodriguez, Julien Toyer, Emma Pinedo, Raquel Castillo, Robert Hetz; Writing by Sonya Dowsett and Julien Toyer and Elisabeth O'Leary,; editing by Barry Moody and Andrew Heavens) ||||| Death toll rises to 80, including one American. Train driver who boasted about speeding is under investigation after video shows dramatic derailment.

 Emergency personnel respond to the scene of a train derailment in Santiago de Compostela, Spain, on July 24. A train derailed in northwestern Spain on Wednesday night, killing dozens. (Photo: Antonio Hernandez, El correo Gallego/AP) Story Highlights Train from Madrid may have been traveling 89 to 119 mph in 50-mph zone

 All eight carriages left tracks, and four overturned

 Accident happened in Santiago de Compostela in the Galicia region

 The train that derailed on a curve Wednesday night in northwestern Spain may have been traveling at more than twice the speed limit, media outlets reported Thursday.

 The veteran driver, who was injured, is being formally investigated amid reports that he had bragged on Facebook about routinely speeding. Officials said he did not test positive for alcohol or drugs.

 Authorities and rail experts cautioned that speed-control systems might also have failed.

 The Associated Press analyzed video of the crash and said the train was going between 89 mph and 119 mph on the stretch of track that has a limit of about 50 mph. The Spanish newspaper El Mundo also reported that the train may have approached speeds of up to 119 mph before it flew off the tracks and smashed into a retaining wall.

 The U.S. State Department said that one American was among the 80 who died.

 The Galician government said 94 others remained hospitalized, with 31, including four children, in critical condition. Five Americans were among the injured, the State Department said, without releasing details.

 The Reuters news agency reported that the driver, Francisco Jose Garzon Amo, is in police custody in the hospital, where he is being treated for unspecified injuries. He took over the controls from another driver about 65 miles before the crash, said the state railway, Renfe.

 Garzon, 52, has worked for Renfe for 30 years. He became an assistant driver in 2000 and a fully qualified driver in 2003.

 He enjoyed going fast.

 The New York Times reported that until it was deleted Thursday morning, Garzon's Facebook page "included a photograph and exchanges that portrayed a taste for speed, and perhaps even recklessness."

 A March 2012 photo showed a speedometer topped out at 124 mph. "I'm at the limit and I can't go any faster or they will give me a fine," he wrote.

 Responding to a friend's quip about speeding, the Times said, Garzon wrote in all caps: "Imagine what a rush it would be traveling alongside the Civil Guard, and passing them so that their speed traps go off. Hehe, that would be quite a fine for Renfe, hehe."

 Garzon had worked the Madrid-to-Ferrol run for more than a year, Renfe said. His express train Wednesday was carrying 218 passengers when it left the tracks at 8:41 p.m. local time (2:41 p.m. ET) about 2.5 miles from the station at Santiago de Compostela. The train carried five crewmembers.

 One driver who was trapped radioed the rail station that the train was traveling 120 mph when it entered the bend, sources told the Spanish newspaper El Pais.

 "We're only human! We're only human!" the driver reportedly said. "I hope there are no dead, because this will fall on my conscience."

 All eight carriages derailed, and four overturned. TV images showed one car torn apart, another on fire and blanket-covered bodies besides the wrecked carriages.

 Hadley Malcolm hosts USA NOW for July 25, 2013, covering the recent train crash in Spain that killed scores of people. USA TODAY, USA NOW, Kaveh Rezaei,

 "A lot of people were squashed on the bottom. We tried to squeeze out of the bottom of the wagons to get out and we realized the train was burning," passenger Ricardo Montesco told radio station Cadena SER. "I was in the second wagon and there was fire. I saw corpses."

 The president of the Galicia region, Alberto Nunez Feijoo, described the scene as "Dante-esque."

 An 18-year Mormon missionary from Utah told the Associated Press he blacked out after the train lifted in the air like a roller coaster.

 Stephen Ward, of Bountiful, found himself caked in blood and heard cries and screams when he came to, thinking it was all a dream. He was discharged Thursday.

 Officials canceled festivities planned for Thursday in Santiago de Compostela to celebrate St James, one of Jesus' 12 apostles whose remains are claimed to buried there. Officials said many of the travelers likely were pilgrims headed to the city, about 60 miles south of Ferrol.

 Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy Brey, who was born in Santiago de Compostola, toured the crash scene Thursday alongside rescue workers and visited the injured and their families at a nearby hospital. He declared three days of official mourning.

 "For a native of Santiago, like me, this is the saddest day," he said.

 King Carlos, the country's head of state, and Queen Sofia also visited the hospital.

 It was Spain's deadliest train accident since 1972, when a train collided with a bus in southwest Spain, killing 86 people and injuring 112.

 Two weeks ago in France, six people died when several cars of a train packed ahead of the Bastille Day holiday in a station outside Paris. Officials blamed a faulty track.

 Contributing: The Associated Press

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 The train company said Thursday that there does not appear to have been a technical fault with the train.

 The train company said Thursday that there does not appear to have been a technical fault with the train.

 Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/17Ff6h4 ||||| Story highlights Survivor says the crash site looked like a scene from hell

 Victim: "Suddenly there was a curve, the suitcases fell and everything went dark"

 Death toll at 80, spokeswoman for Spanish government in Galicia region tells CNN

 Crash may be linked to train going too fast, transport minister tells radio station

 The train races into view, and in the space of a heartbeat, the cars derail and crash into a wall of concrete, flipping onto their sides and skidding along the track with terrifying speed and force.

 Security footage shows the horror of the moment an express train derailed as it hurtled around a curve in northwestern Spain on Wednesday. A spokeswoman for the Spanish government in the Galicia region, speaking on routine condition of anonymity, confirmed 80 people have died in the crash.

 A woman from Arlington, Virginia, is among the dead. And at least five other U.S. citizens were injured, Deputy State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf said.

 Flames burst out of one train car as another car was snapped in half after the crash. Rescue crews and fellow passengers pulled bodies through broken windows and pried open doors as stunned survivors looked on.

 Photos: Photos: Deadly train crash in Spain Photos: Photos: Deadly train crash in Spain Deadly train crash in Spain – Wreckage of the front locomotive of a derailed train stands on the road while workers repair the railway on Sunday, July 28, in Santiago de Compostela, Spain. A spokeswoman for the Galician regional government said that at least 79 people were confirmed dead in the train crash. It occurred on the eve of a public holiday, when more people than usual may have been traveling in the region. Hide Caption 1 of 26 Photos: Photos: Deadly train crash in Spain Deadly train crash in Spain – Train driver Francisco Jose Garzon is taken from a police station to the Preliminary Court in Santiago de Compostela on July 28. Hide Caption 2 of 26 Photos: Photos: Deadly train crash in Spain Deadly train crash in Spain – Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy, second from left, and Galicia's regional President Alberto Nunez Feijoo, right, visit the site of the derailment on Friday, July 26. Hide Caption 3 of 26 Photos: Photos: Deadly train crash in Spain Deadly train crash in Spain – Injured people are evacuated at the site of the July 24 train accident. The driver of the train is being held, Spanish police said July 26. Hide Caption 4 of 26 Photos: Photos: Deadly train crash in Spain Deadly train crash in Spain – A train car is lifted Thursday, July 25, at Angrois near Santiago de Compostela, Spain. The train derailed as it hurtled around a curve at high speed on Wednesday, July 24. Hide Caption 5 of 26 Photos: Photos: Deadly train crash in Spain Deadly train crash in Spain – Emergency personnel work at the crash scene July 25. An investigation into the cause of the derailment is under way. Hide Caption 6 of 26 Photos: Photos: Deadly train crash in Spain Deadly train crash in Spain – Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy, center, visits the crash site July 25 with Public Works Minister Ana Pastor, right, and Alberto Nunez Feijoo, head of the regional government in Galicia. The latter declared seven days of mourning for victims of the crash.

