- From Seinfeld to Shawshank, Rob Reiner changed Hollywood for ever
- Google AI summaries are ruining the livelihoods of recipe writers: ‘It’s an extinction event’
- The 50 best albums of 2025: No 5 – Lady Gaga: Mayhem
- Trump’s approach to Venezuela repeats the mistakes of the past | Austin Sarat
- ‘Oysters are a risk, as is raw meat’: why you get food poisoning – and how to avoid it
- Heat at 30: Michael Mann’s electric crime thriller is a film of fire and sadness
- Bondi terror attack: alleged gunmen travelled to the Philippines before ‘Isis-inspired’ shooting
- Rob Reiner’s son Nick arrested in connection with deaths of his parents
- US military says deadly strikes carried out on three vessels in eastern Pacific
- Europe ready to lead ‘multinational force’ in Ukraine as part of US peace plan
- Donald Trump sues BBC for up to $10bn over edit of January 6 speech
- Trump urges Xi Jinping to free HK pro-democracy media tycoon Jimmy Lai
- US puts £31bn tech ‘prosperity deal’ with Britain on ice
- India’s electoral roll revision threatens democracy and Muslims, say critics
- Rachael Carpani, McLeod’s Daughters and Home and Away actor, dies ‘unexpectedly but peacefully’ aged 45
- With their dead ‘still lying before them’, Sydney’s Jewish community searches for a way forward
- The rise and fall of Jimmy Lai, whose trajectory mirrored that of Hong Kong itself
- Chile’s new far-right head is latest Latin American leader to ride hardline wave to power
- Bump: A Christmas Film review – the most masochistic holiday ever?
- The inexorable rise of voice notes: ‘I’m thinking of you – I just don’t want to speak to you’
- ‘Lunch could last all day – and night’: inside Coco Chanel’s sun-kissed sanctum for art’s superstars
- Around the world, anti-Jewish hate is growing. In Bondi, we see the tragic results | Dave Rich
- At Bondi, every Jewish person’s worst nightmare came true. Can we still have a safe future in Australia? | Dean Sherr
- The US supreme court’s TikTok ruling is a scandal | Evelyn Douek and Jameel Jaffer
- It’s the media’s job to hold power to account. This year, too many got into bed with it instead | Arwa Mahdawi
- A potato is for life, not just for Christmas | Emma Beddington
- The Guardian view on combating Europe’s national populists: protect the less well-off from the winds of change | Editorial
- The Guardian view on birth influencers: the public need protecting from bad advice | Editorial
- Manchester United and Bournemouth share thrills and spills in eight-goal extravaganza
- England face daunting task as Ashes series resumes in shadow of tragedy
- Suns’ Brooks ejected as he clashes with LeBron James again in Lakers’ last-gasp win
- Philip Rivers: how a 44-year-old grandpa nearly pulled off one of the NFL’s greatest comebacks
- By not explaining 'worst 48 hours' Enzo Maresca has put himself at even greater risk | Jacob Steinberg
- How the Guardian ranked the 100 best male footballers in the world 2025
- Harry Kane’s penalty rescues Bayern as Mainz defy the odds with heroic point
- Inter go top as Serie A rejects slow and steady in favour of emotional ride
- Nice plunged into crisis after fans’ dissent goes too far in physical assault
- Congresswoman Ilhan Omar says ICE agents pulled over her son in Minnesota
- Machado suffered vertebra fracture on secret trip from Venezuela to Norway
- Women who say they were tricked into servitude for Opus Dei to meet in Argentina
- Elon Musk’s net worth hits estimated $600bn as SpaceX prepares for IPO
- Biden bowl or Milei statuette, anyone? Meloni to put world leaders’ gifts up for auction
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- ‘I consider him my first son’: how living with a baby monkey taught me I’m ready to be a dad
- Chances of EU trucking industry hitting zero emissions targets are dire, says industry body
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- UK and South Korea sign new trade deal aimed at cars, salmon and Guinness
- Man who drove into Liverpool FC parade was ‘in a rage’, court told
- Mother appeals for help to find daughter abducted from UK to Jamaica
- Young people bearing brunt of UK jobs downturn, thinktank warns
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- Europe’s housing costs akin to ‘new pandemic’, warns Barcelona mayor
- ‘It’s a timebomb’: Ghana grapples with mass exodus of nurses as thousands head to the west
- Washington state orders immediate evacuations in three Seattle suburbs
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- Tell Me Softly review – high-school romance of bad boys and blurred boundaries
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- The 50 best albums of 2025
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- Add to playlist: the slow-burn psychedelia of Acolyte and the week’s best new tracks
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- Pulse by Cynan Jones review – short stories that show the vitality of the form
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From Seinfeld to Shawshank, Rob Reiner changed Hollywood for ever
Reiner’s own films reshaped modern comedy and drama with their intelligence, empathy and range. But through his company, Castle Rock, he paved the way for Seinfeld, Sorkin and many moreNews: Rob Reiner found dead in apparent homicideGallery: Rob Reiner – a life in picturesMeeting Reiner was like a visit from SantaAs a film-maker, Rob Reiner championed humour, civility and intelligence – qualities you suppose would be out of step with the Hollywood of the 1980s where he made his name, and in the 1990s where he scored a series of extraordinary, far-reaching successes. Reiner had a family interest in the workings of on-screen comedy: his father Carl had played a key role on Sid Caesar’s TV shows, which themselves were revolutionary, and helped birth a new generation of screen comics by directing Steve Martin’s film debut The Jerk. Rob had become a household name as Meathead, the liberal foil to Carroll O’Connor’s bigoted Archie Bunker in 70s sitcom All in the Family (the equivalent to Mike Rawlins v Warren Mitchell in the British original, Till Death Us Do Part). But it was as a director and producer that he really made his impact felt.In 1984, Reiner released This Is Spinal Tap, a “mockumentary” about a fictitious heavy metal band from the UK that rewrote the rules on what comedy could do. It sent up rock’n’roll behaviour and codified its cliches (with Reiner himself doing a hilarious parody of Martin Scorsese’s hosting role in The Last Waltz) and gave us zingers that haven’t lost their comedy power more than 30 years on: “The numbers all go to 11”, “it’s such a fine line between stupid, and er … clever.” Its deployment of improvised comedy was revolutionary for a Hollywood feature, and while Reiner wasn’t the first to use the fake-documentary techniques for comedic purposes (that goes back at least to Woody Allen’s Take the Money and Run), it hugely popularised the mockumentary style; subsequent efforts include Bob Roberts, Fear of a Black Hat, Drop Dead Gorgeous and Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan. All these owe Tap a huge debt – as well as the microgenre of star Christopher Guest’s improv-mockumentaries: Waiting for Guffman, Best in Show and A Mighty Wind. Almost incidentally, Spinal Tap became a sort-of-real band, with tours, record releases and a follow-up feature (Spinal Tap II: The End Continues), in which the presence of music industry titans Paul McCartney and Elton John demonstrated the high regard in which the original was held. Continue reading...Google AI summaries are ruining the livelihoods of recipe writers: ‘It’s an extinction event’
AI Mode is mangling recipes by merging instructions from multiple creators – and causing them huge dips in ad trafficThis past March, when Google began rolling out its AI Mode search capability, it began offering AI-generated recipes. The recipes were not all that intelligent. The AI had taken elements of similar recipes from multiple creators and Frankensteined them into something barely recognizable. In one memorable case, the Google AI failed to distinguish the satirical website the Onion from legitimate recipe sites and advised users to cook with non-toxic glue.Over the past few years, bloggers who have not secured their sites behind a paywall have seen their carefully developed and tested recipes show up, often without attribution and in a bastardized form, in ChatGPT replies. They have seen dumbed-down versions of their recipes in AI-assembled cookbooks available for digital downloads on Etsy or on AI-built websites that bear a superficial resemblance to an old-school human-written blog. Their photos and videos, meanwhile, are repurposed in Facebook posts and Pinterest pins that link back to this digital slop. Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/dec/15/google-ai-recipes-food-bloggers
The 50 best albums of 2025: No 5 – Lady Gaga: Mayhem
Returning in high style to the operatic electroclash that first made her name, the zest and zip of these songs still sounds truly innovative• The 50 best albums of 2025• More on the best culture of 2025On her sixth album, pop’s queen of the dramatic reinvention did something more shocking than meat dresses and humanoid motorbikes: Lady Gaga looked back.Unlike the smooth tech-house flavour of its predecessor Chromatica, and diametrically opposed to the dinner jazz of her work with Tony Bennett, on Mayhem she returned to the operatic electroclash that powered her first two albums. There are synths that sound like a Dyson on its last legs. There are the kind of trashy guitars that contractually can only be played by someone sporting a lime mohawk, low-riding leather trousers and nothing else. There is the baby talk of her biggest hit Bad Romance, only where that was “Ro-ma, ro-ma-ma / Gaga, ooh la la” it’s now “Ama ooh na-na / Abracadabra, mutta ooh Gaga”. You can see the difference, right? Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/music/2025/dec/15/the-50-best-albums-of-2025-no-5-lady-gaga-mayhem
Trump’s approach to Venezuela repeats the mistakes of the past | Austin Sarat
Congress must work to stop the president from leading us further into a South American quagmireDonald Trump seems determined to have a military confrontation with Venezuela. He has deployed a massive military arsenal in and around the Caribbean Sea and taken a series of provocative actions off the Venezuelan coast, justifying it as necessary to stem the flow of drugs into the United States.The Council on Foreign Relations says that deployment includes an “aircraft carrier, destroyers, cruisers, amphibious assault ships, and a special forces support ship. A variety of aircraft have also been active in the region, including bombers, fighters, drones, patrol planes, and support aircraft.” This is the largest display of American military might in the western hemisphere since we invaded Panama in 1989.Austin Sarat, William Nelson Cromwell professor of jurisprudence and political science at Amherst College, is the author or editor of more than 100 books, including Gruesome Spectacles: Botched Executions and America’s Death Penalty Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/dec/15/trump-venezuela-repeat-past-mistakes
