Steaming service now in exclusive talks over deal that would change film and TV landscape Warner Bros Discovery has entered exclusive talks to sell its streaming and Hollywood studio business to Netflix, a move that would dramatically change the established film and TV landscape. Netflix is in competition with Paramount Skydance and Comcast, which owns assets including Universal Studios and Sky, to buy the owner of the Hollywood studio Warner Bros, HBO and the HBO Max streaming service. Continue reading...

Two leaders are due to hold defence and trade talks on Friday, against the backdrop of the Ukraine war, which has seen the US hit India with tariffs over its continued purchases of Russian oil Analysis: Putin and Modi to meet amid politically treacherous times for Russia and India The two leaders are meeting against a turbulent geopolitical backdrop, and analysts have emphasised the significance of the Russian president travelling to India, both as a symbol of the enduring relationship between the countries and as a message that neither would be cowed by US pressure amid the Ukraine war. Hannah Ellis-Petersen and Pjotr Sauer have assessed what is at stake for both countries here. Vladimir Putin was given a cordial greeting on Thursday night at Palam air base in New Delhi. Here are some images from the welcoming ceremony. Continue reading...

The Uzbek shone at London Classic and a 3,000+ tournament performance reaffirmed his place among world’s best This week’s XTX London Classic at Arsenal’s Emirates Stadium took place in an elegant arena with a full view of the football pitch. The English players suffered for most of the event, but hit back in style on Thursday when all four won their eighth-round games. Scores after eight of the nine rounds were Nodirbek Abdusattorov (Uzbekistan) 7, Alireza Firouzja (France) 5, Nikita Vitiugov (England) 4.5, Luke McShane and Michael Adams (both England) 4, Nikolas Theodorou (Greece) and Pavel Eljanov (Ukraine) 3.5, Abhimanyu Mishra (USA) and Gawain Maroroa Jones (England) 3, Sam Shankland (USA) 2.5. The four English victories in Thursday night’s eighth round transformed what had been a difficult event into a demonstration of sustained national strength at the board. Continue reading...

From tackling child poverty to being honest about Brexit, the party seems to have recognised the growing electoral threat to its left What does it take for a small child not to recognise their own name? I’ve been thinking about that for days, since reading the Local Government Association’s recent report on a growing crisis in early childhood. We’ve known for a while about children starting school still in nappies, or speaking in Americanisms absorbed from hours stuck in front of YouTube, or even struggling to sit upright because they’ve spent too long slumped over an iPad to develop core muscles. So sadly, it’s not surprising to read of early-years workers telling the LGA they see more and more pre-schoolers who can barely speak, play with others or contain their rage when things don’t go their way. But it was the practitioner who noted that some children “don’t seem to respond to their name” who got to me. You have to wonder how often that child hears a loving adult trying to get their attention. Too often, another practitioner said, “children are not spoken to at home, but offered screens all day” – at mealtimes, out shopping, or in the car – with parents seemingly scared of provoking tantrums if they take the phone away. The report describes a complex puzzle with multiple causes: poverty, and the parental exhaustion that comes of a hardscrabble life; growing up in a pandemic; changes in early-years provision; and way too much screen time. It can’t be solved by money alone, but certainly won’t be solved without it. So a two-pronged strategy of lifting the two-child limit on children’s welfare payments – as Rachel Reeves did last week – and intervening early where toddlers aren’t meeting their milestones makes sense. The Best Start family hubs rolling out gradually nationwide will, we learned this week, get Send (special educational needs and disabilities) co-ordinators, focusing particularly on speech and language. They’ll promote the upcoming National Year of Reading to wean kids off screens and on to books, and more generally attempt, on a shoestring, to mimic the support that their predecessor programme Sure Start once offered parents. There’s not enough funding – there never is – but there are the beginnings of joined-up thinking, accepting that tackling problems in nursery rather than in primary school is easier, cheaper and kinder on everyone involved. Gaby Hinsliff is a Guardian columnist Continue reading...

