Varanasi will be the next feature from S. S. Rajamouli. 'Filmed for IMAX' it says. 'Filmed?!?' I reply. www.youtube.com/watch?v=jDGE...

Just putting this here so I can refer to it later. Egg heist?

At first, Keeper has lots of mysteries. Many of the answers seem a bit lightweight, ready to fly away in the wind. The images that reveal the answers, however, could linger forever. A grim idea watered down with banalities, then rendered like a nightmare. Meshes of the Afternoon-alike in places too.

I did the accounting and, thanks to my Limitless card, each of my cinema tickets this year has cost me pennies. Meanwhile, any cinema snacks have required me to take out a small loan.

I want to write more audio drama. I have an original Radio 4 show coming next year, a Rusty Quill show somewhat sooner than that, and you may have heard my 'What if the pandemic was an episode of Buffy?' series Circles. Do you have an audio drama that needs stories? I love audio drama. Hit me up!

How many hours of this thing are there?

I'm not sure 'You can't upload machine-generated video to this app' equates to 'anti AI' when it could so easily be 'we want to devour your human-made video to feed our video generating machines'.

I went to the cinema to see a 3D movie just a few days ago and I'll see another next week. I don't see any connection to AI except they are both - as is everything, grossly enough - used to harvest blind, misinformed investment. Generative AI is vapid and wasteful. Stereoscopic film is an artform.

Switching Peter Dinklage in for Natasha Lyonne makes perfect 007 sense but I can't get my head around Peacock not renewing Poker Face. Why?

New Squeeze song seems like the beginning of a concept album? www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ec9G...

I just dropped a special #Noirvember missive on my Substack. Free to read at the link below. andrewnette.substack.com/p/helmut-kau...

The remarkable story we discussed this morning. (No paywall but do consider subscribing.) www.thenewworld.co.uk/james-ball-e...

I see people close in age to 30 using 'over 30' as a kind of benchmark, people close to 40 using 'over 40' and so on, as if it's not just some sort of slippery continuum, no fixed markers tied to numbers. I guess there's a tendency to feel like or fear that you've just grown up? Or are about to?

Channel 5's version of Play for Today airs for the first time tonight. I hope it finds an audience. And, of course, I hope it's strong, compelling stuff. We'll see. www.youtube.com/watch?v=fVqa...

Molly Manners has made a mini romcom with Joe Wilkinson and Keira Knightley to advertise a supermarket and it's absolutely baffling. www.youtube.com/watch?v=wWeY...

I'm not at all torn over the BBC. Wipe clean the regime, give the reins to people who believe in the mission to inform, educate and entertain - and understand right wing policy is contrary to informing and educating by its very nature. Right wing politics are a distortion of reality. A deception.

Brilliant BBC Scotland thriller Guilt has been remade in Australia as Reckless, with Tasma Walton in the Mark Bonnar role. www.youtube.com/watch?v=gZSD...

Includes a shopping list of 'undercover' movies.

My tiny Over the Garden Wall fan game is now available for FREE! 🎉 juliaminamata.itch.io/otgw Thanks so much @patrickmchale.bsky.social, @forkfrenzy.bsky.social, @blastingcompany.bsky.social, Elijah Wood, @clickpulp.com, @grundislav.games. Thanks @requiemcafe.bsky.social & @mossmouth.bsky.social.

The reaction to the Panorama edit has been nothing short of hysterical. Yes the BBC has some impartiality problems. But its biggest isn't the one you think. New piece from me. open.substack.com/pub/goodalla...

Good God, someone's just uploaded to YouTube a nearly 2-hour long video of one of the original Vic Reeves Big Night Out live shows at the Albany Empire from 1989. www.youtube.com/watch?v=nKPU...

Whatever project is going on to undermine the BBC or why, there's a realy opportunity now to replace the hideous Tim Davie with a progressive and socially responsible director general. There's no reason a public service broadcaster should be anything less. Give us a BBC that serves not panders.

I want to see this Norwegian mouse Christmas movie. www.youtube.com/watch?v=bee-...

The most incredible library in the world, @bodleian.ox.ac.uk opened to OTD 1602, through the energy, money & commitment of Sir Thomas Bodley. It began with 5k books, & now more than 22m, with 2m+reader visits a year, & multi-million online users across the globe. Privilged to be its 25th librarian!

I went to my least favourite local cinema to see Del Toro's Frankenstein tonight. It's not really Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, much less James Whale's, and not Terence Fisher's (though more so than expected). It looks and feels like a romantic cousin to Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings. I like it!

The first episode of Crime Night has been made available to all of us. www.youtube.com/watch?v=PkUD...

If I had won some Tony Awards and been shortlisted for a Pulitzer prize I'd try to parlay that into writing a Muppet movie too.

Why aren't there Lego comics?

"Red hot socialist. Drives a fast car."

It has come to this: at least two journalists are reviewing the Christmas ads, complete with star ratings. www.standard.co.uk/culture/tvfilm

New awareness campaign

What's it like inside your head?

If you're in need of positive and rather wholesome news, there's a high school teacher named Bryan who took a ton of freely licensed celebrity headshots at the New York Film Festival last month for Wikipedia, and I truly can't believe how drastic the upgrade is for some articles (thread)

Union busting scumbags.

In lovely science news, it is now official: I am the inaugural Writer in Residence at the Royal Institution to mark 200 years of the Christmas Lectures: www.rigb.org/explore-scie...

There's a @markharrison.bsky.social quiz on @filmstories.bsky.social today for the first time in forever. filmstories.co.uk/features/fil...

Just remembered I'm going to see Back to the Future at the cinema tomorrow night and how exciting that is. Woo hoo!

Some shots in the new Scream 7 trailer were filmed in Dallas, Georgia, if that helps with all the speculation and gossip.

The Scream 7 trailer gives the appearance of being very spoilery and I expect it is. Not much would make me happier than this being at least as good as Scream 4. Maybe every third Scream film will be the winners. www.youtube.com/watch?v=UJrg...

If you have Amazon Prime, get what you can can out of it. Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is now free for Prime people through the Luna thing. luna.amazon.co.uk/game/indiana...

Suck on our HALLOWEEN SPECIAL with @brendonconnelly.bsky.social, @ajblack.bsky.social & Lindsay Drysdale joining us mid-storm to talk about anthology horrors and tell ghost stories… 🎃 podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/v...

Great people doing good things!

The partner of a relative of the husband of a friend is crowdfunding a film. Check it out!

I did today's Wordle the way I plan a story. ⬜⬜⬜🟩🟩 ⬜⬜🟩🟩🟩 ⬜🟩🟩🟩🟩 ⬜🟩🟩🟩🟩 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

I know nothing about Dr Who, but, for Londoners, the phrase "Going For Dinner With Billie Piper" is the absolute best way to remember the order of the vertical streets running east to west in Soho (Greek, Frith, Dean, Wardour, Berwick, Poland) and has saved many a late night out

This is how you do it. www.youtube.com/watch?v=Boit...

I have been reminded of Strangers, an Australian TV movie with obvious Hitchcock influences. I would love to see this again. A nice Blu-ray would be a treat. The sort of thing Imprint Films might do? www.youtube.com/watch?v=HtMD...

This sounds like a good option, at least within our given circumstances. Though, of course, this tool also makes it possible for people to restrict their news sources to only those regurgitating complete and utter crap.

I'm in this podcast again, telling a weird, wild and true ghost story from my life that weaves in lots of actual tragedy from the mortal realm. Also, some chat about postnuclear vampires with WWE-meets-Meatloaf aesthetics.