‘Oysters are a risk, as is raw meat’: why you get food poisoning – and how to avoid it
Several kinds of bacteria can give you an upset stomach. Here is how to steer clear of the worst offenders, and what to do if they do make it throughMany people in the modern world, it’s probably fair to say, do not take food poisoning particularly seriously. Yes, most folks wash their hands after handling raw chicken and use different chopping boards for beef and green beans – but who among us can honestly say we’ve never used the same tongs for an entire barbecue or left a storage box of cooked rice on the sideboard for a couple of hours? Ignore that rhetorical question for a moment, though – before you comment that of course everyone should do all those things, let’s talk about what’s happening in your body when it all goes horribly wrong.At the risk of stating the obvious, food poisoning occurs when you eat food contaminated with harmful bacteria, viruses or toxins – but that doesn’t mean it always works the same way. “Some bacteria, such as Bacillus cereus – sometimes found in reheated rice – produce toxins before the food is eaten, meaning they can cause symptoms such as sudden vomiting within hours,” says Dr Masarat Jilani, an NHS specialist who regularly manages children and adults with food poisoning. Bacillus cereus also produces another type of toxin in the small intestine, which can cause diarrhoea. “Others, such as Salmonella and E. coli, act after you’ve eaten and often cause longer-lasting symptoms through inflammation of the gut.” Continue reading...Heat at 30: Michael Mann’s electric crime thriller is a film of fire and sadness
Al Pacino and Robert De Niro’s dueling performances add an extra punch to the 1995 masterpiece which is both action-heavy and deeply tragicConsider the hype leading into Heat when it hit theatres 30 years ago today. Here was Al Pacino and Robert De Niro, two legends the movie’s trailers flexed by their rhyming last names only, both masters of their craft who, much like their characters, had been watching each other from a distance (maybe competitively, maybe with respect and admiration), sharing the screen for the very first time. The pent-up anticipation was built right into the narrative, which patiently delays the onscreen face-off between Pacino’s dogged homicide detective Vincent Hanna and De Niro’s career criminal Neil McCauley for almost 90 textured and intense minutes.Imagine the surprise then, and the comic relief, when the moment finally arrives, and these two opposing forces collide (as the trailers would say) … for a warm and exceptionally civil cup of coffee. Continue reading...Bondi terror attack: alleged gunmen travelled to the Philippines before ‘Isis-inspired’ shooting
Police investigating claims Sajid and Naveed Akram received ‘training’ overseas before Sunday’s attackThe father and son duo allegedly behind the Bondi attacked appear to have been inspired by Islamic State, the Australian prime minister says, as police confirmed they were investigating why the pair travelled to the Philippines last month.The New South Wales police commissioner, Mal Lanyon, on Tuesday alleged Naveed Akram, 24, and his 50-year-old father, Sajid, had recently travelled to the Philippines. Continue reading...Rob Reiner’s son Nick arrested in connection with deaths of his parents
Nick Reiner arrested on suspicion of murder after Rob Reiner and Michele Singer Reiner found dead at their homeRob Reiner and wife Michele found dead in apparent homicideRob Reiner – a life in picturesReiner changed Hollywood for everNick Reiner has been arrested on suspicion of murder after the deaths of his parents, the renowned actor-director Rob Reiner and Michele Singer Reiner, according to the Los Angeles police chief Jim McDonnell.Nick Reiner, 32, was taken into custody on Sunday night. Jail records initially showed that his bail had been set at $4m, but Nick Reiner was later ordered held without bail, the police said. Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/film/2025/dec/15/rob-nick-reiner-arrest
US military says deadly strikes carried out on three vessels in eastern Pacific
US Southern Command says eight men killed in attacks on boats it said it were ‘engaged in narco-trafficking’ The US military has launched a fresh round of deadly strikes on foreign vessels suspected of trafficking narcotics.The US Southern Command posted footage of the strikes on social media on Monday, announcing it had hit three vessels in international waters, killing a total of eight men. Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/dec/15/us-military-strikes-vessels-pacific
Europe ready to lead ‘multinational force’ in Ukraine as part of US peace plan
Proposal is part of new package of security guarantees, backed by the White House, that could mark breakthrough in reaching agreementEurope is ready to lead a “multinational force” in Ukraine as part of a US proposal for a peace agreement between Russia and Ukraine, European leaders have said.In a statement, the leaders of the UK, France, Germany and eight other European countries said troops from a “coalition of the willing” with US support could “assist in the regeneration of Ukraine’s forces, in securing Ukraine’s skies, and in supporting safer seas, including through operating inside Ukraine”. Continue reading...Donald Trump sues BBC for up to $10bn over edit of January 6 speech
President accuses corporation of ‘intentionally, maliciously and deceptively’ editing speech in Panorama broadcastDonald Trump has filed a lawsuit against the BBC over its editing of a speech he made to supporters in Washington before they stormed the US Capitol in 2021, requesting up to $10bn in damages.The US president alleged the broadcaster “intentionally, maliciously, and deceptively” edited his 6 January speech before the insurrection, in an episode of Panorama just over a year ago. Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/dec/15/trump-bbc-lawsuit
Trump urges Xi Jinping to free HK pro-democracy media tycoon Jimmy Lai
US president says he feels ‘so badly’ about Lai’s conviction and has spoken to the Chinese leader about itDonald Trump has said he wants Chinese leader Xi Jinping to release Jimmy Lai as he voiced sadness over the Hong Kong media mogul’s conviction on national security charges.“I feel so badly. I spoke to President Xi about it, and I asked to consider his release,” Trump told reporters on Monday, without specifying when he asked Xi. Continue reading...US puts £31bn tech ‘prosperity deal’ with Britain on ice
Pledge to invest billions in UK paused, with Washington citing lack of progress on trade barriers across pondThe US has paused its promised multi-billion-pound investment into British tech over trade disagreements, marking a serious setback in US-UK relations.The £31bn “tech prosperity deal”, hailed by Keir Starmer as “a generational stepchange in our relationship with the US” when it was announced during Donald Trump’s state visit, has been put on ice by Washington. Continue reading...India’s electoral roll revision threatens democracy and Muslims, say critics
Opposition claims SIR process being used to disenfranchise minority groups to benefit Narendra Modi’s governmentIndia’s political opposition has warned that democracy is under threat amid a controversial exercise to revise the voter register across the country, which critics say will disenfranchise minority voters and entrench the power of the ruling Narendra Modi government.An debate erupted in India’s parliament last week over the special intensive revision (SIR) process, which is taking place in nine states and three union territories, in one of the biggest revisions of the country’s electoral roll in decades. Continue reading...Rachael Carpani, McLeod’s Daughters and Home and Away actor, dies ‘unexpectedly but peacefully’ aged 45
The beloved Australian actor died on 7 December after a battle with chronic illnessGet our weekend culture and lifestyle emailMcLeod’s Daughters and Home and Away actor Rachael Carpani has died, aged 45, her family has announced.A statement from her parents, shared by her sister on Instagram on Monday, said that the actor had “unexpectedly but peacefully passed away after a long battle with chronic illness in the early hours of Sunday 7th December”. Her exact cause of death was not made public.Sign up for our rundown of must-reads, pop culture and tips for the weekend, every Saturday morning Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2025/dec/16/rachael-carpani-actor-dies-aged-45
With their dead ‘still lying before them’, Sydney’s Jewish community searches for a way forward
‘I would hope that as a response, a million people were willing to march around this country … to stand up and say that antisemitism has no place here’Victims of Bondi beach terror attackBondi terror attack: full reportFollow our Australia news live blog for latest updatesRabbi Benjamin Elton was driving back from co-officiating a wedding in Jervis Bay – a picturesque beach location about three hours south of Sydney – when he started to get the messages.His WhatsApp groups buzzed with reports – some accurate, some not – about an attack in Bondi, about the number and names of the wounded and dead. Continue reading...The rise and fall of Jimmy Lai, whose trajectory mirrored that of Hong Kong itself
Progressing from child labourer to billionaire, Lai used his power and wealth to promote democracy, which ultimately pitted him against authorities in BeijingOn Monday, a Hong Kong court convicted Jimmy Lai of national security offences, the end to a landmark trial for the city and its hobbled protest movement.The verdict was expected. Long a thorn in the side of Beijing, Lai, a 78-year-old media tycoon and activist, was a primary target of the most recent and definitive crackdown on Hong Kong’s pro-democracy movement. Authorities cast him as a traitor and a criminal. Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/dec/15/jimmy-lai-rise-fall-hong-kong-itself
Chile’s new far-right head is latest Latin American leader to ride hardline wave to power
From the US to Hungary to Argentina, rightwing leaders are praising José Antonio Kast’s win in Chile’s presidential raceJosé Antonio Kast’s victory in Chile’s presidential election has been widely praised by leaders of the global right, with congratulations coming from the US secretary of state Marco Rubio, Hungary’s Viktor Orbán, Italy’s Giorgia Meloni, Argentina’s Javier Milei and X’s Elon Musk.The son of a Nazi party member, a father of nine and a staunch Catholic known for opposing abortion and same-sex marriage, Kast won 58.16% of the vote in the runoff – more than 2m votes than the leftist Jeannette Jara, a former labour minister under the current president, Gabriel Boric. Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/dec/15/jose-antonio-kast-chile-election-analysis
Bump: A Christmas Film review – the most masochistic holiday ever?
