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Puppy Love is a romantic comedy film directed by Nick Fabiano and Richard Alan Reid from a screenplay co-written by Greg Glienna, Peter Stass, and Kristen Guenther. The rom-com film stars Grant Gustin and Lucy Hale in the lead roles of Max and Nicole. Puppy Love follows the two after a horrible first date but Max’s dog gets pregnant by Nicole’s dog and this starts a cutesy and anxiety-filled love story. So, if you loved the romance, comedy, and charming characters in Puppy Love here are some similar movies you should check out next.

Rescued by Ruby (Netflix) Credit – Netflix

Rescued by Ruby is a biographical comedy-drama film directed by Katt Shea from a screenplay by Karen Janszen. Based on a true story, the 2022 film follows the story of State Trooper Daniel O’Neil who dreams of...

Exclusive: As true-crime continues its rise, CrimeCon, the leading live event for crime experts, professionals and fans, is bringing its content to those who can’t be in the room.

The event, which is taking place in Nashville from May 31 to June 2, has struck a deal with SiriusXM to air a raft of its sessions.

Some 16 of the event’s key sessions will be broadcast exclusively on SiriusXM’s Triumph channel on June 8 and 9.

Speakers at the event include CSI creator Anthony Zuiker, America’s Most Wanted’s John Walsh, Chris Hansen, Nancy Grace, Mark Geragos, Ben Crump, Sean “Sticks” Larkin, Paul Holes, John Douglas and Ann Burgess, who is the subject of Hulu docuseries Mastermind: To Think Like a Killer.

The events that will be broadcast include Til Death Do Us Part – The Epidemic of Love Gone Wrong, featuring Nancy Grace, Silent No More: Missing & Murdered Indigenous Women and Relatives,...

Verve has promoted Liz Parker to partner, the agency announced. Parker runs Verve’s intellectual property team and co-runs its motion picture literary team. She joined the agency in 2018, moving from New York to Los Angeles to build the its publishing division.

Parker previously worked as a literary agent at InkWell, and as the publishing director for Counterpoint and Soft Skull Press.

During her tenure, Parker has built up the IP division while opening up new avenues for material such as TikTok and Reddit, as well as expanded the publishing team to also encompass media rights and podcast/audio rights. Last year, the group published over 25 books, while selling or optioning double that number.

“Verve has always been committed to helping our clients tell their stories, and it’s that commitment that led to the hire of Liz Parker back in 2018, to give our clients new ways to do so,...

Click here to read the full article.

The Vow is returning with a six-episode second season, promising a rare view into Nxivm founder Keith Raniere’s innermost circle, including co-founder Nancy Salzman.

“My whole company was destroyed and my whole life fell apart,” says Salzman, Nxivm’s president and co-founder with Raniere, in the trailer (below), which also features Raniere speaking from prison. “Going into this, I thought Keith was innocent. I was wrong,” Salzman tells the filmmakers.

The Vow, Part Two begins at the start of Raniere’s trial, with the finale capturing the verdict. The follow-up, directed by Jehane Noujaim, debuts Oct. 17, with weekly episodes on HBO and HBO Max.

Much has happened in the two years since The Vow first exposed Nxivm to a mainstream audience.

Nxivm, a company that masqueraded as a self-help group but was actually running a secret sex cult, and its leader Raniere...

Exclusive: Verve has made several key promotions this week across the motion picture and television literary teams with Partners Felicia Prinz and Chris Noriega being upped to Co-Heads overseeing the Television Literary Team, Parker Davis and Liz Parker will assume the Co-Head mantle of the Motion Picture Literary Team, and Tyler Reynolds has been promoted to head the Television Director Team. Reynolds will report to Prinz and Noriega. In these newly created positions, Prinz, Noriega, Davis, Parker, and Reynolds will be responsible for the day-to-day management of their respective teams while working alongside the Partnership to streamline decision making, communication and to provide strategic support.

“As Verve continues to scale, we realize that empowering our valuable colleagues is the best way to maintain our unique work culture while providing the best creative representation in the business,” said the Partnership. “Felicia, Chris, Parker, Liz, and Tyler are highly respected by their colleagues,...

