Sean Penn, Kate Winslet, Penelope Cruz, the late Heath Ledger and movie sensation Slumdog Millionaire were the big winners at the 81st Academy Awards in Hollywood.

BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. (AP) — If Heath Ledger is named best supporting actor at Sunday's Academy Awards ceremony, his daughter, 3-year-old Matilda Rose Ledger, will become the owner of the Oscar statuette.

In 2008 the United States dealt with a recession, a new President elect, and the passing of many great celebrities. Let's take a moment to remember these noted actors, comedians and musicians...

Work by late director Anthony Minghella will be screened at the Shanghai Film Festival this summer. The British filmmaker, who the won Best Director Oscar for his 1996 movie The English Patient, died from complications following surgery for cancer of the tonsils and neck at London's Charing Cross Hospital on Tuesday. He was 54 years old.

Hollywood stars Gwyneth Paltrow, Kevin Spacey and Ralph Fiennes have paid moving tributes to Oscar-winning film director Anthony Minghella who died on Tuesday. The British filmmaker - who the won Best Director Oscar for his 1996 movie The English Patient - died from complications following surgery for cancer of the tonsils and neck, which he underwent last week at London's Charing Cross Hospital. He was 54-years-old.

Singer/actress Jill Scott is to become a regular on TV after show producers decided to turn her small screen movie The No.1 Ladies' Detective Agency into a series. The soul diva was asked to take on the role after starring as lead heroine Precious Ramotswe in the Anthony Minghella-directed TV film last year, which aired on the cable channel HBO.

Movie mogul Harvey Weinstein is set to wed his designer girlfriend Georgina Chapman in a star-studded ceremony on Saturday. He proposed to his lover of two years last month, with the pair's nuptials taking place in a secret location in Westport, Connecticut.

A sexy and steamy story about a disparate group of Londoners connected by a string of burglaries and a passionate affair, Breaking And Entering makes its DVD debut on May 8 from Genius Products LLC. and The Weinstein Company.

The Oscar-winning Best Foreign Film is to be remade as a Hollywood movie. German espionage drama The Lives Of Others will be revamped as an English-language film with moviemakers Sydney Pollack and Anthony Minghella coming together for the project.