Oly and Santi take their newborn on a hellish cruise halfway around the world. But amid the torture there are beautiful moments to treasure in this much-loved Aussie drama As a teenager, Oly Chalmers-Davis weathered her fair share of motherhood-related horrors. For a start, the high-achieving 16-year-old went into labour in the school toilets, having not even realised she was pregnant. Not long afterwards, she was forced to tell her boyfriend he wasn’t the father – the baby was the product of a fling with another classmate. Then, unable to entertain the prospect of her perfect grades slipping, she decided to juggle studying with looking after a newborn, all the while navigating mastitis, mockery from her classmates (including some inventively mean-spirited memes) and a rocky on-off romance with her child’s dad, Santi.After five series following Oly (Nathalie Morris) and Santi (Carlos Sanson Jr) as they struggled to adjust to parenthood, hit Australian comedy-drama Bump wrapped things up last December – yet we were left on a cliffhanger. Recently married and with little Jacinda (Ava Cannon) well into primary school, the pair were preparing to welcome another child. Now the show is back for a feature-length festive special, picking up the story eight weeks after the birth of their son. Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2025/dec/16/bump-a-christmas-film-review-bbc-one-iplayer
The inexorable rise of voice notes: ‘I’m thinking of you – I just don’t want to speak to you’
Britons now send an average of 58 hours’ worth of these messages a year. But what about the recipients who are experiencing ‘voice note fatigue’?Name: Voice notes.Age: About 14. Continue reading...‘Lunch could last all day – and night’: inside Coco Chanel’s sun-kissed sanctum for art’s superstars
The French fashion designer’s lavish Mediterranean villa was frequented by everyone from Dalí to Garbo to Stravinsky to Churchill. It has now been lovingly restored – with a thrillingly bolstered libraryIt is the place where Salvador Dalí painted The Enigma of Hitler, a haunting landscape featuring a giant telephone receiver that seems to be crying a tear over a cutout picture of the Fuhrer. Conceived in 1939, the work seems to anticipate war. It is also the place where Winston Churchill penned parts of his multi-volume A History of the English-Speaking Peoples, and painted its dappled-light view. Somerset Maugham would visit, too, as well as novelist Colette, composer Igor Stravinsky and playwright Jean Cocteau, partaking in lunches that lasted all day and night, with debates and discussions around artistic ideas.This place is La Pausa: the Mediterranean villa in the hills of Roquebrune-Cap-Martin, once owned by husband-and-wife writing duo Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson, followed by French fashion designer Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel, who had it rebuilt from scratch at the end of the 1920s. She later sold it to an American publishing couple, Emery and Wendy Reves. Continue reading...Around the world, anti-Jewish hate is growing. In Bondi, we see the tragic results | Dave Rich
After the latest in a series of deadly attacks on the global Jewish community, Jews are angry. And we have good reason to beDave Rich is director of policy at the Community Security TrustHeaton Park, Boulder, Washington DC – and now Bondi beach. Add the murders of Rabbi Zvi Kogan in the UAE and Ziv Kipper, an Israeli-Canadian businessman, in Egypt, and Jews have been killed on five continents since the 7 October 2023 attack by Hamas upended the Middle East and unleashed a wave of antisemitism around the world. Anti-Jewish terrorism is now a global problem, as is the hateful extremism that drives it.The death toll from the appalling atrocity in Sydney is shocking enough: at the time of writing, 15 people killed, including a child, and many more injured. Awful images circulate, as they always do. The mobile phone footage of two gunmen calmly taking aim at families enjoying a Hanukah party is utterly chilling. It takes a special kind of dehumanisation, an ideology of pure hatred and self-righteous conviction, to do that.Dave Rich is director of policy at the Community Security Trust and the author of Everyday Hate: How Antisemitism is Built into Our World – and How You Can Change itDo you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. Continue reading...At Bondi, every Jewish person’s worst nightmare came true. Can we still have a safe future in Australia? | Dean Sherr
Condemning a terrorist attack is easy. We need the condemnation, and the solidarity, but we also need actionBeing Jewish in Australia today feels very different to when I was a child.Growing up, it was about family, community, culture. It was about our customs, cuisine, our shared history and connectedness. Continue reading...The US supreme court’s TikTok ruling is a scandal | Evelyn Douek and Jameel Jaffer
The decision means TikTok now operates under the threat that it could be forced offline with a stroke of Trump’s penJudicial opinions allowing the government to suppress speech in the name of national security rarely stand the test of time. But time has been unusually unkind to the US supreme court decision that upheld the law banning TikTok, the short-form video platform. The court issued its ruling less than a year ago, but it is already obvious that the deference the court gave to the government’s national security arguments was spectacularly misplaced. The principal effect of the court’s ruling has been to give our own government enormous power over the policies of a speech platform used by tens of millions of Americans every day – a result that is an affront to the first amendment and a national security risk in its own right.Congress passed the TikTok ban in 2023 citing concerns that the Chinese government might be able to access information about TikTok’s American users or covertly manipulate content on the platform in ways that threatened US interests. The ban was designed to prevent Americans from using TikTok starting in January 2025 unless TikTok’s China-based corporate owner, ByteDance Inc, sold its US subsidiary before then.Evelyn Douek is an assistant professor at Stanford Law SchoolJameel Jaffer is inaugural director of the Knight first amendment institute at Columbia University Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/dec/15/supreme-court-tiktok-ruling
It’s the media’s job to hold power to account. This year, too many got into bed with it instead | Arwa Mahdawi
The lines between advertising, public relations and journalism have become dangerously blurredFunded by readers, the Guardian’s fierce independence is guaranteed. Please help us reach our year-end fundraising goalEnough time has passed now, I think, that I can safely tell you about one of the stupidest things I have ever done. Almost a decade ago I decided to quit my well-paid job in advertising in order to pursue a precarious career in freelance journalism. The merits of that decision are up for debate but the real stupidity is in how I quit my job: I wrote a rather cringeworthy column for the Guardian about my “meaningless job in advertising” and publicly proclaimed that I’d decided to quit. My boss saw the piece and, well, he obviously wasn’t happy. (Sorry, Sean!)I bring this embarrassing anecdote up because I’ve been doing a lot of reflecting recently on the reasons why I left advertising. Maybe this sounds twee, but I was sick of selling people things they didn’t need. I wanted to do something meaningful. Continue reading...A potato is for life, not just for Christmas | Emma Beddington
Yes, we love our roasties – but have we really explored the spud’s potential as a gift, an aesthetic, a mood?All I want for Christmas is … the Nairn Museum potato flask. Showcased as part of the Highland museum’s virtual Advent calendar on Instagram last week, it’s a late-18th-century Staffordshire pottery flask – to be filled with strong drink and used to toast a safe journey for a traveller – shaped like a very realistic, knobbly spud, complete with green bits. The benefactor who donated the flask apparently explained it was so ugly that no one in his family wanted to inherit it.More than 15,000 Instagram likers beg to differ, including me: I desperately covet this beauteous and useful tuber, surely the ideal emotional support accessory for the season’s more trying social engagements. As the museum’s representative explains, the potato was “seen as a very fashionable vegetable” back then, and I think we need to think hard about that: why isn’t it now? It might be the most valuable player on the Christmas dining table (don’t even think about arguing), but it’s cruelly taken for granted. Have we ever considered the potato as a gift, an aesthetic, a mood? Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/dec/15/a-potato-is-for-life-not-just-for-christmas
The Guardian view on combating Europe’s national populists: protect the less well-off from the winds of change | Editorial
As EU countries face multiple challenges in a new era, they must fight to preserve the continent’s social model. That means a new economic approachMore than a year after the election that handed Donald Trump a decisive comeback victory, the Democratic party has still not released its postmortem analysis. But last week, an influential progressive lobby group published its own. Kamala Harris’s campaign, its authors argued, failed to connect with core constituencies because it did not focus enough on addressing basic economic anxieties. By prioritising the menace to democracy that Maga authoritarianism represented, progressives neglected the bread-and-butter issues that were uppermost in many people’s minds.As the EU braces for a tumultuous period of politics between now and the end of the decade, that is a lesson that needs to be fully absorbed in Brussels, Paris and Berlin. The White House, as its recently published national security strategy makes clear, is hopeful that “patriotic” parties in Europe will soon replicate Mr Trump’s success. In the EU’s Franco-German engine room, Marine Le Pen’s National Rally (RN) and Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) lead the polls, backed by large swaths of blue-collar voters. But among mainstream leaders and parties, it is hard to discern a response that is adequate to troubling times. Continue reading...The Guardian view on birth influencers: the public need protecting from bad advice | Editorial
Our investigation of the Free Birth Society points to problems with maternity care and the role played by technologyDespite all the proven advances of modern medicine, some people are drawn to alternative or “natural” cures and practices. Many of these do no harm. As the cancer specialist Prof Chris Pyke noted last year, people undergoing cancer treatment will often try meditation or vitamins as well. When such a change is in addition to, and not instead of, evidence-based treatment, this is usually not a problem. If it reduces distress, it can help.But the proliferation of online health influencers poses challenges that governments and regulators in many countries have yet to grasp. The Guardian’s investigation into the Free Birth Society (FBS), a business offering membership and advice to expectant mothers, and training for “birth keepers”, has exposed 48 cases of late-term stillbirths or other serious harm involving mothers or birth attendants who appear to be linked to FBS. While the company is based in North Carolina, its reach is international. In the UK, the NHS only recently removed a webpage linking to a charity “factsheet” that recommended FBS materials.Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. Continue reading...Manchester United and Bournemouth share thrills and spills in eight-goal extravaganza
From near-total control to collapse to late Bruno Fernandes and Matheus Cunha goals that seemed to put Manchester United on the right end of a 4-3 festive thriller. But then, yet more horrific defending allowed Eli Junior Kroupi, on as a substitute, to score Bournemouth’s third equaliser and the points were shared.Fernandes’s strike was a pinpoint curled free-kick and Cunha’s finish came 120 seconds later when Benjamin Sesko’s cross from the left hit Adrien Truffert and diverted into the Brazilian’s path. Continue reading...England face daunting task as Ashes series resumes in shadow of tragedy
Sunday’s events in Bondi have stunned Australia and the watching world before a third Test that could be a decisive one for this England team’s legacyAdelaide may be 1,300km to the west of Bondi but the sense of pain in the city has been no less for the distance. People are in shock here trying to make sense of the horrors that unfolded on Sunday evening – a day that was supposed to be one of celebration for Sydney’s Jewish community.As the first national public event being staged in Australia since, the third Ashes Test that starts here on Wednesday will play out to a sombre backdrop. The flags at Adelaide Oval will fly at half-mast, a minute’s silence will be observed before the toss, while players are likely to wear black armbands throughout. Inevitably, security for the match has been increased.It will doubtless be an emotional week for Australia’s players and not least given the number of links to New South Wales within their squad. Nathan Lyon summed up the helplessness many were feeling on Monday, offering thoughts and prayers to those affected before admitting: “Nothing I’m going to say right now is going to make anyone feel any better.” Continue reading...
Suns’ Brooks ejected as he clashes with LeBron James again in Lakers’ last-gasp win
Pair have history going back to 2023 playoffsLos Angeles blow 20-point lead in fourth quarterLeBron James made two free throws with 3.9 seconds left, Luka Dončić scored 29 points and the Los Angeles Lakers recovered from blowing a 20-point lead in the fourth quarter to top the Phoenix Suns 116-114 on Sunday night.Phoenix trailed 99-79 with 7:48 left, but took a 114-113 lead with 12.2 seconds left on Dillon Brooks’s three-pointer over James, who made contact with Brooks after the shot. Brooks bumped James on the way back down the court, earning his second technical foul and an ejection.More importantly, it gave the Lakers a free throw, but James missed the shot. On the ensuing possession, James was fouled on a three-point attempt by Devin Booker with 3.9 seconds left. The 40-year-old James – who finished with 26 points – missed the first free throw but made the final two to give the Lakers a 115-114 lead. Phoenix’s Grayson Allen got up an awkward shot at the buzzer, but it was blocked by James. Continue reading...