Nancy Salzman, the co-founder and former president of Nxivm, has been sentenced to 42 months in prison. Salzman, 66, who was close with cult leader Keith Raniere, pleaded guilty to racketeering charges in March 2019, and received her sentence in a Brooklyn courtroom on Wednesday.

In a sentencing memo, prosecutors has asked that Salzman be sentenced in the upper range of the recommended 33 to 41 months, and they got their wish: “The conduct underlying the defendant’s conviction warrants a substantial sentence,” wrote assistant U.S. Attorney Tanya Hajjar in a pre-sentencing court filing.

Salzman was featured, though not interviewed, in the phenomenon that was the HBO docuseries “The Vow” last year. The second season of the show — directed and executive produced by Jehane Noujaim and Karim Amer — is currently in production.

Sarah Edmondson — the Nxivm whistleblower who was one of the stars of “The Vow,” if such a charaterization can be made about...

Former high-ranking Nxivm member Lauren Salzman has avoided prison time for her role in the cult.

While Salzman could have ended up serving seven to nine years behind bars, she was sentenced on Wednesday to time served, five years of probation, and 300 hours of community service.

Salzman had previously spent a number of years in home confinement, after pleading guilty to racketeering and conspiracy charges in April of 2019.

Her mother, Nancy Salzman, co-founded Nxivm with Keith Raniere in 1998. While the younger Salzman was once a close confidante of Raniere’s, she would ultimately testify against him in his 2019 trial, proving key in securing his conviction. It appears that her cooperation (as the highest-ranking Nxivm member to take the stand) may have resulted in a lighter sentence.

“The defendant helped Keith Raniere implement some of the most twisted, manipulative and reprehensible schemes,” Judge Nicholas G. Garaufis said of Salzman on Wednesday,...

Lauren Salzman, 45, a former Nxivm collaborator of cult leader Keith Raniere, was sentenced on Wednesday to time served and five years of probation. Salzman, the daughter of Nxivm co-founder Nancy Salzman, had pleaded guilty in April 2019 to racketeering and conspiracy charges.

Salzman was featured in the HBO docuseries “The Vow” last year, which became a sensation. A second season of the show — directed and executive produced by Jehane Noujaim and Karim Amer — is currently in production.

Salzman is the fourth Nxivm member to be sentenced. In September, Clare Bronfman, was sentenced to 81 months; in October, Raniere himself was sentenced to 120 years in prison; and last month, former “Smallville” actor and top Nxivm recruiter Allison Mack was sentenced to three years. Nancy Salzman has also pleaded guilty, and according to the Albany Times-Union, her sentencing is set for next week.

At Raniere’s trial in spring 2019, Salzman testified against him for four days.

Keith Raneire, convicted sex-trafficker and leader of the Nxivm cult, has been ordered to pay $3.4 million to his victims.

The New York Times reported that 21 victims will receive portions of the money, part of which will go towards procedures allowing women to remove Raniere’s branded initials from their skin. These women were members of the sect within Nxivm called the Vow, or D.O.S., an acronym for a Latin phrase that means “lord/master of the obedient female companions.”

The women were physically restrained and branded by others in the Vow as they chanted, “Master, please brand me, it would be an honor.” Members of the group were also labeled as “slaves,” and were made to provide “collateral” material to “masters,” higher-ranking members of the cult. The “collateral” was used to force obedience when Vow members received instructions from higher-ranking members, which included engagement in various sexual acts.

Exclusive: Following the promotion of Roberto Larios to Agent just before the holidays last year, Verve has started the new year with the hire of Literary Agent Noah Ballard, expanding its Publishing team. The hire will also epxand its New York presence with Ballard being based in the agency’s New York offices.

Ballard, a University of Nebraska grad, began his career working for Emma Sweeney at her eponymous agency before moving over to Curtis Brown, where he has been an agent for the last six years. Named by Writer’s Digest as a “Top Literary Agent to Follow on Twitter”, Ballard’s clients include Cinelle Barnes (Monsoon Mansion), Julie Dicaro (Sidelined), Josh Gondelman (Nice Try) and Tochi Onyebuchi.