 Hide Caption 7 of 26 Photos: Photos: Deadly train crash in Spain Deadly train crash in Spain – A relative of one of the passengers waits to hear news in Santiago de Compostela on July 25. Hide Caption 8 of 26 Photos: Photos: Deadly train crash in Spain Deadly train crash in Spain – Other relatives of passengers wait for information in Santiago de Compostela on July 25. Hide Caption 9 of 26 Photos: Photos: Deadly train crash in Spain Deadly train crash in Spain – Rescue workers inspect a carriage in the wreckage July 25. Hide Caption 10 of 26 Photos: Photos: Deadly train crash in Spain Deadly train crash in Spain – A general view of the derailment in northwestern Spain on July 25. Hide Caption 11 of 26 Photos: Photos: Deadly train crash in Spain Deadly train crash in Spain – Emergency workers at the derailment scene July 25. Hide Caption 12 of 26 Photos: Photos: Deadly train crash in Spain Deadly train crash in Spain – Emergency personnel evacuate a man at the scene July 25. Hide Caption 13 of 26 Photos: Photos: Deadly train crash in Spain Deadly train crash in Spain – Emergency workers help passengers July 25. Hide Caption 14 of 26 Photos: Photos: Deadly train crash in Spain Deadly train crash in Spain – Women wait for news about crash victims in Santiago de Compostela on July 25. Hide Caption 15 of 26 Photos: Photos: Deadly train crash in Spain Deadly train crash in Spain – Teams at the crash site July 25 expect to find more bodies, an official says. Hide Caption 16 of 26 Photos: Photos: Deadly train crash in Spain Deadly train crash in Spain – The train was on its way from Madrid to the town of Ferrol with more than 200 passengers aboard. Hide Caption 17 of 26 Photos: Photos: Deadly train crash in Spain Deadly train crash in Spain – Train driver Francisco Jose Garzon, identified by Spanish newspapers El Pais and El Mundo, is helped from the scene by a police officer. Hide Caption 18 of 26 Photos: Photos: Deadly train crash in Spain Deadly train crash in Spain – The state railway company said the train derailed on a curve as it was approaching the train station in Santiago de Compostela. Hide Caption 19 of 26 Photos: Photos: Deadly train crash in Spain Deadly train crash in Spain – Emergency workers climb on top of the wreckage as they help free injured passengers from the crash. Hide Caption 20 of 26 Photos: Photos: Deadly train crash in Spain Deadly train crash in Spain – While it was unclear how fast the train was going at the time of the crash, it was capable of reaching up to 155 mph. Hide Caption 21 of 26 Photos: Photos: Deadly train crash in Spain Deadly train crash in Spain – Rescuers work to pull victims from the derailed cars. Hide Caption 22 of 26 Photos: Photos: Deadly train crash in Spain Deadly train crash in Spain – One person at the scene said he saw several passengers and witnesses helping get people out of the mangled cars. Hide Caption 23 of 26 Photos: Photos: Deadly train crash in Spain Deadly train crash in Spain – Rescuers work to clear a derailed car. Hide Caption 24 of 26 Photos: Photos: Deadly train crash in Spain Deadly train crash in Spain – "The efforts now center on searching for bodies and victims that could still be alive in the wreckage of the cars," journalist Ignacio Carballo from the Voz de Galicia newspaper told CNN en Español. Hide Caption 25 of 26 Photos: Photos: Deadly train crash in Spain Deadly train crash in Spain – Officials said blood donations were needed as a result of the crash. Hide Caption 26 of 26

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 Investigations into the cause of the crash continue, but suggestions that the train was traveling too fast appear to be gaining weight.

 The train driver is being questioned by police and is under formal investigation, said Maria Pardo Rios, a spokeswoman for the Galicia regional supreme court. "He is not being charged by a judge at the moment -- it is all at a police level," she said.

 Of the scores of people injured in the crash, 95 remained hospitalized Thursday, officials said. Thirty-two adults were in critical condition.

 Most of the deaths happened at the scene, Rios said. In Spain, judges typically record deaths that take place outside of hospitals.

 Judicial teams are still at the crash site and expect to find more bodies, she told CNN on Thursday morning.

 Interim charge d'affaires Luis G. Moreno at the embassy said it was in touch "with families of some injured American citizens."

 "We are deeply shocked by the news of last night's train crash in Galicia. Our hearts and prayers are with the friends and families of the victims," he said Thursday.

 UK Foreign Secretary William Hague said one British citizen was injured.

 The crash came on the eve of a public holiday held to mark the region's saint's day. Local officials canceled festivities planned for Wednesday night and Thursday across Galicia.

 Train's speed questioned

 The state railway, Renfe, said the train crashed on a curve several kilometers from the train station in the city of Santiago de Compostela, a popular tourist destination.

 The train was nearing the end of a six-hour trip from Madrid to the town of Ferrol in northwest Spain when it derailed at 8:41 p.m. Wednesday, the railway said.

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 It was unclear how fast the train was traveling when it crashed. It was capable of going up to 250 kilometers per hour (155 mph), said Julio Hermida, a spokesman for the state railway.

 The driver, who suffered minor injuries, told police the train had entered the bend too fast, TVE reported.

 The driver has worked for the company for the last 30 years, a spokesman for the railway confirmed to CNN. In 2000, the driver started working as a train driver assistant, and in 2003 began working as a train driver, a job the driver has held since.

 Rafael Catala, secretary of state for transport and housing, told Spanish radio network Cadena SER that the "tragedy appears to be linked to the train going too fast," but that the reasons for that are not yet known.

 Spanish news agency Efe and national daily El Pais cited sources within the investigation as saying that the driver had said the train was going at about 190 kilometers per hour, and that the limit on that curve was 80 kilometers per hour (50 mph.)

 The president of Renfe, Julio Gomez-Pomar, told radio station COPE on Thursday that the train had undergone a routine inspection that same morning.

 "The train did not have an operating problem," he said. "The maintenance and control record of the train was perfect."

 Mourning declared

 Spain's King Juan Carlos visited a hospital in Santiago de Compostela where victims injured in Wednesday's train accident are recovering.

 "All Spaniards, we are united at this time. ... Really all Spaniards join in the pain of the families of the dead," he said. "We hope that the wounded will recover, little by little."

 The royal family canceled all events scheduled for the day out of respect for the day of mourning, the royal household told CNN.

 Alberto Nunez Feijoo, head of the regional government in Galicia, declared seven days of mourning in the region for victims of the tragedy.

 In a speech, he said "all of the community cries about the tragedy that we are living, we cry for the victims, we cry for the unease and sadness of the families."

 Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy viewed the scene of devastation Thursday morning and visited some of the hospitalized crash victims.

 Rajoy, who is from the area, told a news conference there was a "huge challenge" ahead, not least in identifying all those killed and informing their families, and he praised the response of everyone who has helped after the crash.

 Two investigations are under way, he said, adding, "We want to establish what happened."

 Rajoy declared three days of national mourning to honor the victims of the crash.

 The prime minister came under fire in Spanish media after a condolences message for the train crash victims posted by his office late Wednesday included a paragraph apparently "copied and pasted" from a statement previously sent to victims of an earthquake in Gansu, China.

 ''I would like to express my deepest condolences for the loss of human lives and the material damage from the earthquake that has occurred in Gansu has caused," the note said.

 Victim: 'Everything went dark'

 One victim, speaking from a hospital bed with his arm in a sling, told CNN affiliate Atlas that it seemed like train was going fast.

 "But we didn't know what was the maximum speed, so I thought it was normal," he said, "And suddenly there was a curve, the suitcases fell, and everything went dark. And I hit my head a ton of times, and 10 seconds later I was wedged between seats, and I had people's legs on top of me."

 As he waited for rescuers to pull him from the wreckage, he heard other passengers yelling.

 "I heard little children screaming. ... I also heard two girls that yelled out, one supporting the other," he said.

 Rescuers came through it and helped the 18-year-old from Bountiful, Utah, get out.

 He waited for hours while victims with more serious injuries were taken to the hospital. As he watched rescue crews carry the dead and wounded, he cried and sang church hymns to calm himself down.

 A photo taken at the scene shows him leaning on a police officer as he walked beside the tracks, with blood oozing down his face and splattered on his crisp, white shirt.

 The Mormon missionary walked past dead bodies on the ground. He told London's Daily Telegraph that it looked like a scene from hell.

 U.S. citizen among those killed

 When the train crashed, Ana-Maria Cordoba was on the way with her husband and their daughter to visit her son, who had been on a pilgrimage in Spain, the Catholic Diocese of Arlington told CNN.

 Cordoba, who worked for the diocese, was killed, spokesman Michael Donahue said.

 Her husband and daughter are hospitalized in stable condition, the diocese said.

 Crash investigation

 Investigators are looking at all possible causes of the crash, a senior aide to the prime minister said Wednesday.

 Renfe's spokesman said he did not know how many crew members were aboard the train when it crashed. Normally, there would be at least five crew members on a train like that, he said.

 Officials appealed for blood donations just after the crash but on Thursday said the short-term needs were met.

 Herman Van Rompuy, president of the European Council, expressed condolences from the European Union.

 Pope Francis, who is on a visit to Brazil for World Youth Day, sent a telegram to the bishop of Santiago de Compostela, Julian Barrio Barrio, offering his support and prayers for all those affected by the tragedy. ||||| A passenger train derailed in northwestern Spain on Wednesday night, killing at least 35 people and leaving hundreds injured, officials said.

 Emergency personnel respond to the scene of a train derailment in Santiago de Compostela, Spain, on Wednesday, July 24, 2013. A train derailed in northwestern Spain on Wednesday night, toppling passenger... (Associated Press)

 Emergency personnel respond to the scene of a train derailment in Santiago de Compostela, Spain, on Wednesday, July 24, 2013. A train derailed in northwestern Spain on Wednesday night, toppling passenger... (Associated Press)

 A woman is evacuated by emergency personnel at the scene of a train derailment in Santiago de Compostela, Spain, on Wednesday, July 24, 2013. A train derailed in northwestern Spain on Wednesday night,... (Associated Press)

 Emergency personnel respond to the scene of a train derailment in Santiago de Compostela, Spain, on Wednesday, July 24, 2013. A train derailed in northwestern Spain on Wednesday night, toppling passenger... (Associated Press)

 Emergency personnel respond to the scene of a train derailment in Santiago de Compostela, Spain, on Wednesday, July 24, 2013. A train derailed in northwestern Spain on Wednesday night, toppling passenger... (Associated Press)

 Emergency personnel respond to the scene of a train derailment in Santiago de Compostela, Spain, on Wednesday, July 24, 2013. A train derailed in northwestern Spain on Wednesday night, toppling passenger... (Associated Press)

 Alberto Nunez Feijoo, president of the region of Galicia, said at least 35 people aboard the train were killed.

 State-owned train operator Renfe said in a statement that 218 passengers and an unspecified number of staff were on board at the time of the accident. Renfe did not give an estimate of the numbers of dead or injured.

 Feast day festivities planned in the city of Santiago de Compostela were cancelled, town hall spokeswoman Maria Pardo told Spanish National television TVE.