Philip Rivers: how a 44-year-old grandpa nearly pulled off one of the NFL’s greatest comebacks
The Colts quarterback was coaching high school football before his surprise return. And he showed brains are almost important as brawn at his positionIs quarterback the most demanding position in sports? It’s close enough to make no difference: players must memorize a complicated playbook, orchestrate an entire offense, scan for open receivers while 280lb opponents sprint toward them with violent intent, and then thread a pass to a target who could be 30 yards downfield amid a crowd of defenders. Now try doing all that as a 44-year-old grandfather, exactly 1,800 days since you last started an NFL game.Philip Rivers broke a historic streak for the Indianapolis Colts on Sunday. The longest layoff between games before then belonged to another 44-year-old quarterback who returned to action after years out of the game, and some time in coaching – Steve DeBerg for the Atlanta Falcons in 1998. Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2025/dec/15/philip-rivers-indianapolis-colts-nfl-return
By not explaining 'worst 48 hours' Enzo Maresca has put himself at even greater risk | Jacob Steinberg
Manager’s comments on Saturday have left Chelsea baffled and the Italian in dangerIf Enzo Maresca was interested in ending speculation that he has a problem with elements of Chelsea’s hierarchy then he would have done so on Monday . Instead the Italian made no attempt to clear up a situation entirely of his own making.He rebuffed questions about his cryptic response to beating Everton on Saturday and even reacted with exasperation when he was asked if he regretted saying a lack of support from unspecified people had put him through his “worst 48 hours” since joining the club. Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/football/2025/dec/15/worst-48-hours-enzo-maresca-at-risk-chelsea
How the Guardian ranked the 100 best male footballers in the world 2025
Didi Hamann, Romário and Dunga were part of our 219-strong voting panel to decide who should make our list this yearIf someone, back in 1994, had said that at one point in my life I would work on a project selecting the world’s best footballers together with Romário, I would not have believed them.That summer I was living in Rosersberg, seeing Sweden make their way to a World Cup semi-final, watching the late games at the local Blå Laguna pizza restaurant. Tommy Svensson’s team finally came unstuck against a Brazil side not only containing the wonderful Romário, but also Bebeto, Dunga, Jorginho and Raí. Brazil went on to win the World Cup, beating Italy on penalties in the final. Continue reading...Harry Kane’s penalty rescues Bayern as Mainz defy the odds with heroic point
Urs Fischer’s side are certain to begin 2026 bottom of the table but denied rampaging leaders victory at home Sometimes the numbers really don’t say it all. Mainz were on the wrong end of many of them as Sunday evening drew in, as you would expect for a visit of almost any team to the Allianz Arena, never mind a struggler. They had the lowest share of possession of any Bundesliga team in a game since the statistics were first recorded – 15%. When they did have the ball, fewer than 60% of their passes were actually completed. Are you sure you can face looking at the xG after that? Mainz logged a respectable 1.07, but Bayern Munich’s was a staggering 4.72.And yet, even if the most deflating statistical confirmation of all is that Mainz are certain to begin 2026 bottom of the table (even with a game still to play before Christmas), they have every right to feel good about themselves, even after conceding a late penalty equaliser to the inevitable Harry Kane. In Urs Fischer’s debut after being appointed as the new head coach Mainz became the first team to prevent Bayern from taking maximum points at home this season, and the first last-placed team to take a point at the venue since relegation-bound Köln in April 2006. Continue reading...Inter go top as Serie A rejects slow and steady in favour of emotional ride
Cristian Chivu’s side are yet to draw a game this season while Milan continue to drop points against the minnows“The reality is different to the narrative,” declared Cristian Chivu in his press conference just before a 2-1 win away to Genoa sent Inter top of the table. Fresh off back-to-back Champions League defeats, albeit in controversial circumstances, and having lost four Serie A games in the first 14 rounds, his approach to criticism was bullish. “Despite what people say, in my view we are having a great season. We started under a magnifying glass, because people said we were failures and we were finished, but we are still up there.”Looking at the standings, it is rather hard to disagree with him. Inter are the sole leaders, the first time all campaign they have been in this position. Even with those setbacks against Atlético Madrid and Liverpool, they remain in a strong position to secure a top-eight Champions League spot and will participate in the Supercoppa Italiana in Riyadh this week. Continue reading...Nice plunged into crisis after fans’ dissent goes too far in physical assault
Ineos-owned club must pick up the pieces as hundreds of supporters hit and spit on players after sixth straight lossBy Get French Football NewsFootball is often lauded for its capacity to bring people together but in Nice, it has also laid bare its capacity to tear a city apart.It’s a Sunday night, and the Nice players and staff have just landed back in the Côte d’Azur after another defeat, their sixth in succession in all competitions. It wasn’t just the loss but the manner of it, and who it came against. “We lost at Lorient, a team that should be relegated. We’re rubbish, we know it,” said a visibly-emotional Sofiane Diop as the midfielder pleaded with the travelling fans after the 3-1 defeat on 30 November. Continue reading...Congresswoman Ilhan Omar says ICE agents pulled over her son in Minnesota
Representative says her son was let go once he showed ID as Trump ramps up operation targeting Somali population in MinneapolisDemocratic congresswoman Ilhan Omar told a Minneapolis broadcaster that her son had been stopped over the weekend by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents, after Donald Trump ordered an operation targeting the Minnesota city’s Somali population.“Yesterday, after he made a stop at Target, he did get pulled over by [ICE] agents, and once he was able to produce his passport ID, they did let him go,” Omar said on Sunday in an interview with WCCO. Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/dec/15/ilhan-omar-son-ice-minnesota
Machado suffered vertebra fracture on secret trip from Venezuela to Norway
Opposition leader and Nobel peace prize laureate’s injury was reportedly sustained during high-risk sea crossingVenezuelan opposition leader and Nobel peace prize laureate María Corina Machado suffered a vertebra fracture during her secret journey from Venezuela to Norway last week, her spokesperson has confirmed.Machado previously said she feared for her life during the perilous voyage to receive her award in Oslo. Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/dec/15/maria-corina-machado-venezuela-norway
Women who say they were tricked into servitude for Opus Dei to meet in Argentina
Pope urged organisers to hold conference after 43 women alleged they were exploited as minors by Catholic groupBuenos Aires will on Tuesday host the first-ever international gathering of former Opus Dei members who say they were tricked and trafficked into domestic servitude as minors – allegations that have drawn scrutiny of the powerful, secretive Catholic group. Pope Leo XIV privately urged organisers to convene the conference, the Guardian has learned.Forty-three women in Argentina say they were lured to Opus Dei schools as children and teenagers under promises of receiving an education. Instead, they say they were forced into working up to 12-hour days, cooking and cleaning for the elite male members, without pay. Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/dec/15/women-say-tricked-servitude-opus-dei-to-meet-argentina
Elon Musk’s net worth hits estimated $600bn as SpaceX prepares for IPO
Startup valuation, likely to go public at $800bn, will bolster Musk’s wealth to an estimated $677bn, according to ForbesElon Musk on Monday became the first person ever worth $600bn, according to Forbes. The news comes on the heels of reports that his SpaceX startup was likely to go public at a valuation of $800bn.Musk, who was the first to surpass $500bn in net worth in October, owns an estimated 42% stake in SpaceX, which is preparing to go public next year. No other person has hit the $500bn mark. Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/dec/15/elon-musk-net-worth-spacex-ipo
Biden bowl or Milei statuette, anyone? Meloni to put world leaders’ gifts up for auction
Italian prime minister’s charity sale may also feature presents from Narendra Modi, Viktor Orbán and Volodymyr ZelenskyyPassing on unwanted presents might be considered a little discourteous – unless it’s done the right way.Italy’s prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, will offload 270 gifts given to her by world leaders during her travels abroad, which could include a chainsaw-wielding statuette of Javier Milei, the Argentinian president, or a pair of blue python skin shoes with gold heels, in a charity auction. Continue reading...Glaciers to reach peak rate of extinction in the Alps in eight years
Climate crisis forecast to wipe out thousands of glaciers a year globally, threatening water supplies and cultural heritageEurope live – latest updatesGlaciers in the European Alps are likely to reach their peak rate of extinction in only eight years, according to a study, with more than 100 due to melt away permanently by 2033. Glaciers in the western US and Canada are forecast to reach their peak year of loss less than a decade later, with more than 800 disappearing each year by then.The melting of glaciers driven by human-caused global heating is one of the clearest signs of the climate crisis. Communities around the world have already held funeral ceremonies for lost glaciers, and a Global Glacier Casualty List records the names and histories of those that have vanished. Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/dec/15/alpine-glaciers-rate-extinction-climate-crisis
‘I consider him my first son’: how living with a baby monkey taught me I’m ready to be a dad
I went from selling flats in Paris to being alone in a cabin in Guinea looking after primates. It changed my life, but one relationship marked me like no otherIn 2022, I had a job at an estate agents in Paris selling ridiculously expensive flats, and decided I needed to do something more meaningful with my life. I resigned, and six months later arrived in Guinea.In hindsight I was a young kid, full of anger, not happy with his life. That 26-year-old is definitely not me now – and it was living with primates that changed my life. Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/dec/15/baby-monkey-jungle-guinea-monkeys-aoe
Chances of EU trucking industry hitting zero emissions targets are dire, says industry body
Only 10,000 out of economic bloc’s 6m trucks are electric and are more likely to be operating on short routesBusiness live – latest updatesThe chances of the European trucking industry hitting zero emissions targets are “dire”, an industry body has warned, as it emerged that only a tiny amount of lorries delivering goods in the EU are electric.Speaking as the European Commission prepares to water down electric car targets, the boss of the association for commercial vehicles called on the commission to commit to an urgent review of the sector, tackling problems including a lack of public charging points, a lack of tax breaks for trucks and high energy costs. Continue reading...Weather tracker: Bushfires ravage Western Australia as temperatures soar
Extreme heat follows blazes in New South Wales, while winds plunge Brazil’s largest city into darknessExtreme heat and bushfires have ravaged the parched landscape of Western Australia. With temperatures expected to continue soaring above 40C (104F) over the coming days, the Bureau of Meteorology has issued a severe heatwave warning across much of the south-west.The conditions follow bushfires in New South Wales this month, which resulted in the destruction of homes and loss of life. Severe heatwave warnings have also been issued for later this week in parts of South Australia and New South Wales, as a ridge of high pressure moves eastward, bringing blazing sunshine to much of the region. Continue reading...UK and South Korea sign new trade deal aimed at cars, salmon and Guinness
Government says arrangement will bring in extra £400m on top of more than £15bn of existing annual trade with KoreaThe UK has signed a new trade deal with South Korea designed to increase exports of cars, Scottish salmon and Guinness canned in Britain.Keir Starmer described the deal, which replaces an existing agreement, as “a huge win for British business and working people”. It follows UK deals with India and the US, and the free trade agreement with the EU clinched this year. Continue reading...Man who drove into Liverpool FC parade was ‘in a rage’, court told
Paul Doyle, 54, is due to be sentenced on Tuesday after admitting 31 offences against 21 adults and eight childrenA former Royal Marine was a “man in a rage” as he mowed down dozens of Liverpool football club fans at a victory parade in what many feared was a terrorist attack, a court has heard.Victims of Paul Doyle wept as dashcam footage showed bodies spinning through the air as he accelerated into crowds while screaming: “Fucking hell, move!” Continue reading...Mother appeals for help to find daughter abducted from UK to Jamaica
Tau Rodriguez-Fairplay, five, taken in February by mother’s former spouse, is believed to be in town hit by hurricaneA UK-based mother whose five-year old daughter was abducted and taken to Jamaica is appealing for help to locate the missing child. Tau Rodriguez-Fairplay is believed to have been hidden in the town of Black River, which was devastated by Hurricane Melissa in October.Her mother, Samar Rodriguez, a London School of Economics lecturer in human rights and gender, said Tau had been missing since early February. Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/dec/15/tau-rodriguez-fairplay-abducted-uk-jamaica