“As Verve enters its twelfth year, we are excited to continue our strategic approach to growing the agency and are thrilled to announce the hire of Literary...

True-crime TV has found its new obsession: The twisted saga of the Nvixm cult, with famous followers like Smallville alum Allison Mack and salacious accusations of sex slavery, has inspired not one but two long-form TV documentaries, along with a number of one-off investigative specials. HBO’s The Vow, which premiered in August, was billed as the definitive look at the cult’s inner workings, told by the members themselves. But is it even good? And does another TV documentary actually do a better job at bringing Nxivm’s shocking deeds to light? Let’s take a closer look, shall we?...

Sarah Edmondson is breathing a sigh of relief after learning the man responsible for so much of her life's turmoil will spend the rest of his days behind bars. On Tuesday, Oct. 27, alleged cult leader Keith Raniere was sentenced to 120 years in prison for his role in the Nxivm scandal. In an exclusive interview with E! News, Edmondson, a former member of Nxivm who helped bring Raniere and his co-conspirators to justice, "I'm feeling a mixture of relieved, vindicated and safe for the first time in a long time." Due to restrictions caused by the pandemic, Edmondson was unable to attend today's hearing and said she learned of Raniere's fate through a text. "I was...

On Monday afternoon, the day before Keith Raniere was set to be sentenced, Make Justice Blind, an assortment of ardent Nxivm devotees, gathered to hold a press conference in front of the Brooklyn federal courthouse in downtown Brooklyn. The group, including Battlestar Galactica‘s Nicki Clyne, set out to present what they referred to as “smoking gun” evidence that would supposedly justify a call for a delay in sentencing for Keith Raniere, the leader of the alleged sex cult Nxivm who has been incarcerated at the Metropolitan Correctional Center since his 2018 arrest.

“The Vow” finale hinted at several big interviews gearing up for the second installment on HBO. Any additional details on what we can expect for season two will have to wait until 2021 (when next set of episodes is scheduled to drop). Until then, here’s an update on all the major players in the docuseries that exposes the practices of the self improvement organization and cult known as Nxivm. What’s next for Nxivm founder Keith Raniere, Nancy Salzman and whistleblowers Mark Vicente, Bonnie Piesse and Sarah Edmondson?

Do not read if you haven’t watched the season one finale of “The Vow” — spoilers ahead.

What do we know about the future? In September, filmmakers Karim Amer and Jehane Noujaim revealed their plans to interview all parties involved in Nxivm to Variety “We reached out to everybody involved — many people, on all sides of the story — and we are continuing to film.

HBO’s buzzy Nxivm sex cult docuseries “The Vow” has been criticized for dragging at times over the course of its nine-episode run. But the closing moments of Sunday’s season finale left no doubt about where the storyline is headed in season two, which HBO formally ordered last week.

Warning, spoilers for the finale episode of “The Vow” ahead.

Here comes the counterspin from now-convicted felons Keith Raniere and Nancy Salzman, co-founders of the self-help programs at the heart of the whole of shocking story that led to federal human trafficking, sex abuse and racketeering charges. “The Fall,” episode 9 of “The Vow,” ends with hints that the pair will go on camera, or at least on the record, with “Vow” directors/executive producers Jehane Noujaim and Karim Amer.

The closing sequence features what appears to be a glimpse of Salzman under house arrest, complete with a shot of her...

Sex cult documentary series The Vow is coming back for a second season on HBO.

The premium cable network has renewed the series, from directors and exec producers Jehane Noujaim and Karim Amer, to continue to the story of the Nxivm cult. Season 2 will air in 2021.

It will be set against the backdrop of the federal trial of the United States against Keith Raniere and will offer a further view into Raniere’s innermost circle. It delves into the stories of Nxivm’s top leadership in the US and Mexico, and into powerful, intimate stories of Dos members. Season 2 follows the legal and emotional journeys of the group’s founders, supporters and defectors as new evidence and stunning revelations come to light while federal prosecutors and defense attorneys battle for opposing views of justice in a case caught in the national spotlight.

