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Séamas McSwiney has decades of experience in film journalism, and work published in some top international publications. As our guest film correspondent he will be sending us special reports from the Cannes 2014 film festival, starting with this preview.

It's that time of year again, where Glamour, Art and Business get together on the Riviera, in search of attention, glory and profit.

The press conference to announce the fifty or so films in the Official Selection of the Festival de Cannes, (Competition, Un Certain Regard, Out-of-Competition, Midnight screenings, etc) was a jovial event, it being the last over which Gilles Jacob would preside.

He and the General Delegate, Thierry Frémaux, were sat beside the official posters featuring a shot of Marcello Mastroianni from Fellini's 8½. He's the Cannes ‘poster boy' to counter the recent series of alluring actresses who have adorned recent years' posters, considered by some to be a tad sexist. Marcello is therefore this year's ‘male object' for the ogling eyes of all admirers.

If you want to grab your last chance to hit the slopes this season, now is the time to book your late season skiing holiday. So get your sunglasses and poles ready as we help you pick the best late season ski resorts!

Zermatt, Switzerland

The famous Swiss ski resort hosts Europe's highest lifts from the Klein Matterhorn, taking you up to 3899m where snow retains its high quality until late in the season. It is also one of the few truly year-round ski destinations in the world, as 70 per cent of the pistes are either situated on the glacier or have snow-making facilities. What is more, the iconic Matterhorn is probably an even more awe inspiring sight during spring than in winter.

Riksgransen, Sweden

If you are not heading high in search for snow, you definitely have to head north! Situated 250km inside the Arctic Circle, Riksgransen is one of the world's most northern ski resorts. It offers the best skiing conditions late in the season and the lifts don't stop running until the end of June. In fact, it is too dark to open until February but, from late May, the 24-hour daylight allows you to ski under the midnight sun into the small hours!

Last week, I read an article on a Slovak blogging website about involuntary organ donations in China. After reading it I have to conclude that what is going on in the world nowadays is worse even than the events of the WWII. Although, maybe we are just better informed...

The article outlines how they kill prisoners in order to use them as organ donors. It is not only those sentenced to the capital punishment or the victims of accidents. Often, people in labour camps disappear under mysterious circumstances.

A year ago, when I visited Oxford, I saw a Chinese exhibition about the Falun Gong. It is a movement associated with meditation and the philosophy of harmony and independence, and its growing popularity is a needle in the eye of the establishment. The members are being persecuted, tortured and executed, and their organs are offered for transplants. There was a painting of an organ harvesting ‘operation' (above)...pretty awful.

The latest data has revealed some very shocking numbers when it comes to young minds from UK shifting base to the land of opportunities that we all know as America. The top universities in the US have recorded a high number of in-take from United Kingdom. The dull job scenario and overall job crunch in the market seems to be the reason why bright minds from the UK have decided to try their luck in United States of America.

As per the data released by the elite universities in America, it was evident that the British students are flocking the American colleges in large numbers especially for the flexibility in courses related to Arts field. The students are known to seek admission in the liberal arts which encompasses a wide spectrum and also provides them the liberty to study range of subjects before they take specialization in the third year.

The most compelling reason to make a noticeable shift is the steep hike in the tuition fee in UK universities. At the same time, American universities are offering attractive scholarships to international students which have led to the surge in the British brain drain from their own country. Listed below are the top five courses that the students are seeking admission in.

With April Fools' fast approaching, pranksters will no doubt already be plotting and scheming for 1st April. In light of this, Gala Bingo have put together a list of some of their favourite pranks from recent years.

There have been many well-publicised hoaxes in recent memory, such as last years' ridiculous suggestion that a Central London theme park was being planned with a slide around the Gherkin. This absurd suggestion will surely have only fooled a small proportion of people, nevertheless it was a bold claim. Up North in Newcastle, there was confusion last year when it was reported that after a poll on the Sun Newspaper, the iconic Angel of the North monument was to be re-painted pink and renamed ‘Cheryl Cole of the North' after the Girls Aloud star who has Geordie origins.

Companies are often keen to gain publicity on the day, as demonstrated in 2010 by coffee giants Starbucks, who announced a new ‘giant' coffee size on their blog. Whilst this sparked widespread interest across coffee-lovers alike, it turned out to be a hoax and the company had no intention of producing the ‘Plenta' - a 3.8 litre option!