Another week, another contestant down, another ratings triumph for ITV … oh, and another Deadlock.

The weekend’s X Factor shenanigans did not come close to the previous vote’s controversy, but there were still plenty of harsh words for the four-member judging panel for once again taking the final decision on who gets the boot to a Deadlock. When the judges are split 2-2, the result is decided by which of the two nominated acts got the fewest public votes.

This time it was Dannii Minogue with the deciding vote, and she backed eventual loser Jamie Archer, recognisable by his frizzy hairstyle. He lost out to 16-year-old, blond-locked Lloyd Daniels, who lives to fight another day despite being widely seen as one of the weakest contestants.

As well as reinforcing many people’s belief that the judges are deliberately manipulating the vote to go to Deadlock, the latest result also means that “Jedward”, the twins who are regularly ridiculed for their performances, are still on course to win the contest in what would be a major upset.

A word of advice if I may? How about having a panel with an uneven number of judges?

British singer Sting has waded into the X Factor debate. In a week where the show’s most famous judge Simon Cowell came in for some fierce criticism for what British viewers saw as a cynical ploy to fix the results, Sting has called the popular television show “preposterous” and “appalling”.

In an interview with London’s Evening Standard, ostensibly to promote his new CD “If On a Winter’s Night”, the Police frontman-turned-solo star launched into the music talent contest which regularly attracts peak audiences of more than 15 million in the UK.

“I am sorry but none of those kids are going to go anywhere, and I say that sadly,” he said of the contestants. “They are humiliated when they get sent off. How appalling for a young person to feel that rejection. It is a soap opera which has nothing to do with music. In fact, it has put music back decades. Television is very cynical.

“They … are not encouraged to create any real unique signature or fingerprint. That cannot come from TV. The X Factor is a preposterous show and you have judges who have no recognisable talent apart from self-promotion, advising them what to wear and how to look. It is appalling.”

Whether the 58-year-old’s comments will bother Cowell, the show’s other judges or the ITV channel which airs the hugely successful series is far from clear. They may be watching the upcoming viewing figures closely, however, after many fans vowed not to watch the programme again after Cowell’s recent antics.

X Factor judge Simon Cowell faced accusations of rigging the result of last night’s X Factor vote as the tabloid newspapers, so often the champions of the hugely popular show, began to turn on the man they like to call “Mr. Nasty”.

Twin act John and Edward Grimes (aka Jedward) survived a popular vote while singer Lucie Jones was shown the door. The two acts ended up at the bottom of the heap in a phone vote, and it was up to the judges to decide which one to throw out. But if the judges are split 2-2, the results of the public vote come back into play. Cowell had the deciding vote with the panel split 2-1 in Lucie’s favour, and he decided for the twins.

The Daily Mirror’s headline (because the X Factor has long been headline news in Britain) was “Farce Factor” while rival The Sun wrote: “‘Ward a Load of Cobblers“. Quoting fans, the latter newspaper added: “Cowell’s gone too far … show is ruined.”

Readers may reasonably ask if any of this matters. Well, it may matter to Cowell, who has become one of pop music’s most successful managers through his appearances on X Factor and similar singing competitions here and in the United States. It may also mean something to ITV, the channel which airs the show in the UK. With peak audiences approaching 15 million, its advertising revenue from the biggest show on British TV must be healthy to say the least.

 For those who follow the show, and care about it, many feel that Cowell’s decision to refer the decision back to the popular vote, rather than voting off Jedward, smacked of a stitch-up. He had been Jedward’s most vocal critic for weeks, and popular opinion would appear to support the argument that loser Lucie had far more talent than the twins, whose performances have been variously described as “bizarre” and “ridiculous”.

Theories abound as to why Cowell might decide to save the twins. The most popular is money — like them or loathe them, the twins seem to get the crowds going and Cowell might be looking ahead to the X Factor tour when the show is over. The removal of strong vocalist Lucie may also remove a potential threat to the singing acts on the show which he endorses.

Will his decision backfire? Will less people tune in to the show because they feel the whole thing is rigged? Or has Cowell pulled it off again by ramping up the stakes and getting the nation talking about the show again? It wouldn’t be the first time.