The series, which premiered in August, followed the members of “self-improvement” group Nxivm,...

With an organization as twisted as Nxivm, there are always more stories to tell.

Filmmakers Jehane Noujaim and Karim Amer will deliver a second installment of their docuseries “The Vow,” coming to HBO in 2021, the premium cabler announced Friday.

Back in September, Noujaim teased this possibility with Variety, saying, “We reached out to everybody involved — many people, on all sides of the story — and we are continuing to film.”

The new installment, being called “The Vow Part Two, will be set against the backdrop of Nxivm head Keith Raniere’s federal trial. Raniere started Nxivm as a multi-level marketing company, selling courses on self-improvement and self-empowerment. As the years went on, subgroups within the larger organization began to pop up, including Jness, a women’s only group, and Dos, a master-slave subgroup that came with sexual abuse and physical branding of its female members or “slaves.”

Raniere was convicted of...

Tracing exactly when HBO's The Vow was filmed can be a little confusing. The narrative isn't exactly linear, bobbing between clips of participants taking Esp courses and Mark Vicente and Bonnie Piesse voicing their suspicions about Nxivm. The latter segments can tell us a great deal about the project's timeline, however. The truth is, production for The Vow officially began in 2017 as a means of self-protection for Vicente and other Nxivm defectors, who did not initially set out to create a docuseries.

HBO bills The Vow as a "documentary series following a number of people deeply involved in the self-improvement group Nxivm over the course of several years." The show is directed by the Oscar-nominated couple Jehane Noujaim and Karim Amer. Noujaim has a link with Nxivm - she met Nxivm official Sara Bronfman in 2008 while attending a conference on Richard Branson's Necker Island. With encouragement from Bronfman and Vicente,...

Karim Amer and Jehane Noujaim, directors of “The Vow,” HBO’s limited series about Nxivm, never want to hear the organization referred to as only “a sex cult” again.

Although Nxivm made major news headlines three years ago, first with a New York Times story about Dos, a group-within-the-group that was collecting embarrassing material on its members (called “collateral”), as well as branding them and in some cases allegedly manipulating them into sexual situations, the group itself was founded in 1998 as a self-proclaimed “multi-level marketing company.” Co-founder Keith Raniere led thousands of workshops and classes on self-improvement and self-actualization, and the company opened centers around the world. To label it just a sex cult now, Amer tells Variety, is “deeply problematic.”

That is why he and his wife and documentary filmmaking partner Noujaim are “trying to tell a story with dignity.” He explains, “People put a lot of faith in the documentary.

One of the ex-nxivm members featured in HBO's Nxivm documentary The Vow is Sarah Edmondson, a Canadian actress who spent over a decade in the cult before eventually breaking free. It was Edmondson's testimony, along with that of other ex-members, that finally grabbed enough attention to spark investigations into Keith Raniere's self-help group turned disturbing cult. In particular, Edmondson was able to provide insights into Dos, the most horrifying of the Nxivm subgroups, which sold itself as a women empowerment group but was revealed to be a group focused on "slavery," including sexual abuses. Keep reading to learn more about Edmondson's history with Nxivm, how she got out, and what she's been doing since escaping.

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Getty / Amy Luke

HBO's latest documentary, The Vow, pulls back the curtain on the horrifying world of Nxivm and its founder, Keith Raniere, who was accused of running an abusive sex cult through the Albany-based "self-help" organization. The nine-episode series reveals many of the cults inner workings, which included a subgroup named Dos (Dominus Obsequious Sororium) that was known for branding its members.

The secret women-only inner circle was often described as a "sorority" by its members, which famously included Smallville actress Allison Mack, who was Raniere's go-to for recruiting new members. One of the ways the women pledged their loyalty to the group was by getting Rainiere and Mack's initials branded with a cauterizing pen in a ritual ceremony. In a previous interview with ABC's Nightline, former Nxivm member Sarah Edmondson said the branding was Mack's idea and that they were initially told the design was a Latin symbol,...