 A photographer at the scene said he saw dozens of what appeared to be dead bodies being extracted from the wreck by emergency workers. TVE showed footage of what appeared to be several bodies covered by blankets alongside the tracks next to the damaged train wagons.

 The photographer, Xabier Martinez, told The Associated Press that he also spoke to two injured train passengers who said they felt a strong vibration before the derailing.

 The accident occurred along a high-speed stretch of track near the train station in Santiago de Compostola, 95 kilometers (60 miles) south of El Ferrol. Rescue workers were seen in the television images caring for people still inside some of the wagons.

 Television footage also showed one wagon pointing upwards into the air with one of its ends twisted and disfigured. Another carriage had left the track altogether and could be seen resting on a nearby road.

 The train, which belongs to the state-owned Renfe company, was headed to El Ferrol from Madrid.

 Officials at the Interior Ministry and the Adif rail infrastructure authority did not immediately answer telephone calls or return messages seeking comment. Officials with Renfe also did not immediately return messages seeking comment. ||||| SANTIAGO DE COMPOSTELA, Spain — The train driver did little to hide his taste for speed. He posted a photograph of a locomotive speedometer needle stuck at 200 kilometers, or about 125 miles, per hour on Facebook last year, boasting that the reading “has not been tampered with” and openly relishing the idea of racing past the authorities.

 “Imagine what a rush it would be traveling alongside the Civil Guard, and passing them so that their speed traps go off,” he wrote, in all capitals. “Hehe, that would be quite a fine for Renfe, hehe,” referring to his employer, the Spanish rail company.

 Now that train driver, Francisco José Garzón Amo, a veteran with more than three decades of experience, is under investigation by a judge in connection with one of Europe’s worst rail accidents in recent years.

 In a chilling video from a security camera, the passenger train he was driving rounded a curve at high speed on Wednesday night, tumbling violently off the track, slamming against a curved wall and piling up in a twisted wreck. Eighty people were killed.

 On Thursday, Spanish news media reported that the driver had said the train’s speed had been about 120 miles per hour, more than double the limit in the stretch of track where the train derailed. On the day of the wreck, he took over from another driver just 60 miles before the crash, according to Spanish news reports.

 The train was almost full, carrying more than 200 passengers and merrymakers returning to the region for a special holiday on Thursday. July 25 is the feast day for St. James the Apostle, the patron saint of Spain, who for centuries has inspired pilgrims to walk El Camino de Santiago, or the Way of St. James. The pilgrimage has had a burst of popularity in recent years, drawing walkers from around the world.

 After the crash, the city of Santiago de Compostela canceled its extensive celebration and the authorities urged people to donate blood. Thousands made a very different kind of pilgrimage to the site of the disaster, watching as rescuers used cranes and trucks to hoist the engines of the wrecked train. All — children, teenagers and older people — stood in funereal silence.

 Nearby, in a building where an information center had been set up, police officers kept the victims’ families from the public eye. Some walked around the building in tears, hugging and comforting one another, while others grew frustrated waiting to see their loved ones.

 “Now, at 9:30 p.m., is when they allowed us to go and see our family member,” said María, a relative of a victim who did not want her full name used. “Twenty-four hours waiting, in these conditions. That’s too much.”

 Most high-speed lines that are part of the European rail traffic system are covered by a GPS-based surveillance network that constantly monitors trains’ speed and automatically brakes them at speed limits.

 Slower trains and trains crossing urban areas in Spain and other countries use a less intrusive system that warns the driver with sound and lights at excessive speeds, but does not automatically brake the train, according to María Carmen Palao, a spokeswoman for Spain’s ADIF rail infrastructure company.

 The accident, she said, took place two to three miles outside the station at Santiago de Compostela, in the “transition zone” between the two systems. The wreck occurred on the Galicia line, run by the rail operator Renfe and opened in 2011.

 The train’s driver survived the accident with light injuries and is under police guard, although he has not been formally arrested. He is “lucid and able to speak,” said Carmen Prieto, a spokeswoman for the Spanish Development Ministry.

 The Spanish newspaper El País reported that people at the train company said that alcohol had not been found in the driver’s system, but the security video showing the train barreling into the turn and abruptly careening off the rails quickly raised concerns that he was traveling too fast.

 Even in his Facebook message, posted in 2012 but removed late Thursday morning, Mr. Garzón elicited some astounded comments from friends.

 “Dude, you’re going full speed, braaaaake,” one commenter wrote.

 “Christ, you’re doing 200km/h,” another said.

 Outpourings of sympathy for Wednesday’s disaster came from all corners, including the White House. “On behalf of the American people, we offer our deepest sympathies and condolences,” President Obama said in a statement. The State Department confirmed Thursday that one American died and five were injured in the accident.

 In a letter to Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy, the president of the European Commission, José Manuel Barroso, said he was “deeply saddened” by the accident. “Such a serious accident, with so many people dead and injured, is a tragedy for Spain and provokes such deep emotions,” he said.

 Mr. Rajoy, who was born in the region, visited the scene and declared three days of official mourning. King Juan Carlos and his wife, Sofía, also rushed to Santiago de Compostela.

 “In the face of a tragedy such as just happened in Santiago de Compostela on the eve of its big day, I can only express my deepest sympathy as a Spaniard and a Galician,” Mr. Rajoy said in a written statement.

 The eight-car train, which left Madrid at 3 p.m. on Wednesday, was traveling to the coast when it derailed around 8:44 p.m., according to the clock on the security video. Witnesses described the destruction as the dead were taken to a temporary morgue. “The road is full of cadavers,” a radio reporter, Xaime López, said on the station Cadena Ser. “It’s striking: you almost can’t even count them.”

 The accident was Spain’s worst train crash since 1972, when 86 people were killed in the southwest of the country. |||||
What is a one-paragraph summary of the above article?

– Another deadly train accident is in the news, this time from Spain. A high-speed train in the country's northwest derailed last night; it was reportedly moving at double the speed limit, and Reuters says the driver is under investigation. Officials say at least 77 people are dead, the New York Times reports. At least 100 more were injured, and 20 are in critical condition, CNN adds. Authorities say the train had about 220 passengers and derailed around 8:40pm local time near the station in the city of Santiago de Compostela, 60 miles south of El Ferrol, the AP notes. An official tells CNN more bodies are expected to be found, and some reports now put the death toll at 78. The train, which belongs to the state-owned Renfe company, was on its way to El Ferrol from Madrid. It was going 110 miles per hour in a zone where the speed limit is 50, sources told Spain's El Pais paper, per the Times. According to CNN, the train driver told police he entered a curve too quickly, and the country's transport secretary confirmed the "tragedy appears to be linked to the train going too fast." The BBC says all 13 cars came off the tracks, and it quotes one passenger who says they seemed to "pile up on one another" at a curve in the tracks. "There are bodies lying on the railway track," says one government official. "It's a Dante-esque scene."


Article:

These crawls are part of an effort to archive pages as they are created and archive the pages that they refer to. That way, as the pages that are referenced are changed or taken from the web, a link to the version that was live when the page was written will be preserved.Then the Internet Archive hopes that references to these archived pages will be put in place of a link that would be otherwise be broken, or a companion link to allow people to see what was originally intended by a page's authors.The goal is to fix all broken links on the web . Crawls of supported "No More 404" sites. ||||| Michael Lohan has popped the question to Jon Gosselin's ex, Kate Major.

 "She's been there for five years with me. I think a friendship is more important than anything when you have a relationship, and this is the strongest one in my life," Lohan, 49, tells UsMagazine.com.

 PHOTOS: Stars' personal wedding photos

 Lohan says he was waiting for the "situation with Lindsay to resolve" before announcing the engagement. He has been encouraging his troubled daughter to enter rehab.

 "[Two weeks ago], I went down to Florida with Kate to visit her dad. I was in a hot tub with her dad at their house, and I said, 'There's something we have to talk about.' He said, 'Oh my God, don't tell me Kate's pregnant!'" Lohan jokes. "I told him I was looking at the future, and I wanted to make it formal and take it to the next level. After that, he approved, then Kate and I discussed it and she discussed it with her dad."

 PHOTOS: Can you believe these couples' age differences?

 While Major, 27, isn't expecting now, she and Lohan do eventually plan to have children. "That's one of the things I spoke to her dad about. I'm not getting any younger and Kate wants to have children," Lohan says.

 Of the engagement, Major tells Us, "I'm really happy."

 She's already started planning.

 "I have talked to some of the bridesmaids and we have discussed having the wedding later this year. It's going to be at Oheka Castle in New York. But right now, I'm just enjoying being engaged... We're really excited!"

 Plus, Major tells Us, "The ring is gorgeous!"

 PHOTOS: Stars' huge engagement rings

 She hasn't received well wishes from Gosselin yet. "Jon and I don't speak, but I wish him and Kate Gosselin the best," Major tells Us.

  |||||
What is a summary?

– Michael Lohan, that paragon of celebrity fatherhood, is engaged to none other than Kate Major, the former Star reporter who famously—and oh-so-briefly—dated Jon Gosselin. “I'm very traditional, so I wanted him to talk to my father,” Major tells People; Lohan got Kate's dad’s blessing during an Easter visit—in a hot tub, no less. Both say they are “ecstatic,” Lohan in particular because Major “doesn’t come with baggage.” Lohan tells Us he wanted to wait for the “situation with Lindsay to resolve” before making the announcement; no word, though, on said resolution. The wedding will likely be later this year at Oheka Castle in New York, Major says, adding that the couple’s 23-year age difference “has never been an issue.” And no, Gosselin hasn’t sent his congratulations, she says: “Jon and I don’t speak.”