Young people bearing brunt of UK jobs downturn, thinktank warns
Resolution Foundation report comes in week when data is expected to show October unemployment riseYoung people are bearing the brunt of Britain’s jobs downturn, according to a report, before official figures this week that are expected to show the UK unemployment rate rising to 5.1%.The Resolution Foundation thinktank said a “jobs deficit” was pushing a growing number of graduates and non-graduates into unemployment as employers reduced hiring. Continue reading...‘This has shaken us’: Providence on edge as manhunt for students’ killer goes on
Tension mixes with grief and frustration at Brown University in Rhode Island as police search for suspectWhat we know so far about the attack in Providence, Rhode IslandTension mixed with grief and frustration in Providence on Monday around the Brown University campus, after authorities said they were still searching for a suspect who killed two students.Nine additional students were injured in Saturday’s shooting on the Ivy League campus in Rhode Island, which is woven into the heart of the city’s East Side neighborhood, a community that to many feels more like a small town than the capital city of the smallest state in the US. Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/dec/15/brown-university-shooting-providence
Europe’s housing costs akin to ‘new pandemic’, warns Barcelona mayor
Jaume Collboni and 16 other city leaders urge EU to unleash billions in funding as it prepares to tackle crisisThe Guardian view on Europe’s housing crisis: time for the EU to get radicalThe soaring cost of housing is akin to a “new pandemic” sweeping across Europe, the mayor of Barcelona has said, as he and 16 other city leaders urged the EU to respond to the crisis by unleashing billions in funding for the hardest-hit areas.The EU is expected to present its first-ever housing plan on Tuesday, after consultations with experts, stakeholders and the public. For months, those on the frontlines of the crisis have warned the problem is too big to ignore. Continue reading...‘It’s a timebomb’: Ghana grapples with mass exodus of nurses as thousands head to the west
An estimated 6,000 nurses left in 2024 for roles in countries including the US, UK, Canada, and Australia. Three nurses explain what made them decide to leave or stayWhen Bright Ansah, a nursing officer in Accra, goes searching for colleagues who have failed to show up for a shift at the overstretched hospital where he works, he knows where to look. “When you see ‘In God we trust’ on their WhatsApp status, that’s when you know they’re already in the US,” he says.The motto of the US has been co-opted by Ghanaian medical professionals who are leaving the west African nation in droves. Many believe their faith has finally been rewarded when, after years of planning, they reach the promised land of the well-equipped, well-resourced hospitals of the US. Continue reading...Washington state orders immediate evacuations in three Seattle suburbs
Orders come after a levee is breached following a week of heavy rain amid a flash-flood warningOfficials in Washington state ordered immediate evacuations in three south Seattle suburbs on Monday after a levee failed following a week of heavy rains.The evacuation order from King county covered homes and businesses east of the Green River in parts of Kent, Auburn and Tukwila. Continue reading...‘Fans stole my underwear – and even my car aerial’: how Roxette made It Must Have Been Love
‘We had 2,000 people outside our hotel room in Buenos Aires singing our songs all night. David Coulthard later told me that all the Formula One drivers were staying there and were annoyed because they couldn’t sleep’In my early 20s, I was in the biggest band in Sweden. But after Gyllene Tider [Golden Times] collapsed, I was depressed for two years. At first, Roxette only got together when Marie Fredriksson, our singer, wasn’t busy with solo stuff. To keep her in the band, I needed to make it successful, so I was very motivated. Continue reading...‘A lot of stories but very few facts’: sceptics push back on buzzy UFO documentary
The Age of Disclosure was granted a Capitol Hill screening and has broken digital rental records but does it really offer proof of alien life?It has been hailed as a game changer in public attitudes towards UFOs, ending a culture of silence around claims once dismissed as the preserve of conspiracy theorists and crackpots.The Age of Disclosure has been boosted in its effort to shift the conversation about extraterrestrials from the fringe to the mainstream with a Capitol Hill screening and considerable commercial success. It broke the record for highest-grossing documentary on Amazon’s Prime Video within 48 hours of its release, Deadline reported this week. Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/film/2025/dec/15/the-age-of-disclosure-ufo-documentary
Tell Me Softly review – high-school romance of bad boys and blurred boundaries
Social-media fame and sexual intrigue collide in this part-Twilight, part-OC romantic drama whose provocative dramatic set-ups feel as glib as porn scenesHere is a Spanish YA romance based on a novel by Mercedes Ron, famous (or perhaps notorious) for the My/Your/Our Fault saga. This time, we have Kami (Alícia Falcó), a confident, attractive cheerleader at her local high school with a huge following on social media, and an angry jock boyfriend who is none too pleased when her attention wanders towards a couple of handsome brothers who have just begun attending the school. Younger brother Thiago (Fernando Lindez) is in the same year as Kami, while the older Taylor (Diego Vidales) joins as a coach, and immediately begins behaving in a variety of ways inappropriate to his pastoral role. It quickly emerges that Kami and the brothers have some sort of dark and contentious history, hinted at in flashbacks and gradually revealed in full across the course of the run time.Coming off like a scrambled-together mix of the love-triangle elements of Twilight with the elite social milieu of The OC, much is made of the idea that Kami is attracted to both brothers, despite Thiago being a sweet lad who is clearly into Kami, and Taylor being someone who is constantly brooding and growling and treating everybody badly. It doesn’t really seem like all that tough of a choice, though the film runs hard with the idea that Taylor’s behaviour, which contains enough red flags to supply bunting to an entire village fete, is justified by the strength of his feelings. Hmm. Continue reading...‘Apocalyptically funny’: why The Mitchells vs the Machines is my feelgood movie
The latest in our series of writers explaining their comfort watches is a celebration of 2021’s acclaimed animated adventureAnimation is a great way of allowing you to experience the world through the eyes of another, complete with the colour, energy, imagination and chaos that this can bring. It’s true whether you’re looking at the world from the perspective of a frustrated and talented teenage girl, or from that of a megalomaniacal rogue AI who dreams of blasting every human on Earth into space in tiny hexagonal pods (with free wifi!). Such is the chaotic and sensational combination of styles that fuels animated road-trip riot The Mitchells vs the Machines, a film that crams a father-daughter conflict, a techno-apocalypse, Olivia Colman, and every colour of the rainbow into a burnt-orange 1993 station wagon.Phil Lord and Christopher Miller produce with the same kind of free-spirited approach that characterised the likes of The Lego Movie and Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. It’s then balanced out by Gravity Falls’ Mike Rianda and Jeff Rowe, who complement the zaniness with a nuanced, gentle and heartfelt story, making it more than just a superficial display of artistry. The Mitchells vs the Machines is not just a story of the relationships people have with one another, but those we have with technology and our past selves. Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/film/2025/dec/15/the-mitchells-vs-the-machines-feelgood-movie
The Great Flood review – Korean apocalypse movie swerves into sinister sci-fi territory
The storytelling is brittle, but there is still enjoyment to be had from this story of a mother and child and rescue from a catastrophic flood in SeoulKim Byung-woo’s chimeric but not unenjoyable sixth feature begins like a normal apocalypse movie, with a deluge inundating Seoul. Then it flirts with taking on social stratification baggage as a beleaguered mother tries to climb up her 30-storey apartment block to escape the rising flood waters. But once it is revealed that An-na (Kim Da-mi) is a second-ranking science officer for an indispensable research project, the film becomes a different beast entirely – possibly something quite insidious.As the film gats under way, An-na’s swimming-obsessed six-year-old son Ja-in (Kwon Eun-seong) sees his dreams come true when water begins flooding their apartment. Along with everyone else, they begin pounding the stairs – before corporate security officer Hee-jo (Park Hae-soo) catches up with them and explains that an asteroid impact in Antarctica is causing catastrophic rains that will end civilisation. But a helicopter is en route to evacuate her and Ja-in, because she is one of the pioneering minds who have been at work in a secret UN lab that holds the key to humanity’s future. Continue reading...The Christmas Dream review – Thailand’s first musical in decades is big on sentimental spectacle
A festive musical blends fairytale optimism with lush orchestration and Sound of Music sweetness – even if this often overwhelms a thin storylineReported to be the first Thai musical in 50 years, The Christmas Dream is directed by Englishman Paul Spurrier, and is an intriguing blend of new and old: a modern Oliver Twist that progresses from the country’s northern hills to Bangkok, with old-school Technicolor trappings and emotionally lush showstoppers aplenty (written by Spurrier and set to an orchestral score by Mickey Wongsathapornpat).With a Michelle Yeoh-like resoluteness but half her size, Amata Masmalai plays 10-year-old schoolgirl Lek, who is forced to flee after her abusive stepfather Nin (Only God Forgives’ Vithaya Pansringarm) fatally beats her mother (Chomphupak Poonpol). Hitting the road with her one-legged doll Bella for company, Lek has only a strong moral compass to guide her to the new home she is promised by her mum’s ghost. A number of picaresque companions put it to the test, including a spoiled rich girl (Kathaya Chongprasith) desperate for a friend and a quack doctor (Adam Kaokept) hawking dodgy cure-alls. Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/film/2025/dec/15/the-christmas-dream-review-thailand-musical
The 50 best albums of 2025
The year’s finest LPs as decided by 30 Guardian music writers – from a slip’n’slide through British club culture to a UK rapper like none before her • More on the best culture of 2025*** Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/music/ng-interactive/2025/dec/08/the-best-albums-of-2025-50-41
‘Happy by Pharrell is exceedingly annoying – but I love it’: DJ Roger Sanchez’s honest playlist
The Another Chance star does Journey at karaoke and gets the party started with Daft Punk. But which Stevie Wonder track would he like played at his funeral?The first song I fell in love withI grew up in New York City, so the emergence of hip-hop really connected with me when I was a kid. Rapper’s Delight by the Sugarhill Gang started me down the road where I am today.The first single I boughtLet No Man Put Asunder by First Choice, on 12-inch vinyl from Rock and Soul in New York City, with money I’d saved from working part-time at the grocery store. Continue reading...‘Harder work than almost any album we ever did’: Pink Floyd’s Wish You Were Here turns 50
As the classic album hits 50, Nick Mason talks about the often difficult process of making it and how it has since fit into their larger catalogueBy almost every measure, from commercial reward to creative reach, Pink Floyd scaled its peak on Dark Side of the Moon. But, when I asked drummer Nick Mason how he would rank the album in their catalogue, he slotted it below the set that came next, Wish You Were Here. Speaking of Dark Side, he said, “the idea of it is almost more attractive than the individual songs on it. I feel slightly the same about Sgt. Pepper. It’s an amazing album that taught us a hell of a lot, but the individual parts are not quite as exciting, or as good, as some of the other Beatles’ albums.”By contrast, he says of Wish You Were Here, “there’s something in the general atmosphere it generates – the space of it, the air around it, that’s really special,” he said. “It’s one of the reasons I view it so affectionately.” Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/music/2025/dec/12/50-years-pink-floyd-wish-you-were-here-album
Add to playlist: the slow-burn psychedelia of Acolyte and the week’s best new tracks
Unhurried trippy bass lines and poet Iona Lee’s commanding, velvety voice conjure a glamorously unhurried sense of hypnosisFrom EdinburghRecommended if you like Dry Cleaning, Massive Attack, Nick CaveUp next Warm Days in December out now, new EP due early 2026As fixtures of Edinburgh’s gig-turned-performance art scene, Acolyte’s eerie, earthy psychedelia is just as likely to be found on stage at the Traverse theatre as in a steamy-windowed Leith Walk boozer. Their looped bass lines and poet Iona Lee’s commanding, velvety voice conjure a sense of slow-burn hypnosis – and just like their music, Acolyte are glamorously unhurried. They’ve released only a handful of songs in the seven years since Lee and bassist Ruairidh Morrison first started experimenting with jazz, trip-hop and spoken word, but now the group (with Daniel Hill on percussion and Gloria Black on synth, also known for throwing fantastical, papier-mache-costumed club nights with her former band Maranta) are gathering pace. Continue reading...Poem of the week: Winter Walk by Lynette Roberts
A journey through a visionary landscape, exceptionally bright in icy weather, conjures a surreal semi-mythical worldWinter Walk She left the hut and bright log fire at noonAnd walked outside on crisp white winter snow
To find the iced slopes shadowed like the moon,
The wild wood desolate and bare below;
The red trees wet, adrift with icy flow,
The evergreens with glassy needled leaves;
A bloodstone veined red and white this view weaves. Continue reading...
