With the hit film Twilight, the transformation of vampires from terrifying, bloodsucking killers to sensitive, emotionally-intelligent, misunderstood souls, is complete. How was Bram Stoker's legacy so drastically betrayed?

Seventy-five years before the Spice Girls coined the term girl power, Betty Boop struck a blow for just such a cause. Ever since, cartoons and animations have challenged our traditional perceptions of femininity.

Ship's captain Peter Newton tells of how he lived to tell the tale of the time his container ship was captured by pirates in the South China Sea.

Although the next generation of container ships may be able to carry 8,000 containers, an industry expert says their higher expense may ultimately lead to smaller vessels.

Singer Dido talks to the BBC's Peter Bowes about new album Safe Trip Home.

Why children could suffer in the wake of fallout from the global credit crunch.

When making their new album, Snow Patrol went back to basics, took music lessons and set fire to their guitars.

A Canadian team is to search for two British ships lost in an 1845 expedition to find the Northwest Passage.

Global box office takings may be at a record high, but the movie industry is notoriously risky. There are incentives, but you could also lose all your money. So is now the right time to invest in film?

Rangers' shock Champions League qualifying defeat could leave them strapped for cash.

Evelyn Keyes, who played Scarlett O'Hara's younger sister Suellen in Gone With The Wind, dies aged 91.

Southport manager Gary Brabin is named as Jimmy Quinn's successor at Cambridge United

The BBC's Emma Jane Kirby visits some of France's finest kitchens to ask whether French cuisine really merits Unesco status.

Deckhands, chefs and shipshape stewards are in short supply as the super-yacht industry booms.

Rising land values and higher crop prices are attracting investors from all over Europe to the UK.

The man who converted one of football's most audacious spot-kicks reveals the secrets of the shoot-out

BBC Sport profiles the new man in charge of Manchester City

Parents will be told how much their children can safely drink as part of ministers' new alcohol strategy.

A lack of workers to pick strawberries in the UK may mean supermarkets run short of the summer fruit.

BBC News entertainment reporter Neil Smith reads Devil May Care, Sebastian Faulks' new James Bond novel.