News article:

Ever since the surprise season 3 premiere of Rick and Morty, fans have been jonesing for special edition Szechuan dipping sauce released by McDonald’s in 1998 to promote Disney’s Mulan. (If you have no idea what I’m talking about, start here.)

 Some fans tried making their own version of the sauce, while others made ovations to McDonald’s to re-release it. And at least one person with a bunch of money and very little patience apparently dropped $14,700 on a 20-year-old tub of original Mulan sauce on Ebay.

 The seller wrote, “I just bought a really old car, while cleaning it I found a packet of this sauce. After watching the recent episode of Rick and Morty I went online to see if it was worth anything. Turns out it was.”

 The buyer topped 186 other bids for the sauce, giving the seller enough cash to ditch that lucky 20-year-old clunker and upgrade to something new or close to it. The seller’s only request was “I hope somebody who wants to eat some 20 year old gnarly sauce gets this. I would prefer not to sell it to a collector.”

 Buddy, for that price it should be kept in a bank vault.

 We think it’s only fair to point out that while it’s a cool stroke of luck for the seller, buying a packet of McNugget sauce for $14,700 is not a very Rick thing to do. Don’t get me wrong, Rick wants the sauce. But it’s more his style to win it in an intergalactic singing competition or gambling with some creepy-looking aliens. At the very least he’d use Jerry’s credit card.

 He’d also definitely eat the sauce. So how about it, new owner of rare McDonald’s Mulan dipping sauce. Are you squanchy enough to be a Rick? Or are you gonna be a loser like Jerry. (P.S. Don’t sue us if you actually eat decades-old expired fast food.)

 H/T Time ||||| Soda gets its own bedroom in Brian Florence's house in Glens Falls, New York. And there might be a few extra cases stacked in his office. All right, and a couple more in the kitchen. But that's it, for now.

 Florence estimates he has around 400 12-packs of canned soft drinks in his home right now. (If you lined those up end to end, they'd span the length of a football field... plus an Olympic-size swimming pool.) Florence is the curator of Sodafinder.com, the website he built to catalogue and sell the sodas he collects by driving all over the country to hunt down unique regional varieties. During peak shipping season, between Thanksgiving and Christmas, his stock balloons to around 600 cases. His earnings from the retail site mostly fund his road trips. But he's recently begun making a small profit, though not nearly enough to quit his full-time job at an insurance company. "I don't want it to be work," he says. "I try to make it as fun as possible."

 Florence may be the king of a community of online buyers, sellers, consumers, and collectors of rare, hard-to-find, or discontinued food and beverage items, but he's not alone. There's a market for these products — usually, for snacks people remember from childhood.

 Dunkaroos, for example, enjoy a healthy demand on Amazon ever since they've been discontinued in the U.S. For vendors like Patrick Meynders of Alberta, Canada, where the '90s lunchbox treat of packaged cookies and frosting is still available in stores, Dunkaroos are one of his top sellers. From his (currently offline) storefront, Canadian Sweets Treats and Other Specialties, he can move upwards of 60 five-serving boxes in a given week to U.S. customers. In 2012, another soda seller, Josh Nichols of Fort Worth, Texas, had just begun selling Dr. Pepper on eBay when the soda company announced it would stop production of Dublin Dr. Pepper, a regional favorite made with real cane sugar. He joined the mad rush of buyers who hoarded cases to sell online. Customers bought bottles even after they expired, he said, just to have as collectors' items.

 Others, like Toledo, Ohio's Pam Lloyd-Camp, stake their business on the demand for vintage foods. Lloyd-Camp runs a robust eBay candy shop called junk-it-junction, the online outpost of her brick-and-mortar business, Boyd's Retro Candy Store, where she sells old-timey favorites like giant Jawbreakers, candy cigarettes, and Sugar Daddies. She even has a small supply of discontinued Clark's Teaberry Gum. In a 2008 Press Publications interview, Lloyd-Camp, a baby boomer, said that she opened a candy shop "to help our generation relive their childhood memories and to give their kids happy memories, too."

 Then there are the few casual opportunists like eBay user batwatcher, who says he had extra Diablo hot sauce from Taco Bell lying around his house when he heard it had been discontinued — and that there was a market for it online. "If someone wants it, they will buy it. If they don't," he says, "I will take it down and probably use it on my own tacos."

 Likely thanks to their sturdy shelf lives — and their role in fond childhood memories — sodas, candies, and other packaged snacks dominate this niche market. Some sellers and buyers are drawn to the hunt and the novelty of collecting rare products. Others are searching for flavors of their youth. All together, they make up a fan base with unique appreciation and reverence for shelf staples that otherwise don't get much respect in the grocery world. And when it comes to building a business on these products, vendors have their process down to a science.

 Florence remembers the first time he bought a Mr. Pibb in the late ‘90s from an Iowa rest-stop vending machine. "I was like, I don't know what that is, I've never heard of that," he says. He liked it, but it was more a novelty than a delicacy. Soon afterward, he began collecting cases of unfamiliar sodas during road trips from his home in upstate New York to Nebraska. He was never a fanatical soda drinker, but he couldn't resist the search for new things. "It was more like the scavenger hunt just to find them. It's the challenge."

 When Florence amassed more than he could drink or give away, he took to the web, and launched his website Sodafinder.com in 2002. He's since dabbled in selling on eBay, but never got many bids, and he won't consider selling on Amazon Marketplace, which charges 99 cents per item sold or a $39.99 monthly subscription fee.

 Today, Sodafinder lists over 150 varieties of hard-to-find soft drinks, including 10 discontinued flavors that come with a warning label: "This item is out of date. Drink at your own risk!" His best sellers include Wink, a refreshing grapefruit-based citrus soda popular in the ‘60s that has since been relegated to a few regional bottlers in the Southeast U.S. (Florence gets his supply near Charlotte, North Carolina); Buffalo Rock Ginger Ale, which Florence describes as "the spiciest you'll ever have in your life," produced by one independent bottling company in Birmingham, Alabama; Tom Tucker Mint Ginger Ale from Pennsylvania; as well as the simple but deliciously scarce Coca-Cola made with real sugar. The kind Florence buys and sells is made with sucrose, which some consider a step below the cane sugar formula used in Mexican Coke (which Florence also sells by the single glass bottle), but it's a major improvement over high-fructose corn syrup. "Corn syrup is a syrup — you can tell on your tongue," Florence says. Sugar tastes more natural.

 Discontinued flavors are sold with a warning label reading "This item is out-of-date. Drink at your own risk!"

 The majority of Florence's customers want sodas to consume, not collect, but that doesn't make their motivations any less nostalgic. "It's not just soda," Florence says. "The taste ties into all your senses and brings back memories." He sees evidence of this in customer reviews. "My mother was a fan of Wink soda growing up, so I bought her two two-liters of Wink for Mother's Day," wrote one shopper. "She was super happy and she said it tasted just as she remembered!"

 Meynders, the Amazon Dunkaroos salesman, started his storefront with the assumption that people would pay to relive childhood memories. The son of an Indonesian mother and a Dutch father, he often drives an hour-and-a-half to a European deli in order to buy ingredients, like Conimex Ketjap, to recreate the dishes of his youth. According to Meynders, he soon realized that "I can't be the only one that is looking for things of my past," and opened his storefront in 2015. Indeed, customers who buy Dunkaroos from him leave reviews like, "Same great taste & brings back childhood memories for my grown kids."

 People feel nostalgia when "we reflect on on a time that we think was — and probably was — somewhat simpler, calmer, and pleasant," says Darrel D. Muehling, chair of the Washington State University Carson College of Business' department of marketing and international business, who has researched the use of nostalgia in advertising. "If we can capture a piece of that past by buying a product or reflecting on something, that tends to generate a positive feeling."

 Muehling points out that we often see the past through rose-tinted glasses, remembering only the good parts. He says generating that childhood yearning for products is a balancing act for advertisers, who need to be careful not to over-promise an experience from years gone by. "There's this twist on nostalgia, that you really can never return to your past," he says. "You can consume a product, but you can't consume a product as a seven-year-old." What tasted good to your elementary-school palate might not be as delicious several decades later; this can lead to disillusioned shoppers, like the one who a review for Meynder saying the cookies-and-icing "tastes nothing like American Dunkaroos used to, so beware if you are ordering on the basis of nostalgia."

 Still, people seem determined to try to recapture those moments, and sometimes, it's a challenge for vendors to keep up. At least once a week, Meynders drives across the border three hours to a post office in Sweet Grass, Montana to get a better price on shipping his products to U.S. customers. Still, he says selling scarce foods on Amazon is his passion project — he hides the store's landing page whenever he's out of town or unable to ship product. Florence maintains his stock with three road trips a year — two shorter jaunts during three- or four-day weekends, and one week-long journey. He rents to save his own car from the wear and tear, and so he can get a van with a solid rear axle that keeps the tires from buckling inward under the soda weight.

 Florence has learned where to get his supply by trial and error, putting in the miles. On his most recent trip, he traveled a 4,000-mile route through State College and Pittsburgh to Cleveland, Chicago, then the Quad Cities, Des Moines, Omaha, and down through Springfield and Columbus on the way home. Of the approximately 175 12-packs and 85 two-liter bottles of soda he unloaded when he returned, the trophy of the trip was Nehi Grape soda, which Florence was surprised to find at an independent bottler in Evansville, Indiana. Sometimes he gets tips from his fans on the Soda Finder Facebook page, but for the most part, he just shows up at grocery stores, Walmarts, convenience stores, and bottling companies along his routes. His trips are also how he monitors the ebb and flow of products on the market. He thinks Pepsi is phasing out Sierra Mist, for example, but he hasn't read that anywhere. He's just been seeing less of it.