In the sixth episode of Jehane Noujaim and Karim Amer’s docuseries “The Vow,” Sarah Edmondson, a whistleblower who was once in the inner-circle of Nxivm and also a part of its master-slave subgroup Dos, is asked outright if she is a victim. Although she answers quickly in the affirmative, she also makes it clear that she made choices during her time working with the organization. Some of these choices simply kept her involved, while others were direct recruitment of other young women. To some, this may paint her in the colors of someone more culpable than coerced.

But the truth is much more complicated. And what Noujaim and Amer endeavor to do with their nine-part HBO docuseries is peel back the layers of the psychology of not only the women who found themselves in this organization that purported to be one of self-improvement, but also of its founder and high-ranking officials,...

If you’re an “inside Hollywood” person, one who scours the blind item gossip community, then you probably heard about Nxivm before most people did. It wasn’t until the Harvey Weinstein scandal and the #MeToo movement that most people learned the name of Keith Rainere, the guru/sex trafficker and his band of followers, many of whom were prominent actresses during the early aughts. But Nxivm remains a shadowy organization and it’s unclear how HBO’s nine-part documentary series “The Vow” will elucidate things for everyone.

It’s easy to understand why Nxivm has sailed under the radar in the world of cult fascination. It’s not as well-connected as Scientology nor is it as outlandish in its philosophies (or as deadly) compared to Heaven’s Gate. Nxivm is like if Goop and Scientology had a baby. As “The Vow” lays out, it started out as more of a lifestyle and wellness organization,...

During the muggy last weeks of June 2019, Keith Raniere, the leader of the self-help organization Nxivm, sat in a downtown Brooklyn courthouse, owlish face peeking out from beneath a halo of pewter hair, looking like an overgrown prep-school boy in a jewel-toned crewneck, as prosecutors recounted a litany of his alleged crimes and peccadilloes, each more depraved and debauched than the last.

Raniere, they alleged, coerced a bevy of bright, ambitious women, including a former WB star and the daughter of an actress from Dynasty, into sending him photos of...

The case of Nxivm, the Albany, N.Y.-based “self-help group” whose bizarre and seemingly cult-like aspects have been covered widely — merges a sort of enormity of evil with the prosaic in ways that can make it hard to connect with at first. What was done to aspirants within the group, who allege having been starved as well as held down and scarred with a cauterizing pen in order to be marked as slaves, represents perhaps the height of inhumanity. Yet such cruel behavior was enacted by individuals whose bland pleasantness reads more like the stuff of contemporary wellness culture than like, well, cult leaders.

This is among the contradictions explored by “The Vow,” HBO’s intriguing true-crime documentary series that captures the world of Nxivm through a couple of key voices. One of those belongs to Sarah Edmondson, a Canadian actor whose thinking about Nxivm radically shifted after she was forcibly branded.

“Natural Born Killers” arrived in multiplexes in 1994 like a molotov cocktail. Despite being dropped by Warner Bros. into the late-August graveyard of release dates, Oliver Stone’s serial-killer satire ended up at number one at the U.S. box office, and has remained a cult favorite since debuting 25 years ago.

As part of Los Angeles’ Beyond Fest, the film will screen in 35mm, in its unrated version, Tuesday night, with director Oliver Stone in attendance at the Egyptian Theatre. In a recent telephone interview with IndieWire, the notoriously prickly director insisted on keeping the Q&a on topic with “Natural Born Killers.” With regards to his upcoming Hollywood memoir slated for 2020, ill-received comments about anti-gay propaganda in Putin’s Russia, or Stone’s relationship to Putin as evinced by his 2017 documentary “The Putin Interviews”: Stone’s answer? “I don’t want to talk about that.”

Okay, then. Shocking to...

Witness testimony at the trial of Keith Raniere, the founder of the self-improvement organization and alleged “sex cult” Nxivm, sparked larger questions about Bdsm and consent on Friday, when Sean Welch, the chief technology officer of the sex toy manufacturer Xr, L.L.C., took the stand.