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The Portuguese credits his loyalty to his trusty Casio watch for helping the head coach lift the Lisbon club after Ruben Amorim’s messy exit If there is a stoppage in what is sure to be a supercharged Dérbi de Lisboa on Friday, the Sporting head coach, Rui Borges, will likely look down to check the watch he considers a lucky charm. The black Casio – bought for €20 while still playing for his hometown club Mirandela in north-east Portugal, 150km inland from Porto – is a symbol of his superstitious nature and one he has maintained on his journey from the obscurity of being an amateur coach to making a mark on the biggest stage in club football. Continue reading...

(Double Double Whammy) One half of Water From Your Eyes re-records songs from the back catalogue of his other band, resulting in acoustic fare touched with regret and darkness As one half of Brooklyn-based duo Water From Your Eyes, Nate Amos makes left-field pop that feels hypermodern: wry, memey lyricism; post-ironic genre-hopping; the kind of jilted chaos and tonal jumble that characterises a social media feed. Yet the band had actually been plugging away for seven years before their 2023 breakthrough. Amos’s solo project This Is Lorelei has been going even longer, only gaining proper traction with last year’s belated debut album Box for Buddy, Box for Star. Now Amos is capitalising on this recent momentum with another release, this time a compilation of re-recorded songs dredged from his extensive Bandcamp back catalogue. Unlike his WFYE output, these tracks are mainly gentle folk-rock numbers that deal in honeyed melancholy. They tend to be brief and narratively vague, glancing at regret, disappointment and darkness (“you don’t want to know what my dreams are about,” he claims on But You Just Woke Me Up). His most obvious stylistic counterpart is indie-rocker Alex G, but while Amos can’t rival him for lyrical punch, he can match his knack for pleasingly diverting detail: see Name the Band’s chunky pop-punk bassline or the bright guitar twang on Dreams Away. Continue reading...

The coffee brand Lavazza engaged Alex Webb, a contemporary street photographer from the Magnum Photos agency, for its 2026 calendar, which explores the rich tapestry of elements that make up the Italian lifestyle Continue reading...

This week’s best wildlife photographs from around the world Continue reading...

The margin may have got smaller but the brilliant Spanish midfielder makes it a hat-trick of No 1 finishes They say the best things come in threes, and Aitana Bonmatí has written herself into the Guardian’s top 100 history as the first player to finish at the top of the tree for a third consecutive year. Last year the majestic midfielder emulated her Barcelona and Spain teammate Alexia Putellas by winning for a second year running, but the 27-year-old has now gone one better, establishing herself once again at the top of the women’s game. Continue reading...

Up to 150,000 residents of El Fasher are missing since North Darfur capital fell to paramilitary Rapid Support Forces The Sudanese city of El Fasher resembles a “massive crime scene”, with large piles of bodies heaped throughout its streets as the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) work to destroy evidence of the scale of their massacre. Six weeks after the RSF seized the city, corpses have been gathered together in scores of piles to await burial in mass graves or cremated in huge pits, analysis indicates. Continue reading...

From Angels with Filthy Souls in Home Alone, to Deception in The Holiday, fake movies are taking on a life of their own The cold was brutal and so were the gangsters. It was the first – and worse, only – day of shooting, and when cinematographer Julio Macat threaded some film into his camera, it was so cold that the film snapped. The gangsters flitted around menacingly, fedoras and machine guns at the ready. Macat was hoping to make a movie that was frightening and strange. “The goal,” he says, “was to scare a kid.” And so, even though it was 1990, he chose to shoot the noir like it was the 40s, with black and white film, fog filters on the camera lenses, and an intense, old-fashioned lighting setup to cast deep shadows on the set. Continue reading...

Two film-makers who worked with the late playwright recall a man of extraordinary wit, endless invention and innate elegance I was utterly knocked out by the way Tom Stoppard’s mind worked, his brilliance and by the fact he made Brazil out of a big lump of stone that I’d spent a year or two preparing. I gave that to him and out of that he carved a beautiful Michelangelo David. Continue reading...