 Florence sold his last case of dnL, a lemony, caffeinated drink by the makers of 7 Up, for $140.

 Getting the product is one thing — the dance between legally purchasing items then pricing them for a profit is another art altogether. Nichols, the Dublin Dr. Pepper eBay vendor, says he forged a direct relationship with the soda company. Today, he special-orders fresh cases of Dr. Pepper made with pure cane sugar, just not bottled in Dublin anymore. He says he has never changed his price of $29.99 for a six-pack of eight-ounce glass bottles. People are willing to pay for it. "A lot of people buy them to put in vending machines from the ‘50s and that's the only thing that fits," he says.

 Florence has his own system. He assumes the big soda companies know he's around — he's seen coca-cola.com and pepsi.com on his site's IP log — but they've never given him trouble, he says, because he buys the drinks as a customer and pays sales tax; he never tries to buy wholesale. To set his prices, Florence used to add up the cost of soda, gas, car rental, and food and divide it by the number of items he'd purchased. Now he does a little better than breaking even because he adjusts according to demand. He sells most soft drinks for $15 to $25 for a case of 12 cans. He has regulars who order from him every few months, usually basic flavors or regular, real-sugar, and diet sodas. One customer buys Nehi Grape with real sugar three times a year. Other buyers are willing to pay big bucks for discontinued sodas. Florence sold his last case of dnL, a lemony, caffeinated drink by the makers of 7up, for $140. His priciest listings ever were twin 12-packs of discontinued Pepsi Blue and the original Mr. Pibb, after Pibb Xtra replaced it, for $600 each. "I never sold them, but it would always get me attention," he says. He did succeed, though, in eventually off-loading individual cans of Pepsi Blue as collectors' items for $25 each.

 The next soda-hunting trip on Florence's schedule is a Southern run, maybe around the Fourth of July. He'll swing through Philadelphia for flavored Canada Dry, pick up Sunkist Fruit Punch in DC, Northern Neck ginger ale in Virginia, and Wink in the Carolinas. Maybe he'll make a stop at the Buffalo Rock bottler in Alabama for that spicy ginger ale, and with luck he'll pick up some Pibb Xtra and unique flavors of Fanta like peach and pineapple while he's down there.

 Florence is transparent about where he buys most of his products. His customers pay for the convenience of having a scarce soda shipped to their doors, not because he has secret hookups or hidden sources. Except one. Before he got married, he says, he had all the fridge space he could want for his personal soft drink supply. Now, he chills a single 12-pack of his favorite: Coke with real sugar. And he won't say where he buys it. That's his sweet secret.

 Andrea Marks is a freelance writer based in New York City.

 Editor: Erin DeJesus ||||| These crawls are part of an effort to archive pages as they are created and archive the pages that they refer to. That way, as the pages that are referenced are changed or taken from the web, a link to the version that was live when the page was written will be preserved.Then the Internet Archive hopes that references to these archived pages will be put in place of a link that would be otherwise be broken, or a companion link to allow people to see what was originally intended by a page's authors.The goal is to fix all broken links on the web . Crawls of supported "No More 404" sites. ||||| Someone on eBay placed a bid worth $14,700 for a pair of 19-year-old McDonald’s McNugget sauces that the seller recently found in “an old car.” One of these condiments, the “Szechuan teriyaki dipping sauce,” was released as a tie-in for the Disney movie Mulan, but it hasn’t been available since the film came out in 1998. People shell out big bucks for nostalgic food products on eBay all the time, but this is an unusually high price tag. Its popularity can only be explained by a viral stunt that the creators of Adult Swim animated comedy Rick and Morty launched a few weeks back.

 Please God, I don't ask for much, please let us gain enough cultural influence to force McDonald's into bringing back that fucking sauce. — Rick (((and Morty))) (@RickandMorty) April 2, 2017

 To coincide with the debut of their April Fools’ Day episode, which had a plot line about the Mulan sauce, the Rick and Morty team started a Change.org campaign asking McDonald’s to bring back the dip. As of press time, this campaign has received over 20,000 signatures. The team even had some success engaging with McDonald’s on social media:

 Rick and Morty fans also flooded the comments of the YouTube video of the commercial for the sauce with references to the show:

 Although McDonald’s has not announced any official plans to bring the sauce back, a spokesperson recently remarked: “We never say never, because when our customers speak, we listen.”

 Until the chain’s head honchos decide to put the sauce back into commission, fans can continue to troll eBay, hoping and praying that someone else in the world discovers a lost packet of “Szechuan dip.” Currently, one eBay seller is offering another packet of the sauce for the comparatively low buy-it-now price of $1,000:

 • Man makes more than £11,500 after selling rare vintage Asian-style dipping sauces from McDonald's [Mirror]

 • Get Mcdonalds to bring back the Szechuan Mcnugget Dipping Sauce for the new Mulan movie [Chang.org]

 • The Secret World of Selling ‘Nostalgic’ Food [Eater] |||||
What is a shorter version of the above article?

– This is either a big fan of the cartoon Rick and Morty, a hopeful collector, or a very brave and nostalgic soul: A packet of 1998 McDonald's Szechuan sauce has sold for $14,700 on eBay, reports Time. The strange background: McDonald's put out the dipping sauce in that year as a publicity tie-in for the Disney movie Mulan, and it received a giant nostalgic push when the character Rick from the popular Adult Swim show pined for it in a recent episode. That led to a viral campaign for McDonald's to bring it back, complete with multiple Change.org petitions. The company has hinted it might do so, and hopeful fans have noted that a remake of Mulan is in the works for next year. But the eBay sale is the strangest component yet. "I just bought a really old car, while cleaning it I found a packet of this sauce," the listing stated. "After watching the recent episode of Rick and Morty I went online to see if it was worth anything. Turns out it was. Also this comes with a packet of wasabi as well." A post at Eater notes that what it calls "nostalgic food" is popular on eBay, "but this is an unusually high price tag." No word yet on the identity of the buyer, or plans for the sauce, but the Daily Dot is issuing a challenge: The character Rick would definitely eat the stuff, "so how about it, new owner of rare McDonald’s Mulan dipping sauce. Are you squanchy enough to be a Rick?" (A brother recently drove his sister to McDonald's, which is notable only because they have a combined age of 11.)


Article:
The small town of Kuşköy, which is tucked into an isolated valley on the rainy, mountainous Black Sea coast of Turkey, looks much like the other villages in the region. Houses balance on steep hillsides beside tea fields and hazelnut orchards. A narrow white minaret and a small domed mosque stand beside a noisy creek. Kuşköy is remarkable not for how it looks but for how it sounds: here, the roar of the water and the daily calls to prayer are often accompanied by loud, lilting whistles—the distinctive tones of the local language. Over the past half-century, linguists and reporters curious about what locals call ku__ş dili, or “bird language,” have occasionally struggled up the footpaths and dirt roads that lead to Kuşköy. So its thousand or so residents were not all that surprised when, a few years ago, a Turkish-born German biopsychologist named Onur Güntürkün showed up and asked them to participate in a study.

 Photograph courtesy Onur Güntürkün

 Whistled languages, although unusual, have been around for centuries. Herodotus described communities in Ethiopia whose residents “spoke like bats,” and reports of the whistled language that is still used in the Canary Islands date back more than six hundred years. Most of the forty-two examples that have been documented in recent times arose in places with steep terrain or dense forests—the Atlas Mountains, in northwestern Africa; the highlands of northern Laos, the Brazilian Amazon—where it might otherwise be hard to communicate at a distance. All are based on spoken languages: Kuşköy’s version, for example, adapts standard Turkish syllables into piercing tones that can be heard from more than half a mile away. The phrase “Do you have fresh bread?,” which in Turkish is “Taze ekmek var mı?,” becomes, in bird language, six separate whistles made with the tongue, teeth, and fingers.

 For Güntürkün, whistled Turkish was not only a fascinating cultural oddity but also an exciting natural experiment. How, he wondered, does the brain handle a language that renders words as something like music? Although neuroscientists have long understood that brain functions do not divide cleanly between the left and right hemispheres, the left hemisphere appears to play a consistently dominant role in our understanding of language—regardless of whether the language is tonal or atonal, spoken or written, signed with the hands or clicked with the tongue. The right hemisphere, meanwhile, seems to govern our understanding of pitch, melody, and rhythm. In Kuşköy, Güntürkün tested this cranial division of labor by recruiting thirty-one volunteers, all fluent in both spoken and whistled Turkish, to listen to pairs of different syllables played simultaneously through headphones, one in each ear. When he gave them spoken Turkish, the participants usually understood the syllable played through the right speaker, suggesting that the left hemisphere was processing the sound. When he switched to whistled Turkish, however, the participants understood both syllables in roughly equal measure, suggesting that both hemispheres played significant roles in the early stages of comprehension.

 Although the technique that Güntürkün used, called dichotic listening, isn’t as precise as laboratory techniques for measuring brain activity, his results, published in today’s issue of Current Biology, are tantalizing. “They tell us that the organization of our brain, in terms of its asymmetrical structure, is not as fixed as we assume,” he told me. “The way information is given to us appears to change the architecture of our brain in a radical way.” He now wonders whether people whose spoken-language comprehension is damaged by a left-hemisphere stroke could learn to understand a whistled dialect, much as some people with stroke-damaged speech can communicate by singing.