During his testimony, Welch produced documents indicating that Daniela Padilla, a member of Nxivm, ordered $900 of Bdsm-inspired sex toys off his website ExtremeRestraints.com, including a remote-controlled electrified collar (dubbed a “puppy trainer”), a studded rubber paddle, a hanging, rubber-strapped cage and ankle shackles.

Although the trial of Keith Raniere, the alleged mastermind behind the self-empowerment cult Nxivm, doesn’t begin until the end of April, the court proceedings have already given us plenty of drama. There’s been fainting in court, child pornography charges and, as with all things 2019, a brief appearance by attorney Michael Avenatti. And in a surprising twist, all of the defendants in the Nxivm case, with the exception of Raniere, have pleaded guilty to some of the charges against them, meaning that at least some of his former acolytes...

In the midst of the ongoing intrigue and uncertainty surrounding the fate of those behind Nxivm, HBO announced on Wednesday that it is producing an upcoming documentary series that will look into the mysterious group. Filmmakers Jehane Noujaim and Karim Amer, whose 2013 film “The Square” garnered an Oscar nomination and won three Emmys, will be at the helm of this new show.

Since its founding over two decades ago, Nxivm has transformed in public perception. Going from a self-described organization aimed to help personal advancement, a gradual stream of investigations have uncovered possible criminal activity at Nxivm’s highest levels. Founder Keith Raniere has been indicted on charges ranging from racketeering to sex trafficking and is currently awaiting a trial that may begin as early as this month. The group gained even more notoriety with allegations that former “Smallville” actress Allison Mack had become a vocal and willing participant in...

It would be an understatement to say that 2018 was a good year for true-crime podcasting — in fact, there’s a bit of a glut in the crime market these days. The soaring popularity of shows like My Favorite Murder, Casefile and Up and Vanished has fired up the imaginations of thousands of podcasting newbies around the world who are, apparently, eager to dissect cold cases. Do we really need another podcast from a group of girlfriends discussing crime scenes while chugging Merlot? Sure, sure we do.

To help ease the...

A&E's new series Cults & Extreme Beliefs will explore all sorts of disturbing groups in which we hope you never find yourself.

In the premiere episode, debuting Monday, May 28 at 10/9c (no need to worry about it overlapping with that special two-hour Lucifer -- a completely different kind of hell), Emmy-winning journalist Elizabeth Vargas delves into the controversial “self-help” organization Nxivm.

The group was recently catapulted into the spotlight with the arrests of its leader, Keith Raniere, and high-profile member and actress, Allison Mack on charges of sex-trafficking.

Now the group stands accused of drawing supporters down a path of destruction that includes near-starvation diets, sexual assault, forced branding, pseudo-slavery, and blackmail.

Related: Lucifer: Fox Sets Two-Hour Bonus Episode for May 28th

In the sneak peek of the premiere episode, Sarah Edmondson, who got away, talks angrily about how she was conned into being there and how her beliefs changed...

Sarah Edmondson's painful initiation into the Dos sex cult, a sect within the larger Nxivm organization, occurred at the Albany home owned by Allison Mack, says the Canadian actress.

Edmondson arrived at the house thinking she was getting a tattoo to mark her entry into what she was told was a secret sisterhood, but was instead held down on a table and branded with a cauterizing pen. The ensuing scar bears the initials of Nxivm founder Keith Raniere as well as Mack, the former Smallville star now facing federal felony charges as the alleged No. 2 in Dos.

Edmondson fled ...

A&E Investigates will look at the so-called self help group Nxivm in the series premiere of Cults and Extreme Belief, hosted by Elizabeth Vargas. The organization has been making headlines in recent weeks with the arrest of its leader Keith Raniere and one of his top lieutenants, Smallville actress Allison Mack, on charges of sex trafficking and other crimes. The group has been called by prosecutors a sex cult that has been keeping women as “slaves,” and branding them with Raniere’s initials.

In the premiere, former members share their experiences of manipulation and sexual violation, including Canadian actress Sarah Edmondson who sits down with Vargas to share new details of her ordeal inside the organization.

Additional organizations that will be explored in season 1 include Twelve Tribes, Sanctuary Church, United Nation of Islam, Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, Jehovah’s Witness and The Family.

