Reacher’s Alan Ritchson takes on alien robots in an action thriller that benefits from some better-than-usual streaming special effects You’d be forgiven for skipping past Netflix’s gory, militaristic action thriller War Machine at this particular moment. There is, after all, an actual war raging on (is there ever a good time, one could argue?) but those behind the film would likely use its sci-fi...
Reacher’s Alan Ritchson takes on alien robots in an action thriller that benefits from some better-than-usual streaming special effects You’d be forgiven for skipping past Netflix’s gory, militaristic action thriller War Machine at this particular moment. There is, after all, an actual war raging on (is there ever a good time, one could argue?) but those behind the film would likely use its sci-fi bent as a differentiation defense. The war being raged here is not between the US and a foreign earthly entity but rather one from somewhere above, our umpteenth soldiers v aliens matchup. It’s a clear “if you like” column filler for fans of Predator, Edge of Tomorrow or, if they exist, Battle: Los Angeles, yet unlike the many films it’s clearly inspired by, the extraterrestrials here are designed to resemble machines that could have originated from another country rather than another planet, robotic whirring over tentacle slithering. It gives the film a slightly generic sheen, like a cheaper Transformers spin-off, but it’s also thankfully devoid of the dreaded Netflix murk, that flattening filter that reduces most colours to grey, the film an acquisition from Lionsgate. Set in Colorado but shot in Australia from native writer-director Patrick Hughes, and granted a theatrical release there last month, it makes for a slicker-than-usual streaming premiere, an easy, drink-your-way-through-it Friday night option for those who wish to remain entirely unchallenged. Continue reading...
The city was portrayed as an aspirational place to live, but now those who moved there are realising the precarity that comes with being an economic migrant To be fooled by a mirage, you needn’t be lost in the desert. Sometimes, the illusion is strongest just when you thought you were safely home, posting from the pool about your teenage daughter’s spa party and your own glittering life in a city ...
The city was portrayed as an aspirational place to live, but now those who moved there are realising the precarity that comes with being an economic migrant To be fooled by a mirage, you needn’t be lost in the desert. Sometimes, the illusion is strongest just when you thought you were safely home, posting from the pool about your teenage daughter’s spa party and your own glittering life in a city where “the possibilities are endless”, as they tend to be for billionaires’ daughters living in tax havens. Only then does the fantasy explode in a puff of intercepted missile smoke, leaving just another woman in her pyjamas telling Instagram ( as Petra Ecclestone did at the weekend ) that she moved to Dubai “to feel safe” and war was never mentioned in the small print. Who could have guessed that living a few hundred miles as the drone flies from Tehran might have risks? Certainly not the anonymous hedge funder who fumed to the Financial Times that “ the trade was not that you were getting exposed to geopolitics ”. Continue reading...
India’s Gukesh Dommaraju, at 19 the youngest ever world champion, has had a hard time this year. The teenager has struggled at Wijk aan Zee, where he totalled a modest 50%, and then this week in Prague, where he was last after eight of the nine rounds, scoring just 2.5/8, without winning a single game. With just Friday’s final round to be played, Prague is currently led by Nodirbek Abdusattorov on...
India’s Gukesh Dommaraju, at 19 the youngest ever world champion, has had a hard time this year. The teenager has struggled at Wijk aan Zee, where he totalled a modest 50%, and then this week in Prague, where he was last after eight of the nine rounds, scoring just 2.5/8, without winning a single game. With just Friday’s final round to be played, Prague is currently led by Nodirbek Abdusattorov on 5.5/8, as the Uzbekistan No 1 continues his winning streak from the London Classic and Wijk aan Zee. The best game so far has been this win by the local Czech hero David Navara. The action-packed game includes queen and rook sacrifices and a pawn promotion, so is well worth playing through. The loser was so impressed by Navara’s creativity that he continued the game until he was checkmated. Prague scores after Thursday’s eighth round were Abdusattorov 5.5, Jorden van Foreest (Netherlands) 5, Navara 4.5, Parham Maghsoodloo (Iran), Vincent Keymer (Germany) and Chithambaram Aravindh (India) 4, Nodirbek Yakubboev (Uzbekistan), Hans Niemann (USA) and David Anton (Spain) 3.5, Gukesh 2.5. View image in fullscreen 4014: Teodors Zeids v Mikhail Tal, Riga Championship 1954. White to move and win. Could you have beaten the ‘Magician from Riga’? Faustino Oro, 12, Argentina’s “chess Messi”, has been competing at the Aeroflot Open in Moscow this week in search of what could have been his third and final grandmaster norm, and with it, the GM title and a world age record. Sergey Karjakin, Judit Polgar and Bobby Fischer were among the previous youngest ever GMs. Oro’s family moved from Buenos Aires to Spain to help his career, and he is already the youngest ever 2500-rated player. Aeroflot Moscow is a major global tournament. The elite six-day, nine-round event included 51 grandmasters and 58 international masters, with a prize fund of 18m roubles (approximately £171,000), and was played at the Carlton Hotel in Central Moscow. The schedule was tight, nine rounds in six days using the time ...