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2025/dec/15/poem-of-the-week-winter-walk-by-lynette-roberts
Pulse by Cynan Jones review – short stories that show the vitality of the form
The Welsh author vividly captures the solitude, hard labour, dramas and dangers of rural lifeIn these six stories of human frailty and responsibility, Welsh writer Cynan Jones explores the imperatives of love and the labour of making and sustaining lives. Each is told with a compelling immediacy and intensity, and with the quality of returning to a memory.In the story Reindeer a man is seeking a bear, which has been woken by hunger from hibernation and is now raiding livestock from the farms of a small isolated community. “There was no true sunshine. There was no gleam in the snow, but the lateness of the left daylight put a cold faint blue through the slopes.” The story’s world is one in which skill, endurance, even stubbornness might be insufficient to succeed, but are just enough to persist. Continue reading...William Golding: The Faber Letters review – the making of a masterpiece
Correspondence between the Lord of the Flies author and his editor reveals one of the great literary collaborations of the ageWhen William Golding submitted Lord of the Flies to Faber in 1953 it had already been rejected at least seven times, maybe as many as 20. Charles Monteith could tell from the dog-eared typescript that it had done the rounds, and a reader for Faber called it “absurd and uninteresting … Rubbish and dull. Pointless.” But Monteith, young and new to the job, could see the book’s potential, and suggested ways that Golding – then a Salisbury-based schoolmaster in his early 40s – might improve it. More radically cut and revised than Monteith expected, the novel became a school syllabus classic. Thus began an author-editor friendship that lasted 40 years.Their early exchanges by post were formal in the extreme: it took two years for Dear Monteith, Dear Golding to become Dear Charles, Dear Bill. But as provincial grammar school boys who both read English at Oxford, the two were attuned to each other. And after the rescue act performed on his first novel, Golding remained humbly grateful for whatever help he could get: “I’m in your hands as usual. I’ve no particular feeling of possession over the book.” Monteith’s touch was gentle for the next few years: enthusiastic, even effusive, he reassured Golding that his drafts of The Inheritors and Free Fall were the finished product. With later novels, such as The Spire and Rites of Passage, editorial feedback was tougher and more extensive. But there were no fallings out. “I’ve always had a feeling of you there, present but not breathing down my neck!” Golding said. He never seriously considered moving to another publishing house. Continue reading...What rhymes with la la la, la la la la la? Kevin Killian, the poet obsessed with Kylie Minogue
He wrote poems named after Kylie songs and named his collection of erotic fiction after her indie album. He even loved the B-sides. So what did the avant garde writer find so inspiring about the mini Melbourne marvel? Kevin Killian was obsessed with stars. Not in a metaphysical sense, like the grand lineage of poets that went before him, but the celebrity kind. Some were A-listers – he kept a vast database on Julia Roberts – and some more obscure. In 2000, taken by the work of cult literary sensation JT LeRoy, and confusion about their identity, Killian gave public readings of their work in San Francisco, where he had lived for 20 years after moving from New York. He would also turn unknown poets into local celebrities, hosting poetry events and making rapturous introductions to crowds that were occasionally outnumbered by the people on stage. “Anyone he admired was an A-lister,” says poet and friend, Evan Kennedy, “especially unknown poets. He’d enthuse about someone, and I’d say ‘Who?’ Kevin engaged the Bay Area poetry scene like Warhol did his Factory – but unlike Warhol, it wasn’t centred around him or his work.”Killian – a figure in San Francisco’s New Narrative movement, alongside writers such as Kathy Acker and Robert Glück – saved his biggest celebrity obsession, however, for Kylie Minogue. She ran through his work like letters in a stick of rock. In 2008, he published Action Kylie, a poetry collection that included works named after Kylie songs (Slow, Spinning Around, Your Disco Needs You), and more abstract scenarios, such as the lovelorn An Audience with Kylie Minogue, in which lyrics from Fever intertwine with the mundanity of Love Hearts sweets. A year later, in 2009, Killian published Impossible Princess, an award-winning collection of gay erotic fiction named after Kylie’s misunderstood 1997 opus. She’d crop up elsewhere too, reflecting Killian’s bonafides as a proper fan. Tightrope, from 2014’s Tweaky Village collection, is named after a Kylie B-side, and highlights how “All her best songs saved as B-sides or just leaked on to the internet, where they live on as fan favourites”. Continue reading...‘If we build it, they will come’: Skövde, the tiny town powering up Sweden’s video game boom
It started with a goat. Now – via a degree for developers and an incubator for startups – the tiny city is churning out world-famous video game hits. What is the secret of its success?On 26 March 2014, a trailer for a video game appeared on YouTube. The first thing the viewer sees is a closeup of a goat lying on the ground, its tongue out, its eyes open. Behind it is a man on fire, running backwards in slow motion towards a house. Interspersed with these images is footage of the goat being repeatedly run over by a car. In the main shot, the goat, now appearing backwards as well, flies up into the first-floor window of a house, repairing the glass it smashed on its way down. It hurtles through another window and back to an exploding petrol station, where we assume its journey must have started.This wordless, strangely moving video – a knowing parody of the trailer for a zombie survival game called Dead Island – was for a curious game called Goat Simulator. The game was, unsurprisingly, the first to ever put the player into the hooves of a goat, who must enact as much wanton destruction as possible. It was also the first massive hit to come out of a small city in Sweden by the name of Skövde. Continue reading...Star Wars, Tomb Raider and a big night for Expedition 33 – what you need to know from The Game Awards
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 won nine awards, including game of the year, while newly announced games at the show include the next project from Baldur’s Gate 3 developer Larian StudiosThe Game Awards 2025: the full list of winnersAt the Los Angeles’ Peacock theater last night, The Game Awards broadcast its annual mix of prize presentations and expensive video game advertisements. New titles were announced, celebrities appeared, and at one point, screaming people were suspended from the ceiling in an extravagant promotion for a new role-playing game.Acclaimed French adventure Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 began the night with 12 nominations – the most in the event’s history – and ended it with nine awards. The Gallic favourite took game of the year, as well as awards for best game direction, best art direction, best narrative and best performance (for actor Jennifer English). Continue reading...Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 – how a tiny studio developed the Belle Époque-set gaming blockbuster
What started as Guillaume Broche’s personal project has been nominated for 12 Game awards, sold more than 2m copies and been praised by Emmanuel Macron as a ‘shining example of French audacity’The record-breaking 12 nominations at the Game awards this year was beyond the wildest dreams of Guillaume Broche when he first began inking out Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 as a personal project while working at Ubisoft.Before selling more than 2m copies, the narrative-driven roleplaying game with “a unique world, challenging combat and great writing” was a technical demo called We Lost. It was Broche’s appetite for risk and a few hopeful Reddit posts that would create the game’s world of Lumiere and its struggle against the Paintress. Continue reading...As AI floods our culture, here’s why we must protect human storytelling in games
Buying the Zombies, Run! studio wasn’t part of my plan, but our post-apocalypse game has a story that makes people feel seen• Don’t get Pushing Buttons delivered to your inbox? Sign up hereA few days ago, I clicked a button on my phone to send funds to a company in Singapore and so took ownership of the video game I co-created and am lead writer for: Zombies, Run! I am a novelist, I wrote the bestselling, award-winning The Power, which was turned into an Amazon Prime TV series starring Toni Collette. What on earth am I doing buying a games company?Well. First of all. Zombies, Run! is special. It’s special to me – the game started as a Kickstarter and the community that grew up around it has always been incredibly supportive of what we’re doing. And it’s special in what it does. It’s a game to exercise with. You play it on your smartphone – iPhone or Android – and we tell stories from the zombie apocalypse in your headphones to encourage you to go further, faster, or just make exercise less boring. Games are so often portrayed as the bad entertainment form, but I made a game that fundamentally helps people to be healthier. Continue reading...Rob Reiner: a life in pictures
The director and actor, who has been found dead at home with wife Michele Singer Reiner, had a celebrated career spanning Stand By Me, All In The Family, The Princess Bride, This is Spinal Tap and the beloved romcom When Harry Met Sally‘I want everyone to be happy’: how Rob Reiner became a great director – and a political hero Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/film/gallery/2025/dec/15/rob-reiner-life-in-pictures
One Battle After Another defeats rivals in London Critics’ Circle film awards nominations
Paul Thomas Anderson’s counter-culture thriller scores nine nods, ahead of Hamnet and Ryan Coogler’s Sinners, with Leonardo DiCaprio in contention for actor of the yearOne Battle After Another, starring Leonardo DiCaprio and directed by Paul Thomas Anderson, has consolidated its place as the awards-season leader in emerging with the most nominations from the London Critics’ Circle film awards.One Battle After Another, a counter-culture thriller loosely based on Thomas Pynchon’s novel Vineland, picked up nine nominations, including film of the year, director and screenwriter of the year for Anderson, and actor of the year for DiCaprio. Co-stars Teyana Taylor, Benicio del Toro and Sean Penn were nominated in the supporting categories while Chase Infiniti was nominated for breakthrough performer. Continue reading...‘The antithesis to Nazi ideology’: how Pippi Longstocking was born to stand up to Hitler
A new documentary explores how Astrid Lindgren’s beloved children’s books about the pigtailed free spirit were written in response to the darkest days of the second world warShe’s the mischievous little red-haired Swedish girl with the pigtails. Since 1945, this waif with no mother or father has rarely been out of the bestseller lists and continues to inspire musicals and movies. Heyday Films, the outfit behind Paddington and James Bond, is now developing an English-language adaptation of her stories.What isn’t generally known outside her native Sweden are the circumstances in which author Astrid Lindgren created Pippi during the darkest period of the second world war, under the shadow of Hitler and Stalin. Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/film/2025/dec/15/pippi-longstocking-astrid-lindgren-nazism-documentary
He wrote the world’s most successful video games – now what? Rockstar co-founder Dan Houser on life after Grand Theft Auto
He rewrote the rule book with Rockstar then left it all behind. Now Dan Houser is back with a storytelling-focused studio to take on AI-obsessed tech bros and Mexican beauty queensThere are only a handful of video game makers who have had as profound an effect on the industry as Dan Houser. The co-founder of Rockstar Games, and its lead writer, worked on all the GTA titles since the groundbreaking third instalment, as well as both Red Dead Redemption adventures. But then, in 2019, he took an extended break from the company which ended with his official departure. Now he’s back with a new studio and a range of projects, and 12 years after we last interviewed him, he’s ready to talk about what comes next.“Finishing those big projects and thinking about doing another one is really intense,” he says about his decision to go. “I’d been in full production mode every single day from the very start of each project to the very end, for 20 years. I stayed so long because I loved the games. It was a real privilege to be there, but it was probably the right time to leave. I turned 45 just after Red Dead 2 came out. I thought, well, it’s probably a good time to try working on some other stuff.” Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/games/2025/dec/15/dan-houser-grand-theft-auto-rockstar