Halifax reports that affordability is now at its strongest since late 2015, after slowdown in price growth Halifax’s regional data continues to show a clear North/South divide – prices fell in the south of the UK last month, but were stronger elsewhere. Northern Ireland remains the strongest performing nation or region in the UK, with average property prices rising by +8.9% over the past year (up from +7.9% last month). The typical home now costs £220,716. Scotland recorded annual price growth of +3.7% in November, up to an average of £216,781. In Wales property values rose +1.9% year-on-year to £229,430. In England, the North West recorded the highest annual growth rate, with property prices rising by +3.2% to £245,070, followed by the North East with growth of +2.9% to £180,939. Further south, three regions saw prices decrease in November. In London prices fell by -1.0%, the South East by -0.3% and Eastern England by -0.1%. The capital remains the most expensive part of the UK, with an average property now costing £539,766. “This consistency in average prices reflects what has been one of the most stable years for the housing market over the last decade. Even with the changes to Stamp Duty back in spring and some uncertainty ahead of the Autumn Budget, property values have remained steady. While slower growth may disappoint some existing homeowners, it’s welcome news for first-time buyers. Comparing property prices to average incomes, affordability is now at its strongest since late 2015. Taking into account today’s higher interest rates, mortgage costs as a share of income are at their lowest level in around three years. Continue reading...

Gibbs treble powers Lions back into playoff push Detroit sack Prescott five times in dominant win Cowboys’ playoff odds plunge after costly defeat Jahmyr Gibbs and a defense that suddenly generated pressure and turnovers helped the Detroit Lions stay in contention for a playoff berth. Gibbs ran for three touchdowns, including a 13-yarder with 2:19 left that sealed the Lions’ much-needed 44-30 win over the Dallas Cowboys on Thursday night. Continue reading...

In this week’s newsletter: Coroners can’t agree on how to count heat fatalities – and the dismantling of climate investments is leaving fragile communities exposed • Don’t get Down to Earth delivered to your inbox? Sign up here Donald Trump’s decision to boycott Cop30, withdraw the US from the Paris agreement and illegally terminate a slew of investments in renewable energy will not change the reality of climate breakdown for Americans. In what has become an annual reporting tradition, I found myself in Arizona reporting on heat-related deaths during yet another gruelling heatwave, when temperatures topped 43C (110F) on 13 out of 14 straight days in Phoenix. Before embarking on this trip, I spent weeks combing through hundreds of autopsy reports, which I obtained from two county medical examiners using the Freedom of Information Act. Each death report gave me a glimpse into the person’s life, and I used clues from the case notes to track down friends and loved ones in the hopes of better understanding why heat is killing people in the richest country in the world. How cyclones and monsoon rains converged to devastate parts of Asia – visual guide The environmental costs of corn: should the US change how it grows its dominant crop? ‘Those who eat Chilean salmon cannot imagine how much human blood it carries with it’ Americans are dying from extreme heat. Autopsy reports don’t show the full story ‘Deeply demoralizing’: how Trump derailed coal country’s clean-energy revival ‘It happened so fast’: the shocking reality of indoor heat deaths in Arizona Continue reading...

The music mogul is back and ready to assemble a new boyband with boot camps, eliminations and the lot – plus a total treat for Swifties With his stubble, his shades and his belief in the eternal power of the choreographed quintet, Simon Cowell is resolutely unchanging. But has the world changed around him? As an assistant bravely points out, there may be teenagers auditioning for his latest project who have barely heard of One Direction. Appropriately, there’s something old school about this series in which Cowell assembles a new boyband – but, possibly for that reason, as the familiar process of auditions, boot camps and eliminations begins, it’s easy to settle in for the duration. Depending on your feelings about the man himself, of course; inevitably, it stakes everything on the viewer being able to root for Simon Cowell. Netflix, from Wednesday 10 December Continue reading...

Wonderful art, amazing design and beautiful locations have drawn our tipsters to chapels, churches and cathedrals from Norway to Bulgaria • Tell us about a great charity challenge you’ve taken part in – the best tip wins a £200 holiday voucher The Tromsøysund parish church, commonly called the Arctic Cathedral, in Tromsø is a modernist delight. The simple, elegant exterior that reflects the surrounding scenery and evokes traditional Sami dwellings is matched by an interior that has the most comfortable pews I have ever sat on. The stunning glass mosaic titled the Return of Christ at one end may not be to everyone’s taste, but to me had power and majesty. Exiting this magnificent building after an organ recital to be met by the northern lights flickering overhead was awe-inspiring. Bruce Horton Continue reading...

