The Associated Press

• Sylvester Stallone may come across as the ultimate guy's guy. But he says action stars like him are "the hardest characters to sell" to other men. "Men are very competitive," Stallone said ahead of Monday's world premiere of The Expendables 3. "They go 'Who's that? I'm sure he takes diuretic steroids, you know, he's shorter than he looks.' ... It's very hard to do it. People think, 'Oh, it's really easy,'" said Stallone. "It's good to jump around, but to get other men to like you, it's very difficult. Men are kind of standoffish that way." The third installment of The Expendables sees the team come into conflict with a ruthless arms dealer, played by Mel Gibson. Harrison Ford and Wesley Snipes join the cast of action legends. And there's new blood, including Twilight heartthrob Kellan Lutz and mixed martial arts fighter Ronda Rousey. Needless to say, the extended team of Expendables battle it out to bring down the bad guys and save the world. The Expendables 3 is in U.K. cinemas from Aug. 14 and opens in the U.S. on Aug. 15.

• Steven Spielberg asked Lasse Hallstrom to work with him more than a dozen years ago, but the Swedish filmmaker only recently accepted the invitation. Hallstrom said he experienced "traumatic suffering" when he had to decline the chance to direct 2002's Catch Me If You Can, which Spielberg went on to direct himself. The trauma was finally resolved, Hallstrom said, when the two filmmakers joined forces on The Hundred-Foot Journey, which Hallstrom directed and Spielberg produced, along with Oprah Winfrey and Ted Talks curator Juliet Blake. "I've been admiring him for a very long time," Hallstrom said of Spielberg, giddily noting the two are about the same age. (Hallstrom is 68, Spielberg is 67.) "To work with him as a producer, that was heavenly," Hallstrom said during a recent interview to promote the film. "To have him in the editing room for a couple days giving his ideas on it, and to have his comments on the dailies, [was] really helpful. And good ideas for the script, too. ... So it was like we made it together, me and Steven Spielberg." The Hundred-Foot Journey stars Helen Mirren as the prickly, prideful owner of a Michelin-rated French restaurant who bristles when an Indian family opens their own eatery across the street. The film opens Friday.

A Section on 08/05/2014