Week in wildlife: a watchful egret, a sun-seeking swan and a procession of caterpillars This week’s best wildlife photographs from around the world A great blue heron chick with its mother at Wakodahatchee Wetlands in Delray Beach, Florida, US. Photograph: Ronen Tivony/NurPhoto/Shutterstock
Week in wildlife: a watchful egret, a sun-seeking swan and a procession of caterpillars This week’s best wildlife photographs from around the world A great blue heron chick with its mother at Wakodahatchee Wetlands in Delray Beach, Florida, US. Photograph: Ronen Tivony/NurPhoto/Shutterstock
New play at the Crucible highlights early struggles and shows the dissolving division between sport and the performing arts The Crucible Theatre is best known for hosting snooker, but it claims a place in football history too. On its outer wall, a blue plaque marks the site where the Sheffield Rules of the game were agreed in 1858, back when it was the Adelphi hotel. So it is a fitting spot to be ...
New play at the Crucible highlights early struggles and shows the dissolving division between sport and the performing arts The Crucible Theatre is best known for hosting snooker, but it claims a place in football history too. On its outer wall, a blue plaque marks the site where the Sheffield Rules of the game were agreed in 1858, back when it was the Adelphi hotel. So it is a fitting spot to be premiering a new play this month about the establishment – and subsequent dismantling – of women’s football in the early 20th century. Football fans and theatregoers may not have always felt like the obvious overlap in a Venn diagram, but the past decade has been a banner one for the beautiful game on stage. We have had a farce about the 2018 World Cup bid ( Three Lions ), a Royal Court drama about homophobia ( The Pass ), a Pulitzer Prize-nominated exploration of teenage girlhood ( The Wolves ) and even a 16th-century folk horror ( The Bounds ). Plus Dear England , the still-touring smash hit that tells the story of Gareth Southgate’s tenure as manager of the national men’s team. Continue reading...
By forefronting Jessie Buckley’s Agnes at the expense of her megastar husband, this female-directed feminist fest gives voice to the anguished howls of disenfranchised women everywhere On paper, it already sounds the most Oscary film ever . A movie about a visionary man whose genius made him one of the greatest figures in literature. William Shakespeare is played by Paul Mescal , an actor who leav...
By forefronting Jessie Buckley’s Agnes at the expense of her megastar husband, this female-directed feminist fest gives voice to the anguished howls of disenfranchised women everywhere On paper, it already sounds the most Oscary film ever . A movie about a visionary man whose genius made him one of the greatest figures in literature. William Shakespeare is played by Paul Mescal , an actor who leaves no demographic unravished by his outrageous levels of magnetism. And yet Hamnet is a film that sidelines both of these men to supporting roles. The film is about Shakespeare’s wife, Anne Hathaway, long viewed as a dumpy, illiterate woman unworthy of attention – abandoned by Shakespeare in Stratford-upon-Avon when he swanned off to London. Anne is referred to in Hamnet as Agnes, as she was also known, and played by Jessie Buckley , the Irish actor who could take on the role of a lamp-post and make you feel its pain. We meet Agnes curled asleep in the roots an ancient tree. She may be illiterate, but she is gifted herbalist who makes medicines from plants and a keeps a falcon. She is her own woman – fierce, intelligent, more than match for the man she calls “the Latin tutor”. Shakespeare’s mother warns him that his bride-to-be is a forest witch. Continue reading...
She co-wrote Gracie Abrams’ hit album then struck out solo, winning a fervent cult for her funny, wordy songs. As her tour hits the UK, she explains why imperfection is so important in pop Backstage at the Berlin venue Huxleys Neue Welt, Audrey Hobert is showing me around her dressing room. On the 27-year-old pop star’s second time outside the US, the novelty of having local snacks on the rider ha...
She co-wrote Gracie Abrams’ hit album then struck out solo, winning a fervent cult for her funny, wordy songs. As her tour hits the UK, she explains why imperfection is so important in pop Backstage at the Berlin venue Huxleys Neue Welt, Audrey Hobert is showing me around her dressing room. On the 27-year-old pop star’s second time outside the US, the novelty of having local snacks on the rider hasn’t dimmed, although her enthusiasm for chocolate thins can’t distract from what’s going on across the room. A comically overlong beige trenchcoat hangs on a rail, the excess length puddling on the floor. Two sets of joke-shop Groucho Marx glasses sit on the dressing table, the original black brows and moustache replaced with orange fluff to blend with Hobert’s vivid strawberry blond. “Those glasses are not flattering,” says Hobert. Having matching hair under the giant plastic nose, she says, “makes it more flattering”. In a few hours, Hobert will start her set standing on a ladder that is concealed by the coat, wearing the glasses, miming on a prop banjo and singing a peppy song about charming strangers called I Like to Touch People. After it ends, the lights dim, Hobert climbs down and swaps to a regular-sized trenchcoat. Despite the changeover being entirely visible, the lights come back up as if to say “Hey presto!” – the trompe l’oeil of high-budget pop stagecraft remade as slapstick. Continue reading...