Endings are hard, but facing them helps us to heal
I understand the temptation to run away – I have felt it too. Try to stay in the room, and in the moment. You’ll be glad you didThis is my last column for you. I am shocked and delighted that I’ve been allowed to carry on for almost two years, saying such controversial and true things as: the oedipal complex is real and all of us have one; psychodynamic psychotherapy is an effective and vital mental health treatment and we must fight for it in the NHS; and Midnight Run is the best film of all time. It has been a joy and an honour, and, now we are here, I’ve been thinking about the significance of endings.Because they are significant. Sometimes, having no time left can make it possible to feel and say what was impossible before. They can invite an intimacy and truthfulness and grief that some find overwhelming. It’s not unusual for patients to talk of dropping out, or to skip the final session – to call it a waste of time, to want to leave the room before the end. Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2025/dec/15/endings-heal-stay-in-room-in-moment
‘I am not happy with my output!’ Kate Hudson on taking risks, rejecting compromise – and finding her voice at 46
After years as Hollywood’s romcom darling, Hudson is putting music at the centre of her career – and after her show-stealing turn in Song Sung Blue, the Oscar buzz is growingThe first voice I hear when I enter the hotel room to meet Kate Hudson belongs to her 21-year-old son, Ryder, who speaks from the end of a phone: “Love you, Mum!”Doesn’t everyone? You don’t have to be related to Hudson to consider her a joyous proposition – a great performer who hasn’t yet made a great film. It was a quarter-century ago in Almost Famous, her breakthrough picture, that she first proved she could hoist a movie out of the doldrums while making the task appear as effortless as blow-drying her hair. Without her performance as Penny Lane, the rock’n’roll muse who describes herself as a “band-aid” rather than a groupie, Cameron Crowe’s dopey valentine to the 1970s of his youth would have been Almost Forgettable. Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2025/dec/15/kate-hudson-interview-song-sung-blue
Georgina Hayden’s recipe for pear, sticky ginger and pecan pudding
This non-traditional Christmas Day dessert is a surefire winner if dried fruit-based puddings aren’t your thingWhile our Christmas Day dinner doesn’t deviate too much from tradition, I do experiment with the dessert. My family, bar one sweet-toothed aunt, avoids dried fruit-based offerings, so classic Christmas cakes and puddings are a hard no. Over the years, I have tried variations on yule logs, pavlovas and sherry trifles, but the biggest crowdpleaser is easily sticky toffee pudding (or something along those lines). This year, I’m making this warming, simple but decadent pear, sticky ginger and pecan pudding, which feels festive and fancy, and can happily make an appearance whenever. Continue reading...The 12 condiments of Christmas
Everyone needs a hand in the kitchen, and in lieu of any sous elves, Claire Dinhut – AKA Condiment Claire – picks the ones that will make your feast singSalt, sweet, bitter, acid, umami. While we don’t think to use too much “sweet” before dessert, it can counterbalance and enhance other flavours. Maple syrup is my sweetener of choice during the holidays because it just tastes cozy. Add it to roasted root vegetables or a poultry glaze, and it’s especially tasty in drinks, from hot apple cider to eggnog and even mulled wine. Continue reading...How to make nesselrode pudding – recipe | Felicity Cloake's Masterclass
A luxurious iced dessert stuffed full of boozy dried fruit, candied peel and frozen chestnut pureeThis festive, frozen chestnut puree dessert is often credited to the great 19th-century chef Antonin Carême, even though the man himself conceded that this luxurious creation was that of Monsieur Mony, chef to the Russian diplomat Count Nesselrode (albeit, he observed somewhat peevishly, inspired by one of his own chestnut puddings). It was originally served with hot, boozy custard – though I think it’s just enough as it is – and it makes a fabulous Christmas centrepiece,Prep 15 minSoak Overnight
Cook 20 min
Freeze 2 hr+
Serves 6 Continue reading...
https://www.theguardian.com/food/2025/dec/14/how-to-make-nesselrode-pudding-recipe-felicity-cloake
Flora Shedden’s Christmas desserts recipes for figgy crumble mince pies, boozy ice-cream, and choc pear meringues
Three sweet treats for even the fussiest sweet tooth: fig and hazelnut crumble mince pies, sherry and raisin ice-cream, and chestnut and pear meringuesOut of sheer laziness, this is a no-churn, very quick to assemble take on things. I tend usually not to recommend no-churn ice-creams unless there is booze involved, so this sherry and raisin one is a great candidate (the alcohol stops the ice-cream from becoming too hard and crystallised). And keep the leftover egg whites from the mince pies to make the chestnut and pear meringue, an alternative for the Christmas pudding haters at your table – there is always one. I think it’s important to have at least two puddings at Christmas. Continue reading...Dior, Chanel and … Veja? The ethical Paris trainer worn by A-listers and royalty
Veja doesn’t do surveys or freebies, hates greenwashing and Black Friday, and as demand for trainers wanes, it continues to go its own wayIn the grand hierarchy of Paris fashion, it’s tricky for a brand to stand out. Especially one whose coup de maître is a goes-with-everything white sneaker. Yet 20 years after Veja first began selling sustainable footwear, it has become the ultimate affordable It brand for scooter-wielding mums, sustainably minded millennials and A-list bigwigs who want to wear their values on their ethical leather-clad feet.Veja’s co-founder Sébastien Kopp says he doesn’t know if people buy his trainers because of how they are made or because of how they look. The company is fastidious about social and fairtrade practices, “but because we don’t do surveys, we don’t do marketing, we simply don’t know this information”, he says, speaking from Veja’s Paris headquarters. Continue reading...A cure for ‘bacon neck’: How to keep your T-shirts in top shape
Marlon Brando was a victim of it, even Princess Diana was caught out by a collar ‘curled like bacon in a pan’. Here are a few ways to avoid their fate• Don’t get Fashion Statement delivered to your inbox? Sign up hereIt is sometimes, amusingly, known as “bacon neck”, and it is the bane of my life: the loss of elasticity that results in a crinkly, ill-fitting collar. This undulating menace commonly befalls the classic crew-neck T-shirt or sweatshirt, but scoop, polo and V-necks can also be afflicted. Too often, science conspires to transform a smooth neckline into something resembling a failed polygraph test.The term “bacon neck” (not to be confused with “turkey neck”, the disparaging phrase for sagging skin that is almost uniformly levelled at women) was coined, or at least popularised, in a 2010 Hanes commercial featuring the basketball star Michael Jordan. In the clip, Jordan’s seat-mate points out a fellow plane passenger’s worn-out collar: “See how it’s all curled up like bacon in a pan? See how bad this guy looks?” Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/fashion/2025/dec/11/fashion-statement-bacon-neck-t-shirts
Step up: what to wear to a ‘no-shoes’ house
Mismatched or holey socks won’t cut it if your host asks you to leave your footwear at the door this party season Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/fashion/gallery/2025/dec/12/what-to-wear-to-a-no-shoes-house
‘It becomes like Zoolander’: the podcast making you think differently about clothes
Avery Trufelman is the New York-based radio producer behind Articles of Interest, a fashion podcast that has non-fashion people gripped in their millionsDid you know that the zipper only came about because a Swedish-born engineer named Gideon Sundback fell in love with a factory owner’s daughter? Or that it took longer for it to be developed than it took for the Wright brothers to invent the aeroplane? You probably know that pockets have become a symbol of gender privilege – but were you aware that in the 18th century, women’s pockets were big enough to hold tools for writing, a small diary and a snack for later? Perhaps most surprising is that layering, which has made Uniqlo one of the biggest brands in the world, was in effect invented in the 1940s by a man named Georges Doriot, who was also famous for inventing venture capital.All these nuggets and more are included in Articles of Interest, a podcast by 34-year-old Avery Trufelman. Listeners tune in for the smarts but also her disarming sense of fun. Not to mention her low, husky voice, which seems made for podcasting. “I don’t take care of it, if that’s what you’re asking,” she says over video call from her apartment in New York. Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/fashion/2025/dec/11/articles-of-interest-fashion-podcast-avery-trufelman
The one change that worked: sharing ‘accountability’ notes has made life better for both of us
Would telling a buddy my to-do list was done – before I’d done it – really make it more likely to happen? But leaving her a voice note every day has increased my productivity, and deepened our friendship When my friend Rosamund suggested we try a productivity technique of leaving each other a voice note every day, I immediately said yes – even if I suspected, deep down, that we might not keep it up for long. I was circumspect because we both lead busy lives, 3,500 miles apart. She lives in London and I’m based in Brooklyn. It is hard to keep in touch sometimes. Even talking on the phone feels tough, what with the time difference and our schedules. Adding another thing to do every day, even a small, two-minute task, felt like a challenge.The technique is simple enough. You send a friend a voice note in the morning saying what you “did” that day. You always speak in the past tense for accountability. The theory is that once you tell a friend you have “done” something, you will be more likely to follow it through. Continue reading...My dad has given my brother 80% of his business and I feel horribly dismissed
You’re reluctant to discuss this with your parents – but doing so might help you shake off the feeling of injusticeI am struggling with the different way my parents have treated me and my brother. My dad started a business when I was five. Now it’s worth several million. My brother was invited by my dad to go into the business when he left university. I was not. By then, the business was well established and my dad stayed on as CEO. My dad gave my brother 80% of it. He will now sell the business and realise millions, meaning he can retire early.My dad helped me with university fees and house purchases. He’s told me I will inherit the house and whatever money is left when my parents pass away, which is likely to be in about 20 years. I doubt there will be anything left. Continue reading...This is how we do it: ‘We were childhood sweethearts – and 28 years later we’re still having sex every day’
Sarah and Scott have been together since school, but the sex just keeps getting better• How do you do it? Share the story of your sex life, anonymouslyIt took me a while to figure out what turned me on – I was well into my 20s when I first had an orgasm with him Continue reading...The moment I knew: as he opened the Uber door, he opened my eyes to a love beyond work
Ash Jacks McCready had low expectations for her first date with Tom, but after an awkward start, their relationship moved fast and wildFind more stories from the moment I knew seriesIn high school I was in an all-consuming relationship with one thing: dance. Any free time I had was spent on working towards a coveted spot at a performance company.As soon as I graduated school in Brisbane, I left to begin my career as a performer. Continue reading...Is it true that … wearing heels changes the shape of your feet?