There appears to be one factor and one factor only in dictating chart success in Britain at the moment, and that factor is X.

Alexandra Burke, last year’s winner of the talent TV contest, performed her new song “Bad Boys” recently on the popular show and stormed to the top of the UK charts with the fastest-selling single so far this year. The 185,000 copies sold was more than twice the total shifted by Robbie Williams, who is making his long-awaited comeback.

Williams also showcased his new song “Bodies” on the X Factor, but the magic failed to rub off after a disjointed performance during which the former Take That singer appeared nervous. Still, one of British pop’s biggest names clearly felt the need to appear on the programme in order to reach an audience that can peak at nearly 15 million viewers.

And now there is Cheryl Cole, a judge on the contest and member of girl band “Girls Aloud” who is launching her solo career. Needless to say, she was invited to perform her new single “Fight For This Love” on the show, and, despite a performance many viewers would describe as mediocre at best and possibly something much worse, looks set to top the charts when they are announced on Sunday.

The Official Charts Company, which compiles the weekly music ratings, says the singer is on course for a tally close or even higher than Burke’s.

Tom Ford has branded as “disgusting” the ban on gay marriage in parts of the United States and elsewhere in the world.

The designer, who is openly gay, used a Venice press conference for his feature film debut “A Single Man” starring Colin Firth to criticize decisions like that in California in November banning same-sex marriage. He did, however, add that his movie, which is in competition at the Venice film festival was not about being gay at all, but about the human condition in general.

“It is, I have to say, quite disgusting that in America and in other countries you cannot have a civil union or something equivalent to marriage,” said the 48-year-old.

“I have someone I’ve lived together with for 23 years. Recently he was in hospital for something. I had to carry papers on me at all times that he had signed saying that I could visit him in his room and make medical decisions for him if anything happened. Our taxes, by the way: if I died tomorrow my estate would be completely taxed and then the remainder go to him whereas if we were a couple his life wouldn’t have to change and my entire estate would move to him. There are things that are wrong with our legal systems in a lot of countries.”

We’re off.

After weeks of planning, the Venice film festival finally launched today with a lengthy, sentimental Italian entry as the opening film, “Baaria.” It is the first home-made movie to start the annual festival in around 20 years, and, if the budget is anything to go by, it should do well. The movie, which is more than two-and-a-half hours long, cost a whopping 25 million euros to make.

Directed by Giuseppe Tornatore (of Oscar-winning “Cinema Paradiso” fame), “Baaria” is set in Sicily and spans the 1930s to the 1980s. It tells the story of Sicily, and more broadly of Europe as a whole, through three generations of the same family.

Critics are divided. One I spoke to hated it, another I have just read liked it. Venice could do with an Italian hit, after so many have failed to impress in recent years.

I’ve just come out of a screening of “The Road”, starring Viggo Mortensen and Charlize Theron, in an interpretation of Cormac McCarthy’s grim novel about a man and his son trying to survive in a post-apocalyptic world. The father-son relationship at its heart is tough to watch for a dad of two young boys like me, and it’s not what I would call an easy watch. But then the acclaimed book was not an easy read either. I’ll be interested to see what the critics say about the movie, and how Mortensen found the shooting when he speaks to us in an interview.

Lead singer Liam Gallagher has issued a typically blunt rebuttal to rumours and speculation that Oasis, arguably Britain’s biggest band of the ’90s, had played their final gig.

The rumours began after Liam and his older brother Noel, the band’s guitarist and songwriter, announced they had fallen out and were communicating via the band’s website or on Twitter. Then, when Oasis cancelled a gig at the last minute over the weekend, the doomsayers went into overdrive.

The reason for the band’s pullout was actually Liam contracting viral laryngitis, but that did not stop the columnists rushing to fill their columns. Liam, who thrives off his bad boy, rock’n'roll image, was clearly not impressed.

“Reports in the smartarses column about Oasis last british gig ever. The kids talking out his arse.” Lax grammar aside, the message was clear, although could Gallagher really be that annoyed at all the free publicity?