 The opportunity to study whistled Turkish, however, is fading. In 1964, a stringer for the Times reported that children in Kuşköy were learning to communicate by whistling before they started school, and that both men and women regularly gossiped, argued, and even courted via whistle. Three years later, a team of visiting linguists observed that whistling was widely used in both the village and the surrounding countryside. But Güntürkün found that few, if any, young women had learned the language, and that, although some young men were fluent whistlers, they had learned the skill as teen-agers, more out of pride than any practical need. In recent years, the town has organized a whistling contest to encourage both tourism and cultural preservation, but the bird language is rapidly disappearing from daily life. In a small town filled with nosy neighbors, texting affords a level of privacy that whistling never did.

 From time to time, though, whistled Turkish still comes in handy. When the residents of Kuşköy call Güntürkün’s university office, they often reach his secretary, who speaks German. When that happens, he says, they know exactly how to make themselves understood: they just whistle. ||||| JavaScript is disabled

 You need to enable JavaScript to use SoundCloud |||||Summary:

– The rapidly disappearing "bird language" that is spoken—or whistled, actually—by about 10,000 residents in the mountains of Turkey is changing the way scientists think about language and the brain. The left hemisphere has always been dominant when interpreting language, be it spoken, written, signed, or even clicked, explains New Scientist. But that changed when German researcher Onur Güntürkün decided to study the whistled version of Turkish. Güntürkün wanted to see if its musicality might require the brain's right hemisphere, which handles frequency, pitch, and melody. His study of 31 whistled Turkish speakers showed the left hemisphere was 75% dominant with spoken Turkish, but the split between hemispheres was even with the whistled language. "We’ve shown for the first time equal contributions from both hemispheres," says Güntürkün, whose study was published in Current Biology. He tells the New Yorker that this suggests our brain structure "is not as fixed as we assume" and that the way information is delivered changes it. The language developed because whistles carry further than spoken words, and its messages can be understood across mountains and valleys. (The New Yorker offers an example of a whistle that means, "Do you have fresh bread?") It's lucky Güntürkün got his study in when he did, as modern technology is killing off whistled Turkish. "You can gossip with a mobile phone, but you can't do that with whistling because the whole valley hears," he says. (But, how does any of this explain how one man could lose most of his brain and not even notice?)


Write a summary based on this article:

EXCLUSIVE

 Rodney King sounded upbeat and excited about an upcoming celebrity boxing match, this according to a friend who spoke to him just hours before his death.

 Damon Feldman -- who worked with King on the boxing circuit and has known him for several years -- tells TMZ he spoke to King at 4:00 PM and they discussed his future in boxing.

 Feldman says Rodney was excited about his next boxing match -- a fight with Jose Canseco -- that was to take place in August. A press conference had been scheduled for June 29 to announce the battle.

 Feldman tells TMZ that Rodney was thrilled to be working again and looking forward to getting back in the ring.

 King died early this morning at his home in Rialto, CA. He was 47.

  ||||| Rodney King Drinking, Smoking Weed Before Drowning

 Rodney King Dead -- Drinking, Smoking Weed Before Drowning

 EXCLUSIVE

 's fiancée is telling friends Rodney had been drinking all day Saturday ... and had smoked weed in the hours leading up to his death ... sources close to King tell TMZ.According to our sources, King's fiancée,, is telling friends King was at the house all day drinking, and he smoked marijuana at some point, before she went to bed at 2:00 AM.We're told Kelley says she next saw King at around 5:00 AM when she was awoken by him screaming in the backyard. Our sources say Kelley found King naked, banging on the glass, and she called out to him, "What's wrong, Rodney?"Kelley is telling friends she then went to grab her phone when she heard a big splash. She then went to the backyard and discovered him in the bottom of the pool and called police.Paramedics attempted to revive King, but were unsuccessful. |||||

– Rodney King drank all day yesterday and smoked marijuana for hours before dying at the bottom of his swimming pool early this morning, TMZ reports. Sources close to King say his fiancée, Cynthia Kelley, tells them she went to bed at 2 a.m. and was awakened at 5 a.m. by his screams in the backyard of his Rialto, Calif., home. She saw him naked, banging to get in, and she asked, "What's wrong, Rodney?" When she went for her phone, she heard a splash. So she ran outside and, seeing him at the bottom of the pool, called police. But paramedics couldn't revive him when they showed up. In another story, TMZ reports that King was in good spirits about fighting Jose Canseco in a celebrity boxing match in August. King's friend Damon Feldman says King was excited to be working again and looking forward to the fight. (See his pool and videos from his past at TMZ.)


Write an article based on this summary:

– Royal-watchers are ravenous for news about the forthcoming progeny of Prince William and wife Kate, so E! and other sites take a look at what life will be like for the soon-to-be third in line to the British throne: He or she will be welcomed with tolling bells, cannons, and bonfires. Yes, really. His or her last name will be the same as William's. Which is Mountbatten-Windsor, for those not in the know. If she's a girl, her name will probably include "Diana." But it most likely won't be her first name, just one of many, the Atlantic Wire points out. Europe's largest betting firm is already taking bets, reports People. Kate will probably breastfeed the little one. That might seem obvious, but up until Princess Diana, British royals typically used wet nurses. There may (or may not) be a nanny. But just one, and any royal siblings may share. (A far cry from the two to four nannies per child some American celebrities use.) However, sources tell the Daily Beast that Kate plans to be a full-time mom and doesn't want a nanny, an idea that initially shocked Prince Charles. She may, however, have a maternity nurse for the first few weeks. Speaking of royal siblings, Kate may be having twins. Medical experts say hyperemesis gravidarum, the severe form of morning sickness that caused Kate to be hospitalized, is linked to having twins, Radar reports. Kate wants her child to lead as "normal" a life as possible. Even so, that "normal" life will likely include a $2 million wardrobe in the first year alone, according to an expert who has dressed royals in other countries. But another expert notes that those clothes will probably be "sensible," and that royal babies are typically brought up with "few parties, not too many toys, and very dull meals."

The seed for this crawl was a list of every host in the Wayback Machine

 This crawl was run at a level 1 (URLs including their embeds, plus the URLs of all outbound links including their embeds)

 The WARC files associated with this crawl are not currently available to the general public. ||||| By Radar Staff

 With the world buzzing about Kate Middleton‘s pregnancy, medical experts say the fact that she is experiencing hyperemesis gravidarum, or severe nausea, could very well signal that the Duchess of Cambridge is expecting twins.

 With Prince William at her side, Kate remains in a London hospital with the rare condition that impacts 2 percent of pregnant women, ABC News reported, leading to weight loss and dehydration.

 PHOTOS: The 11 Most Adorable Celebrity Babies Of The Year

 Medical experts told the network the condition is linked with women having twins.

 Dr. Ashley Roman, of the at New York University Langone Medical Center, said that a study of the condition revealed women who are carrying twins held a 7.5 percent higher risk of experiencing hyperemesis gravidarum. In some cases with the condition, a female child was more likely, the network reported.

 Roman said that the condition shouldn’t impact the baby’s health. She told the network that Kate’s symptoms — nausea and vomiting — are “traditionally thought [of as] a sign of a healthy pregnancy.”

 PHOTOS: Duchess Of Cambridge Visits A Mosque

 Most of the cases conclude 16 or 20 weeks into the pregnancy, Roman said, adding that in scarce cases, it can last the entire nine months.

 Ohio OB/GYN Dr. Nancy Cossler told ABC News Kate will likely have to endure “constantly feeling sick and puking” as she gets the illness out of her system.

 “The biggest problem with this is how it interferes with your life,” Cossler said.

 PHOTOS: Royal Bombshell! Kate Middleton’s Sexiest Looks Ever

 Elsewhere, gamblers were wagering early and often as to what the royal heir’s name would be, with the same batch of names at the top of the favorites board.

 At the English casino Ladbrokes, Elizabeth was the 8/1 favorite, with Frances at 10/1 and Diana at 12/1 odds if the child is female; if male, the casino had John or Charles at 10/1, James at 12/1, Philip or George 14/1, Edward at 16/1 and Andrew at 20/1.

 PHOTOS: Kate Middleton Makes Vanity Fair’s International Best-Dressed List

 Ladbrokes’ Jessica Bridge explained why Elizabeth was the favorite of all prospective names.

 “Kate and Wills pulled the wool over our eyes, but now attention turns to the name of the baby and it looks like the couple will stick with a traditional name,” Bridge said. “If they’re expecting a girl, who better to name her after than Her Majesty?”

 The casino William Hill had Frances — the name of William’s grandmother on his mother’s side — and John as 9-1 favorites, with Charles, George and Victoria, all paying out at 10-1. As for gender, Hill has odds of 10/11 for either male or female.

 For those who like to play the longshots, Paddy Power, a Dublin casino, had Camilla, as in Camilla Parker Bowles, at 66-1 and or Fergie, as in Sarah Ferguson, at 250-1.

 RELATED STORIES:

 A Royal Baby? Kate Middleton’s Close Pal Says Announcement Will Be Made Next Month

 Kate’s Topless Photographer Identified! Name Of Pap Who Snapped Middleton Given To Authorities

 Prince Harry’s ‘Drunken Fumble’ Girl Is Negotiating An Exclusive TV Interview

 Pippa Middleton Dating Rich Brother Of British Reality Star ||||| We're still a long way from the actual birth of the new heir to England's throne, but if Kate and Will's just announced offspring is a girl and a future queen, it looks like "Diana" could be part of her name — just not the first part. Yes, of course there's that whole sex-of-the-baby thing, but let's say that the royal fetus is indeed a girl. Here's why Diana, at least according to the royal tabloid reporters and British tradition, might show up on that birth certificate... toward the middle:

 Royals Have Like Three or Four Names Each: Prince William's full name is William Arthur Philip Louis. It's assumed that the royal baby will continue in this tradition, using names of her relatives — and lots of them.