Stilettos are fine for an evening out, but wearing them all day, every day could cause permanent damage‘If you’d asked me that 15 years ago, I would have said: ‘Absolute nonsense – it’s all genetics and shoes aren’t responsible for any problem,’” says Andrew Goldberg, consultant orthopaedic foot and ankle specialist at the Wellington hospital in London. But viewing 3D scans that show how people’s feet look while standing in their shoes changed his mind completely.He took two scans of a person’s feet – one barefoot and one in high heels – and the difference was striking. In the high heels, the toes were crowded together, the big toe showed a bunion, and the smaller toes were clawed, gripping for balance. Continue reading...Is it true that… you should take vitamin C when you’ve got a cold?
The vitamin has many benefits, but research shows that people who take it are just as likely to get the sniffles as those who don’t‘Vitamin C is important for your health in lots of ways,” says Daniel M Davis, the head of life sciences at Imperial College London. It is a strong antioxidant, helping protect cells from harmful unstable compounds that arise from toxins and pollution. It helps the body absorb iron, and is also used in the production of collagen. “But the idea that taking high doses of vitamin C – or drinking lots of orange juice – will stop you catching a cold, or help you recover faster, is a myth.”Davis, the author of Self Defence: A Myth-Busting Guide to Immune Health, explains that the popular belief in vitamin C’s cold-fighting powers has persisted for more than 50 years, “pretty much solely because of the evangelical view of one man: Linus Pauling”. Continue reading...‘It has to be genuine’: older influencers drive growth on social media
As midlife audiences turn to digital media, the 55 to 64 age bracket is an increasingly important demographicIn 2022, Caroline Idiens was on holiday halfway up an Italian mountain when her brother called to tell her to check her Instagram account. “I said, ‘I haven’t got any wifi. And he said: ‘Every time you refresh, it’s adding 500 followers.’ So I had to try to get to the top of the hill with the phone to check for myself.”A personal trainer from Berkshire who began posting her fitness classes online at the start of lockdown in 2020, Idiens, 53, had already built a respectable following. Continue reading...The one change that worked: I used to be a compulsive shopper – until I hit upon a simple trick
The minute I had any disposable income, I would spend it on things I didn’t need. Deciding to wait a day before handing over my money changed everythingOne day at work two years ago, a notification hit my phone: my paycheck had come through. It was a fair amount for someone still at university, so I did what I always did when payday arrived: I opened every shopping app on my phone. Amazon, Vinted, Etsy, Depop, Zara, you name it. Within the space of an hour, I had spent £90 on clothes, decorative items and a completely useless weighted blanket I never touched.A few days later, I went online again and bought a hairdryer. I already owned one, but thought another couldn’t hurt. Then I added LED strip lights and two pairs of shoes that weren’t even my size. This wasn’t new behaviour. In fact, I’d been notorious for it ever since I could afford to buy my own things. Continue reading...All I want for Christmas … is to escape and go travelling
Going away for the festive season has left me with unforgettable memories, from a boat trip with Bangladeshi fishermen to exploring Castro’s Cuban hideoutI have made a point of escaping Christmas for as long as I can remember. Not escaping for Christmas, but avoiding it altogether – the stressful buildup, consumer chaos, panic buying, the enforced jollity and parties. When the first festive gifts start appearing in the shops in September, it’s time to confirm my travel plans, ideally to include New Year’s Eve as well.Sometimes I travel independently, but more often in a group, and while it’s not always possible to avoid the tinsel and baubles – even in non-Christian countries thousands of miles away – I just relish not being at home at this time of year. Continue reading...Joely Richardson looks back: ‘Natasha’s death was life-changing. She was a figurehead to me’
The Nip/Tuck and Downton Abbey star on losing her sister, growing up in a theatrical dynasty, and how she feels about ageingBorn in London in 1965, Joely Richardson is an actor and campaigner. The daughter of actor Vanessa Redgrave and director and producer Tony Richardson, she trained at Rada, and rose to prominence with roles in 101 Dalmatians, Nip/Tuck and The Tudors, as well as in theatre and on Broadway. More recently, she appeared in Guy Ritchie’s The Gentlemen, and Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale. Richardson is working for Save the Children’s annual festive fundraiser, Christmas Jumper Day, and also backing the charity’s new Christmas campaign.I remember this as a happy day, but my eyes tell a different story. They look a little mistrustful. In my arms is my brother Carlo – we have different fathers; his is Italian actor Franco Nero. That day was Carlo’s christening, and it was obvious from my hand position that I’m not used to standing like that. Someone’s gone: “Put your arms out! We’re taking a picture of you holding the baby!” The whole thing looks awkward. Continue reading...‘The adventure can turn into a disaster’: the digital nomad families ‘worldschooling’ their children
Forget homeschooling, how about taking your family on a perpetual gap year and quitting the nine-to-five? Families who did just that share the hostel horrors and mid-trip meltdowns behind the Instagram feedIt was going to be the adventure of a lifetime. Late last year, Josy and Joe Davis decided to quit their jobs, sell their home and pull their two young daughters out of school to travel the world. Though their life in Gloucestershire was good on paper, post-pandemic it had been increasingly feeling like a grind. Josy, 35, a police dispatcher, worked shifts that swung from early morning to late night. Joe, also 35, a logistics manager, was often on call until 10pm. Neither felt as if they could ever switch off – let alone enjoy family time.Exhausted, Josy caught herself being short with her daughters, Lola and Zara, six and four. “I felt like I spent my days off recovering, rather than actually being present,” she says. Though only in Year 1, Lola was feeling the pressure at school, fretting about where she ranked in the class. Continue reading...Dim the lights, add a trinket tray and put out your best towels: how to spruce up your spare room
Impress your guests with interiors experts’ top tips for a stylish sleepoverWhen guests feel that they’ve been looked after with care, it sets the tone for a harmonious visit. Whether you have the luxury of a guest room, or a space that is somewhere between a home office and a laundry graveyard, there are lots of simple, thoughtful ways to give guests a genuinely warm welcome.When friends and family are staying for just one night, it’s all about making their room comfortable and convenient – think cosy bedding, chargers by the bed, space for an overnight bag, etc. But if it’s a few days or more, it’s worth putting more effort in because, however close you are, you don’t want to be on top of each other. Create a space where they’re happy to relax, and everyone will be able to enjoy some time to decompress. Continue reading...Threshold: the choir who sing to the dying – video
Dying is a process and in a person’s final hours and days, Nickie and her Threshold Choir are there to accompany people on their way and bring comfort. Through specially composed songs, akin to lullabies, the choir cultivates an environment of love and safety around those on their deathbed. For the volunteer choir members, it is also an opportunity to channel their own experiences of grief and together open up conversations about deathWith thanks to onscreen contributor, Lindsey, who died since the making of this filmFull interview with Nickie Aven, available here Continue reading...US librarians tackle ‘manufactured crisis’ of book bans to protect LGBTQ+ rights
In at least half a dozen states, librarians have joined forces with civil rights groups to oppose book bans, often facing personal and professional repercussionsFor decades, libraries served as a safe haven for many queer and marginalized youths in eastern Texas, says former county library director Rhea Young. Unlike the school cafeteria, the library was a space where they could explore and find acceptance in who they wanted to be.“There were books where they can find characters like them, and realize it’s okay to be who they are,” Young said. “There needs to be more places like that, not fewer.” Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/dec/15/us-librarianbook-bans-lgbtq-rights
Assad family live in Russian luxury as Bashar ‘brushes up on ophthalmology’
Family friend, sources in Russia and Syria, and leaked data help give rare insight into life of dictator’s reclusive householdIn 2011, a group of teenage boys spray-painted a warning on to a wall in their school playground: “It’s your turn, Doctor.” The graffiti was a thinly veiled threat that Syria’s president, Bashar al-Assad, a London-trained ophthalmologist, would be next in the line of Arab dictators toppled by the then raging Arab spring.It took 14 years, during which 620,000 were killed and nearly 14 million displaced, but eventually the doctor’s turn came and Assad was deposed, fleeing to Moscow in the middle of the night. Continue reading...‘Law is the only weapon I have’: a Ukrainian lawyer’s campaign to rescue the children stolen by Russia
Though once so despairing she thought of giving up the law for art, Kateryna Rashevska is still pushing for the return of thousands of Ukrainian children abducted by the invadersAt only 28, the human rights lawyer Kateryna Rashevska has become the public face of Ukraine’s campaign to repatriate children forcibly deported to Russia. She knows this means she is being watched.The past two years have seen the Ukrainian addressing the UN security council, the US Senate and writing submissions to the international criminal court (ICC), which then issued an arrest warrant for Vladimir Putin for the “unlawful deportation” of Ukrainian children. Continue reading...Tell us: have you ever had an allergic reaction caused by your clothes?
Synthetic fabrics, particularly from fast fashion retailers, can be treated with a range of hazardous chemicals which can cause an allergic reaction. If you think this is happened to you, we’d like to hear from youHave you suffered any personal health repercussions you suspect may have been caused by your fashion purchases?Research has shown that synthetic fabrics, particularly from fast fashion retailers, are often treated with a range of hazardous chemicals - including dyes containing heavy metals such as lead, antimicrobial agents, and anti wrinkle treatments - that can cause allergic reactions such as skin irritation or respiratory issues in some people. Continue reading...Tell us: have you bought tickets for the 2026 World Cup yet?
We’d like to hear from fans about their experience of buying tickets – and also from those who have decided against doing soThe first two rounds of ticket sales for the 2026 World Cup have opened. Yet even with the draw yet to take place and matchups yet to be determined, fans appear to be flocking to buy them. The dynamic pricing model instituted by Fifa has raised prices sky-high, with many fans offering stories of technological issues with Fifa’s sales platform as well.We want to hear from you: Have you bought World Cup tickets? How much did you spend? Do you think it’ll be worth it? And did you face any obstacles – technical or otherwise – to getting the tickets you want? And if you haven’t bought tickets yet – why not? Continue reading...Tell us: are you a UK centenarian or do you know one?
We would like to hear from centenarians, their family and friendsThe number of centenarians (aged 100 years and over) in the UK has doubled from 8,300 in 2004 to 16,600 in 2024, according to the Office for National Statistics.Between 2004 and 2024, the number of male centenarians has tripled from 910 to 3,100. During the same period, the number of female centenarians almost doubled from 7,400 to 13,600. Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/society/2025/nov/04/tell-us-are-you-a-uk-centenarian-or-do-you-know-one
What would you write in a very last letter and why?
If you had the chance to write just one last letter, to whom would you send it? The Danish postal service will deliver its last letter at the end of this month to focus on packages, citing the “increasing digitalisation” of society.While the public will still be able to send letters through the distributor DAO, it made us think about how we would use that last chance to send a letter. Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/dec/05/what-would-you-write-in-a-very-last-letter-and-why
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Kick off your afternoon with the Guardian’s take on the world of footballEvery weekday, we’ll deliver a roundup the football news and gossip in our own belligerent, sometimes intelligent and – very occasionally – funny way. Still not convinced? Find out what you’re missing here.Try our other sports emails: there’s weekly catch-ups for cricket in The Spin and rugby union in The Breakdown, and our seven-day round-up of the best of our sports journalism in The Recap.Living in Australia? Try the Guardian Australia’s daily sports newsletter Continue reading...https://www.theguardian.com/info/2022/nov/14/football-daily-email-sign-up