Golden jubilee for a bigger Games This is the 14th edition of the Winter Paralympics, to be held on the 50th anniversary of its first. It will be bigger than ever before, with more than 600 athletes from 56 countries expected to take part. El Salvador, Haiti, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Portugal will compete for the first time. There will be 79 different medal events in six different sports, w...
Golden jubilee for a bigger Games This is the 14th edition of the Winter Paralympics, to be held on the 50th anniversary of its first. It will be bigger than ever before, with more than 600 athletes from 56 countries expected to take part. El Salvador, Haiti, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Portugal will compete for the first time. There will be 79 different medal events in six different sports, with mixed doubles in wheelchair curling a new addition since Beijing 2022. The president of the International Paralympic Committee, Andrew Parsons, said the Games would deliver “world-class sport [that is] highly competitive. Sport that will surprise you. And most importantly, sport that will have a life-changing impact on everyone who witnesses it.” From Verona to Milan via Cortina As with the Winter Olympics, which grabbed the attention of the world last month, these Paralympic Games are to be hosted by Milano Cortina across a range of venues hundreds of miles apart. The opening ceremony will take place in Verona on Friday night, before the action proper begins at the central hub of Cortina d’Ampezzo on Saturday. Cortina will host para-alpine skiing at the Tofane Alpine Skiing Centre, alongside wheelchair curling and para-snowboard. Nordic events – para-biathlon and para-cross country skiing – will be staged at the Tesero Cross-Country Skiing Stadium near the town of Predazzo. Finally, the Para-Ice hockey competition will take place in Milan at the Santagiulia Stadium. View image in fullscreen The wheelchair curling mixed doubles gets under way in Cortina d’Ampezzo. Photograph: Evgeniy Maloletka/AP Six sports – but many categories Events are limited to the six sports listed above but, as with all para-sports, they are broken down into different categories reflecting the disability of the athletes. Alpine skiing, say, includes five different events – slalom, giant slalom, super-G, downhill and super combined – which are then broken down into men’s and women’s categories an...
SHANGHAI, March 6, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- ATRenew Inc. ("ATRenew" or the "Company") (NYSE: RERE), a pioneer in technology-driven recycling and trade-in solutions for consumer products in China, today announced that Mr. Yue Teng has been appointed as a new member of the Company's board of directors (the "Board") and the compensation committee of the Board, and Ms. Rui Zhu has been appointed as a new ...
SHANGHAI, March 6, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- ATRenew Inc. ("ATRenew" or the "Company") (NYSE: RERE), a pioneer in technology-driven recycling and trade-in solutions for consumer products in China, today announced that Mr. Yue Teng has been appointed as a new member of the Company's board of directors (the "Board") and the compensation committee of the Board, and Ms. Rui Zhu has been appointed as a new member of the nominating and corporate governance committee of the Board, effective immediately, to fill the vacancies arising from the resignation of Mr. Mervin Ye Zhou. Upon the appointment of Mr. Yue Teng, the Board consists of eight members: Mr. Kerry Xuefeng Chen, Mr. Yongliang Wang, Mr. Chen Chen, Mr. Yue Teng, Ms. Shuangxi Wu, Mr. Jingbo Wang, Mr. Guoxing Jiang and Ms. Rui Zhu. Mr. Yue Teng is a director of Strategic Investment Department of JD.com (NASDAQ: JD and HKEX: 9618 (HKD counter) and 89618 (RMB counter)), responsible for overseeing investments in the logistics and industrial property sectors for JD.com and its subsidiaries. Prior to joining JD.com in August 2021, Mr. Teng was an associate in the Real Estate Investment team at Hony Capital and a portfolio manager at Goldstream Investment from May 2018 to August 2021, and a vice president at Amundi Smith Breeden from September 2013 to April 2018. Mr. Teng received his bachelor's degree in management science in operations research from Fudan University, and his master's degree in engineering management with a focus on financial engineering from Duke University. Mr. Kerry Xuefeng Chen, the Company's Founder, Chairman, and Chief Executive Officer, on behalf of the Board and the management of the Company, said, "We are delighted to welcome Mr. Yue Teng to the Board. We believe Mr. Teng will bring deep strategic insights that will further strengthen our ongoing collaboration with JD.com. His extensive experience across key sectors—combined with his background in business and finance will provide valuable perspectiv...