 Remember the Ring: William isn't afraid of honoring his mother, and we all noticed that when he picked out Kate's engagement ring — an 18-carat sapphire that Diana picked in 1981. And even in 1981, Diana was scolded for picking out a commoner's ring and not having one that was custom-made.

 He's Sort of Set on "Diana" Already: "If it’s a girl her middle names will be Elizabeth after Wills’ grandmother and Diana after his mother," a source told Now Magazine back in June in the wake of the Diamond Jubilee.

 But It Won't Be Her First Name: "If it's a girl it's not likely to be called Diana," royal expert Rob Lacey told ABC News. "You might very likely get Elizabeth Diana something. It shows the bravery with which he's kept his mother's memory alive," Lacey said.

 Also, as Slate points out, "Queen" pretty much becomes the name anyway. Of course this could all be moot if the fetus turns out to be a boy — William would be seriously breaking with tradition in honoring his mother with a female first name as any part of a future king's name, no matter how long it is.

 Want to add to this story? Let us know in comments or send an email to the author at aabadsantos at theatlantic dot com. You can share ideas for stories on the Open Wire.

 Alexander Abad-Santos |||||


News article:

Director Robert Zemeckis gives good plane crash. He did it well in the early frames of Castaway, and the one here is even better. A short commercial flight, in heavy rain, from Orlando to Atlanta. Sudden mechanical breakdown, the uncontrolled dive, one engine fails, a calculated roll to stall the plunge, second engine fails, the eerie silence of a plane shorn of power, then the deadly quiet glide to a patch of open field. Crash. However, of the 102 souls on board, only 6 died, and the reason is clear. Skilled, decisive, with ice-water in his veins, the pilot was indisputably heroic. But this too is indisputable. Those same veins contained high levels of alcohol and traces of cocaine: The hero was also legally intoxicated.

 Screen grab from online trailer for "Flight" Movies Flight: The official trailer

 But we already knew that, since the opening scene, just as good, coolly reveals “Whip” Whitaker’s morning ritual. Wake up groggily light a cigarette, drain the dregs from last night’s beerfest, snort a revivifying line, shower and don the uniform and aviator glasses and report for duty. Since the addled fly boy in question is Denzel Washington, looking rather pot-bellied and doughy for the occasion, this first sequence plus the subsequent crash have us riveted and hoping for more of the same, for an uninterrupted journey towards a great movie. Alas, this isn’t a direct Flight.

 Instead, there’s an extended stopover when the script, tearing off on various tangents begins to resemble a room-full of errant luggage. Some of the tangents are interesting – like the gathering of officialdom in the aftermath of the tragedy. Reps from the National Transportation Safety Board, from the pilots’ union and from the airline company convene to pursue both their separate and common interests. All seem keen to mitigate the legal liability, thereby placing some of the blame on God and the rest on that real mechanical failure. As for Whip’s really damning toxicology report, the union’s lawyer (Don Cheadle) sets out to “kill” it on a technicality. Unfortunately, when he succeeds, the picture goes into its own tailspin.

 That’s because the focus shifts from an intriguing aeronautical drama to a bland psychodrama, as boozy Whip refuses to admit he’s an alcoholic – albeit a remarkably functioning alcoholic, which raises another problem. Torn between lionizing and villainizing its star attraction, the screenplay keeps emphasizing Washington’s in-flight heroics, and thereby blunders into a case of truly impaired judgment: the tacit yet blaring assumption that, buoyed by an emergency’s adrenalin, a great pilot sober is still a great pilot drunk. Now that’s a sobering thought indeed, which, the next time I’m sandwiched into an aisle seat staring past the drinks cart at the locked cockpit, I dearly hope to have forgotten.

 Anyway, from there, the baggage marked Days of Wine and Poses gets unpacked, leaving Washington to strike whatever pose is demanded by the story’s increasingly convoluted twists. He’s a good fella, he’s a bad fella, pulled off the wagon by his old friend Harling the flamboyant enabler (John Goodman chewing the scenery), then urged back on by his new friend Nicole the reformed junkie (Kelly Reilly swallowing a Georgian accent). So, oscillating to and fro, Whip stumbles towards the climax of the big NTSB hearing, where the suspense is meant to build around this puzzler: Will our flawed hero be falsely exonerated or truly redeemed?

 In the hands of a less sentimental director than Zemeckis, that might be a compelling quandary; but here, for us no less than Whip, it feels like being stuck between a rock and a soft place. That makes his choice easy and our verdict easier. This movie is captivating until it gets uplifting – Flight soars when it crashes and crashes when it soars. ||||| First lesson learned from Flight: Never take Denzel Washington for granted. After making his bones with Glory, Malcolm X and The Hurricane, and winning a Best Actor Oscar for 2001's Training Day, Washington settled into a groove of action films (Safe House, Unstoppable). With the exception of 2007's incisive American Gangster, they relied more on his star power than his acting skills. Flight reminds us of what Washington can do when a role hits him with a challenge that would floor a lesser actor. He's a ball of fire, and his detailed, depth-charged, bruisingly true performance will be talked about for years.

 Washington, 57, plays Capt. Whip Whitaker, a commercial pilot with a jones for hooch and blow, on the job as well as off. His marriage is a casualty, along with his relationship with his only son. Can Whip stay up all night doing drinks, drugs and sex with a hottie flight attendant (Nadine Velazquez) and still make his 9 a.m. flight to Atlanta? He can. Can he sneak vodka on board in an orange juice container and still fly in a blinding rainstorm? He can.

 But do you want him to? That's the big question that Washington, screenwriter John Gatins and director Robert Zemeckis keep working like a wound. After Zemeckis spent the past 12 years experimenting with performance-capture animation (Polar Express, yikes!), it's good to have him back in the live-action arena he deserted after Cast Away. Flight is Zemeckis at his most emotionally open and thematically provocative.

 It also comes on like gangbusters. In the white-knuckle opener, Zemeckis nails us to our seats as a hungover Whip dozes, much to the horror of God-fearing co-pilot Ken Evans (Brian Geraghty). The suspense tightens when the jet's hydraulics fail and Whip – roused from his stupor by a line of coke – must literally turn the plane upside down to make an emergency landing. The raw panic is palpable. But what astonishes is Whip's unflappable cool, born of a lifetime on the job and, just maybe, Dutch courage. The sequence is a marvel of technical wizardry. But Zemeckis never lets FX crush the story's human scale. Six lives were lost on this flight. But 96 more were saved because Whip was flying high.

 That is the ethical tightrope that Flight walks with keen intelligence. Whip is cheered as a hero, since 10 other pilots failed to duplicate his feat in simulations. Ironically, that fact enables him to drink more. He's invincible! Nicole (Kelly Reilly), a recovering junkie, shares his bed and tries to steer him toward rehab. But a shot at going cold turkey leads to the inevitable relapse.

 Whip is a pawn. The airline and the pilots union want a cover-up. A hotshot lawyer (Don Cheadle) is hired to spin reports of Whip's high-octane blood-alcohol level at the crash site. At a public hearing, the head prosecutor (a superb Melissa Leo, her honeyed voice a lethal weapon) is determined to make someone accountable for those six lives lost. How can Whip get through an interrogation, especially the morning after a killer bender? The same way he landed the jet, with a little help from his dealer friend Harling (John Goodman, vividly funny and scary as a force of Dr. Feelgood nature).

 At the hearing, Zemeckis has only to train his sights on Washington as he captures a soul in free fall. You might bitch that Flight levels off after its shocking, soaring start. But you'd be missing the point of an exceptional entertainment that Zemeckis shades into something quietly devastating – not an addiction drama, but the deeper spectacle of a man facing the truth about himself. God isn't Whip's co-pilot. His jet even clipped off the steeple of a church on its way down. Whip is a man alone. And all you need to know about him is mirrored in Washington's eyes. Zemeckis couldn't invent a digital effect to match an image that hypnotic, that haunting. ||||| Paramount Pictures Denzel Washington as Whip Whitaker in 'Flight.'

 Four years after Charles Lindbergh crossed the Atlantic and became a global hero, the humorist James Thurber published a New Yorker magazine piece, "The Greatest Man in the World," about a fictional pilot named Jack "Pal" Smurch. Mr. Thurber's aviator flew around the world nonstop in a rickety airplane he had built, then revealed himself to be a braggart, a fool and a generally despicable human being. The airline pilot played by Denzel Washington, Whip Whitaker, is far from despicable—he is, after all, played by Denzel Washington—but he's no Chesley Sullenberger, either. "Flight," which was directed by Robert Zemeckis, soars when Whip is at the controls, struggling to save a seemingly doomed airplane. When he's back on the ground and struggling with himself, the film takes a surprising turn into a drama of addiction and moral exploration. One unwelcome surprise is how shopworn the story's components prove to be. Still, they're enhanced if not redeemed by Mr. Washington's stirring portrait of a skillful, prideful pilot hitting bottom.

 White-knuckle fliers may want to pass on "Flight" altogether, though they'll be missing an early sequence that's right up there with the best of the incipient-disaster genre: Think "Airplane!" without the laughs. What's unclear is whether Whip, who shouldn't even be sitting in the cockpit, will be up to the challenge. What's abundantly clear from the outset of the midair crisis is that a cascade of malfunctions will make his airplane uncontrollable. (However wildly over the top the sequence may seem to be, it's only a heightening of what actually happened off the California coast in 2000 when a loose jackscrew jammed the horizontal stabilizer of an Alaska Airlines MD-83, sending the airplane into a dive from which the pilots tried, unsuccessfully, to recover by flying upside down.)