From Seamus Heaney’s collected poems and Simon Armitage’s animal spirits, to prizewinners Karen Solie and Vidyan Ravinthiran Many of 2025’s most notable collections have been powered by a spirit of wild experimentation, pushing at the bounds of what “poetry” might be thought to be. Sarah Hesketh’s 2016 (CB Editions) is a fabulous example: it takes 12 interviews with a variety of anonymous individuals about the events of that year and presents fragments of the transcripts as prose poems. The cumulative effect of these voices is haunting and full of pathos, as “they vote for whoever, and their life stays exactly the same”. Luke Kennard and Nick Makoha also daringly remixed their source material and inspirations. The former’s latest collection, The Book of Jonah (Picador), moves the minor prophet out of the Bible into a world of arts conferences, where he is continually reminded that his presence everywhere is mostly futile. Makoha’s The New Carthaginians (Penguin) turns Jean-Michel Basquiat’s idea of the exploded collage into a poetic device. The result? “The visible / making itself known by the invisible.” Continue reading...

Alder/FRSO/Collon (Ondine) Conductor Nicholas Collon keeps the sound clean and the pace dynamic in a bracing recording, while, in the Four Songs op 27, Louise Alder is unfailingly communicative The ascent and descent depicted in Richard Strauss’s An Alpine Symphony can seem like a long slog, but not in the bracing new recording from the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra. Nicholas Collon’s conducting keeps the sound clean and the pace dynamic, capturing the hulking, almost supernatural grandeur of the mountain at the opening and the close, and the detail of the natural world viewed in between; the waterfall music fizzes thanks to the exactitude of the playing. Nothing is overblown or indulgent; instead there’s a straightforwardness, even an innocence about the sound – from the winds in particular – that is inhuman in the right kind of way, with a warmer, soft-edged string tone kept in reserve for the passage giving thanks for a safe homecoming. Louise Alder is the soloist in Strauss’s four Op 27 songs, which suit her beautifully; her gleaming soprano sound is buoyantly supported by the orchestra and, whether the music is portentous, exuberant or tender, she’s unfailingly communicative with the text. Morgen!, the final song, is initially less magically delicate than it can be – but Alder never lets our attention drop, and when she blanches her tone in the closing phrases the effect is suddenly, beautifully moving. Continue reading...

From picking Royal Mail or a courier firm to avoiding post office queues, here’s how to have a stress-free experience For Royal Mail parcels within the UK, these are: 17 December for second class and second-class signed for; 20 December for first class and first-class signed for; 19 December for Tracked 48; 22 December for Tracked 24; 23 December for special delivery guaranteed. Continue reading...

Official data cannot show what impact ECHR has on asylum cases, says leading thinktank Migration Observatory Gaps in official migration statistics are hampering public debate and policy decisions including on cases relating to human rights laws, according to a leading thinktank. The University of Oxford’s Migration Observatory has identified 10 areas where information is lacking, including immigration enforcement and returns, and the size of the population living undocumented in the UK. Continue reading...

From a rose-coloured cottage in the centre of a historic market town to an old windmill on a hilltop with sweeping views Continue reading...

Suzanne Mulholland and Joe Swash help a family to prepare a fuss-free festive spread. Plus: Kate Winslet on directing her first film. Here’s what to watch this evening 8pm, Channel 4 Would you make your Christmas dinner three months before the big day? Suzanne Mulholland – AKA The Batch Lady – swears by a frozen turkey and prepared trimmings in this heavily Lidl-sponsored programme. She and Joe Swash join a family hosting Christmas for the first time to show them how it’s possible to whip up a festive feast in just half an hour, as well as lobster mac and cheese and a tiramisu that the kids can make. Hollie Richardson Continue reading...

Exclusive: Group’s open letter says Reform UK leader must take responsibility for behaviour as a schoolboy A group of Holocaust survivors have demanded Nigel Farage tell the truth and apologise for the antisemitic comments that fellow pupils of Dulwich College allege he made toward Jewish pupils. The Reform UK leader has said he never racially abused anyone with intent but may have engaged in “banter in a playground”. Continue reading...