Exclusive: Nxivm has been making headlines the past few weeks with the high-profile arrests of founder Keith Raniere and one of his top lieutenants, Smallville actress Allison Mack, on charges of sex trafficking as the so called self-help organization has been called by prosecutors a sex cult that has been keeping women as “slaves,” and branding them with Raniere’s initials.

One of those branded women is Canadian actress Sarah Edmondson who last fall became the first to speak out about the alleged abuse after a decade inside Nxivm along with her husband, Anthony Ames, a fellow actor and former Ivy-League Quarterback.

Edmondson and Ames are now slated to headline a documentary TV series. Set against the ongoing legal drama involving the leaders of Nxivm, the series will follow the duo as they, under the guidance of renowned cult expert and deprogrammer Rick Alan Ross, head of the Cult Education Institute,...

Kristin Kreuk dealt with a lot of strange goings-on while starring on “Smallville,” but nothing quite like this. Days after the arrest of Keith Raniere, the founder of a “sex cult” known as Nxivm, the actress has denied allegations that she was involved in recruiting sex slaves for the organization. Raniere, who was apprehended in Mexico on sex-trafficking charges, has been accused of branding women and treating them as his sexual property.

Kreuk released a statement on Twitter in which she calls these accusations “blatantly false”:

“When I was about 23, I took an Executive Success Programs/Nxivm ‘intensive,’ what I understood to be a self-help/personal growth course that helped me handle my previous shyness, which is why I continued with the program. I left about five years ago and had minimal contact with those who were still involved. The accusations that I was in the ‘inner circle’ or...

A former member of mysterious self-help group Nxivm has claimed she was invited into a secret society allegedly associated with the organization — then branded with the initials of the group’s founder in a “horrific” initiation ritual. Sarah Edmondson, who filed a New York Department of Health complaint about the alleged branding with a cauterizing device, tells ABC’s 20/20 tonight: “It was a horror movie. It was the most horrific, inhumane way to treat anybody.” Edmondson claims the branding took place under no anaesthetic after she and a handful of other women were taken into a room, blindfolded and naked....read more...

For Catherine Oxenberg, the “red flags” she could never quite see suddenly came into sharp, horrifying focus one afternoon last April when a friend reached out with news about her eldest daughter, India.

For the past several years, the former Dynasty actress had grown concerned about how increasingly “reserved, distant and burdened” her daughter had become after joining Nxivm, a controversial self-empowerment group in 2011.

But it wasn’t until her conversation with a friend, Bonnie Piesse, who had left Nxivm months earlier, that all the pieces to the terrifying puzzle fell into place.

“You need to save your daughter,” Piesse,...

Dynasty star Catherine Oxenberg is desperately fighting to save her 26-year-old daughter, India, from a controversial group she alleges has “brainwashed” her oldest daughter.

In 2011, Oxenberg saw an opportunity to bond with her then 20-year-old daughter after she learned from a friend about a self-improvement program called Nxivm (pronounced Nex-i-um) and they decided to attend a meeting together.

For nearly 20 years, an estimated 16,000 people have paid as much as $3,400 for an executive-coaching workshop offered by the Albany, N.Y.-based organization, whose leader, Keith Raniere, 57, is known as Vanguard to his followers. With locations in New York, San Francisco and Mexico,...

The North by North-East Film Festival begins June 14th and runs until the 20th with several multi-genred films gracing the festivities. The schedule is below and one of the highlights from the festival is director Blaine Thurier's A Gun to the Head, which manages to bring together comedy and a few chills. The film also shows the difficulties of reforming a criminal life with several romantic gags along the way. Preview the film's trailer inside and prepare for Nxne 2010 in Toronto, Ontario in a couple weeks!

The synopsis for A Gun to the Head here:

"A reformed criminal escapes his wife’s dinner party for a quick beer with his cousin and former partner in crime. Over the course of one wild night, he is dragged back into a world of drugs , women, guns and gangsters, endangering the lives of those he loves the most" (A Gun).

Releae Date:...