 Crisis has been a major food group for many of the characters Mr. Washington has played; he's such a quick-witted star, with his flashing smile and mercurial spirit, that he ingests danger gleefully and thrives on it. Not this time, though. It's a shock to see the shape he's in—overweight, unkempt, a star stripped of his charisma for a role that keeps him in a garishly unflattering light. And Whip's experience and demonstrable skill may not be enough to save him, even though he's first hailed as a hero. Too many secrets threaten to bring him down in the investigation that follows his fateful flight.

 Watch a clip from the Robert Zemeckis film "Flight." An airline pilot (Denzel Washington) saves a flight from crashing, but an investigation into the malfunctions reveals something troubling. Also starring Nadine Velazquez. (Photo & Video: Paramount)

 When movie stars choose roles that make them unattractive, they're often praised for their courage, even though doing so can amount to adventurous career management. I'd rather praise Mr. Washington for the eloquence, solemnity and disarming humor of his performance as a man whose body and soul are beset by the contending forces of probity and deceit, a good man whose addictions to drugs and booze have turned him into a shameless liar.

 That said, the script, by John Gatins, brings mixed blessings at best. Instead of hurtling to a climax, the story moves in fits and starts, loses momentum, injects itself with cockeyed comedy—John Goodman's Falstaffian drugmeister is the damnedest deus ex machina you've ever seen—lumbers through 12-step thickets and finally resolves into an old-fashioned morality play. Mr. Zemeckis's direction is similarly a mixture of thrilling action, incisive characterization, overblown set pieces—the federal crash investigation is staged like a full-scale congressional hearing—and shameless, though effective, melodrama. The cast includes Don Cheadle and Bruce Greenwood, both of whom give the movie's star valuable support, and Kelly Reilly, who, as another addict in Whip's life, turns tepid writing into passionate humanity.

 Watch a clip from the Disney animated film "Wreck-It Ralph." A video game villain (John C. Reilly) wants to be a hero, but his quest brings havoc to the whole arcade where he lives. Also with Jane Lynch & Sarah Silverman. (Photo & Video: Disney)

 'Wreck-It Ralph'

 Can it be that three decades have passed since video arcade games such as Pac-Man and Donkey Kong first unleashed their jumpy, choppy, charmingly blocky characters on a pop-eyed public? Disney's latest animated feature evokes nostalgia for that bygone era of barebones 8-bit technology and simple gameplay rules with a genially simple scheme. Just as Pixar's "Toy Story" trilogy revealed the secret life of toys, "Wreck-It Ralph" follows characters from a game called "Fix-It Felix, Jr.," a takeoff on Donkey Kong. On duty, they're exuberant primitives. Off duty, they're fully drawn creatures in a 3-D world. Ralph, voiced by John C. Reilly, is the game's bad guy, a sensitive hulk who wants desperately to win a medal as a good guy. To that end, he flees his console's confines, travels around the arcade electronically and patches himself, with chaotic consequences, into a succession of modern high-definition games. It's a lovely pretext for dazzling visuals, yet the production is diminished by the clumsiness of an 8-bit script.

 That's a major or a minor matter, depending on how addicted you may have been to those early games, many of whose characters make cameo appearances; whether the film will connect with today's young kids is a major matter soon to be resolved. The story begins promisingly, with Ralph in an envious funk. He has always been compelled to wreck things—the rules of his game are inviolable—while Felix (Jack McBrayer) has always gotten praise for fixing things with his magic hammer. A 12-step group for bad guys doesn't do much for Ralph's bruised psyche, so the first stop on his pilgrimage is, logically enough, a game called "Hero's Duty." There he impersonates a robot and meets Vanellope von Schweetz (Sarah Silverman), a shrill and glitchy character—she suffers from visual static—who has been evicted from her own game of "Sugar Rush."

 Enlarge Image Close Disney Wreck-It Ralph and Vanellope von Schweetz

 The film was directed by Rich Moore, in his feature debut, and written by Jennifer Lee and Phil Johnston. Its narrative core concerns the fraught friendship of Ralph and Vanellope, which in turn poses the question of whether a bad guy can really transform himself into a good guy. (Spoiler alert: Yes, he can.) But character gets trampled as the action goes turbo, Vanellope's voice grows ever more shrill and we find ourselves trapped, along with Ralph, in a Sugar Rush surround of oppressively pretty colors and numbingly repetitive races and chases. A further question posed by "Wreck-It Ralph" is whether brilliant animation alone can sustain a film that comes up short in dramatic development. (Spoiler alert: No, it can't.)

 Watch a clip from the film "This Must Be the Place." Cheyenne (Sean Penn), a retired rock star, returns to New York to find the man responsible for a humiliation suffered by his recently deceased father during WWII. (Photo & Video: Weinstein Co.)

 'This Must Be the Place'

 Sean Penn stars as Cheyenne, a burned-out American rock star living in Dublin and trapped in a second, passive childhood, plus full Goth regalia. At several points Cheyenne says "Something's not quite right here: I don't know exactly what it is, but something…." Before I get to what that something might be, let me touch on several relatively right things about this remarkably lifeless film, which Paolo Sorrentino directed from a script he wrote with Umberto Contarello.

 Mr. Penn's performance, depressed by the nature of his sad-clown character, is self-regarding in ways that are simultaneously dismaying and fascinating. The music, by David Byrne and Will Oldham, is exceptionally varied and characteristically rich. The cinematographer, Luca Bigazzi, finds one striking vista after another when Cheyenne leaves Dublin and criss-crosses the U.S.

 Enlarge Image Close The Weinstein Company Sean Penn and Frances McDormand

 What's wrong here, ludicrously and groanworthily wrong, is the reason for Cheyenne's criss-crossings. He is, it develops, on a hunt for the Nazi war criminal who did some unspecified something to his late father during the Holocaust. As juxtapositions go, regressed Goth rock star and Holocaust could hardly be more bizarre, and bizarre can be good when it's done deftly. In this case, however, it's done ponderously and sententiously. The movie's title is taken from the classic Talking Heads song, which is subtitled "Naive Melody." Cheyenne is a faux naif in a faux tone poem.

 DVD Focus

 'Unstoppable'

 'Unstoppable' (2010)

 Denzel Washington at his most irresistible, in an action thriller, by the late Tony Scott, that gives new meaning to the notion of a one-track mind. The premise is simple to the point of primal—a runaway freight train hurtling through Pennsylvania with a load of lethal chemicals and no one in the locomotive. On the same track, heading toward it, is another freight train pulled by a locomotive with the movie's co-stars at the controls: Mr. Washington is the veteran engineer, and Chris Pine is the rookie conductor. Rosario Dawson is Connie, a yardmaster who knows her stuff.

 Enlarge Image Close Picturehouse/Everett Collection Seth Gordon's documentary 'The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters' is about the quest for the world's highest score in Donkey Kong.

 'The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters' (2007)

 Seth Gordon's documentary sees the craziness of it all—the quest for the world's highest Donkey Kong score; the beeps and boops emanating from the big, retro boxes; the pervasiveness of pinnacle-and-fame disease that prompts outwardly sane people to seek enshrinement in the Guinness Book of World Records. Yet Mr. Gordon also understands the roiling passions that underlie the virtuosity, and he's got a great eye for spotting real-life heroes—or antiheroes, as the case may be. "The King of Kong" is blessed with one of each, so feed this DVD to your player and press Play.

 'Sweet and Lowdown'

 'Sweet and Lowdown' (1999)

 Sean Penn is Emmet Ray, a fictional 1930s jazz musician in Woody Allen's mock documentary, which uses real jazz critics as earnest commentators. Emmet is as lowdown as a man can get. Vain, selfish, fatuous and casually cruel, he is the personification of insensitivity; his idea of good clean fun is shooting rats in garbage dumps. Give him a guitar, though, and he's an angel, channeling the music of the spheres. The movie represents Woody in a minor mode, but it's marvelous all the same. Samantha Morton is the childlike Hattie, a mute waif with a clouded mind.

 — Email Joe at joe.morgenstern@wsj.com and follow him on Twitter: @JoeMorgenstern. |||||
What is a shorter version of the above article?

– The new release Flight, starring Denzel Washington as drug- and alcohol-addicted pilot, gets a solid 78% on Rotten Tomatoes. Most critics seem to think the acting and directing are superb, but at some point, the movie takes a bit of a nosedive: Flight starts out with a thrilling plane crash, and after that "takes a surprising turn into a drama of addiction and moral exploration," writes Joe Morgenstern at the Wall Street Journal. Unfortunately, the latter parts feel "shopworn"and "instead of hurtling to a climax, the story moves in fits and starts, loses momentum." Rick Groen at the Globe and Mail praises director Robert Zemeckis' ability to deliver a good crash scene, but thinks his sentimentality hurts the movie. "This movie is captivating until it gets uplifting—Flight soars when it crashes and crashes when it soars," he writes. Good music, strong supporting actors, and great special effects are Flight's strong suits, but the "downward addiction and denial spiral" is all too familiar, writes Tom Long for the Detroit News. "It's that movie, done well, but done again." Peter Travers, writing for Rolling Stone, disagrees. He says those complaining are "missing the point of an exceptional entertainment that Zemeckis shades into something quietly devastating—not an addiction drama, but the deeper spectacle of a man facing the truth about himself."