The website further explained that Oasis, behind hits like “Wonderwall” and “Champagne Supernova”, would complete its world tour and then take a break before thinking about recording another album.

As the film industry looks ahead to box office business after “Harry Potter,” with the lucrative franchise due to wind up in the summer of 2011, one person in as good a position as most to offer an opinion on what may be the next big film series suggests that the “Twilight” vampire romances could fill the void.

“Harry Potter” 1-5 have amassed $4.5 billion at global box offices so far, and with HP 6, otherwise known as “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince”, due to hit cinemas this week, the cash tills look set to go on ringing. HP 7, the final book in J.K. Rowling’s boy wizard series, has been split into two movies, meaning that at the current rate, the 8-movie series could take a cool $7.2 billion.

Last year’s first outing for the “Twilight” series, based on the Stephenie Meyer books, made $380 million worldwide, according to www.boxofficemojo.com, a far cry from HP 1. But the word — and more to the point, the hype — appears to be spreading beyond U.S. shores, and with heartthrob lead actor Robert Pattinson causing hysteria wherever he breathes, the momentum could grow.

Daniel Radcliffe, who plays Harry in the “Potter” pictures, knows how Pattinson feels.

“The thing that’s interesting for me is that it’s the only other franchise really which comes close to ‘Potter’ in terms of the mania that surrounds it and the attention that the leads get and how global it is,” he told reporters in London recently. “So part of me doesn’t actually want to have an opinion on the film.”

Underlining the pressures superstardom can bring, Pattinson was hit by a taxi in New York last month while trying to flee a crowd of hysterical teenage fans. He was not seriously hurt.

Radcliffe is under no illusions about why the girls scream when they see him.

“I go to Japan and they all scream and it all goes mad and it happens all over the world, but that’s a different type of me, that’s the me that’s on red carpets and stuff and that’s who a lot of people seem to be attracted to and fancy and stuff. But the me who sits in a darkened room for eight hours watching cricket with a big bowl of pasta in my socks and underwear is not nearly as appealing to women.”

Celebrity heiress and businesswoman Paris Hilton is back in Cannes to drum up some interest in the documentary “Paris, Not France”, which follows her as she goes about her daily life being rich and famous.

The 28-year-old tried to prevent the film, directed by Tom Petty’s daughter Adria, from reaching the big screen, but now sees it as a  kind of set-the-record-straight exercise for someone whose portrayal in the media is not always flattering.

“I was a little scared,” Hilton told reporters at the Cannes film festival, where she said she was partying hard. “I filmed it over three years ago so it was a different period of my life.”

“It also shows how it is living in this life and how much pressure there is. It definitely shows a different side than the media portrays me as.”

You can read about the documentary here, from a story we did when it screened back at the Toronto International Film Festival in September 2008.

Asked why she thrust herself into the limelight as much as she did, Hilton replied: “I have a brand, I have a business … I always have something to promote. I love doing it, it’s fun. I always loved Marilyn Monroe and she loved the camera and the camera loved her and I just think of her as one of my idols.”

Plus ca change…

The Cannes film festival IS different from recent editions, but not radically. For me, the most noticeable difference between 2009 and 2005/6/7/8 is the absence of stars, be they genuine cinema greats or headline-grabbing celebrities who people care about, however fleetingly.

Sure, there are famous people here — Quentin Tarantino, Penelope Cruz, Mariah Carey, Brad Pitt, (a little later on) and Bill Clinton (in town soon for a charity dinner). But there are significantly fewer than we in the press are used to. In one sense that’s a good thing in that reporters can concentrate more on the film festival itself rather than the red carpets and celebrity-driven stunts. On the other hand, any major festival, and particularly the world’s biggest in Cannes, needs the glamour that star power brings to generate interest around the world.

So that’s what is different. But what is the same is the sunshine, the extortionate prices, the yachts in the harbour occupied by scantily-clad women and not-so-scantily-clad men, the parties (albeit fewer) and that “Cannes attitude”, in other words, “put-on-your-Sunday-best-even-if-it’s-Monday-because-you-never-know, someone-important-might-notice-you.”