For her directorial debut, Winslet assembled a cast including Toni Collette, Timothy Spall, Johnny Flynn and Andrea Riseborough to tell a story inspired by her own family’s bereavement. The actors talk mourning, immortality and hospital vending machines

In 2017, Sally Bridges-Winslet died of cancer. She was 71. It was, her youngest daughter said, “like the north star just dropped out of the sky”.

It would have been even worse, says Kate Winslet today, had the family not pulled together. “I do have tremendous amounts of peace and acceptance around what happened because of how we were able to make it for her.”

A passenger having a mental health episode was heading for the emergency exit. He lunged for the door handle, screaming

I write thrillers: mostly ­historical mysteries. In September 2024, I was returning from a ­literary festival in Italy, where I had been talking about my ­latest book. It was a Ryanair flight, and as we came in to land at London Stansted, I heard people behind me shouting. I looked back to see some of them were standing up. A moment later a big man – I would guess he was 6ft 4in, and powerfully built – burst through them. He headed towards an emergency exit and lunged for the door handle, screaming. Behind him, a smaller guy was clambering over the tops of the seats, shouting: “It’s not terrorism. It’s not terrorism. Mental health!”

While exit doors can’t be opened when a plane is at full altitude because the air pressure inside is too great, levels dip during descent, and it is possible to open them. I feared that if he opened the exit, the plane would be hard to control and we might hit the ground about 300mph faster than we were meant to.

Here are all the best movies to watch over the holidays – from favourites like Elf and Paddington to the latest from Mission: Impossible and Knives Out. Plus, two of the sexiest films ever made

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There’s much more to do, but we should be encouraged by the progress we have made

Today marks the 10th anniversary of the Paris climate treaty, one of the landmark days in climate-action history. Attending the conference as a journalist, I watched and listened and wondered whether 194 countries could ever agree on anything at all, and the night before they did, people who I thought were more sophisticated than me assured me they couldn’t. Then they did. There are a lot of ways to tell the story of what it means and where we are now, but any version of it needs respect for the complexities, because there are a lot of latitudes between the poles of total victory and total defeat.

I had been dreading the treaty anniversary as an occasion to note that we have not done nearly enough, but in July I thought we might be able celebrate it. Because, on 23 July, the international court of justice handed down an epochal ruling that gives that treaty enforceable consequences it never had before. It declares that all nations have a legal obligation to act in response to the climate crisis, and, as Greenpeace International put it, “obligates states to regulate businesses on the harm caused by their emissions regardless of where the harm takes place. Significantly, the court found that the right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment is fundamental for all other human rights, and that intergenerational equity should guide the interpretation of all climate obligations.” The Paris treaty was cited repeatedly as groundwork for this decision.

He’ll soon be going back on the hunt for bent coppers – but not before a wild revenge tale of divorcees going rogue. The star talks feeling inferior to Meera Syal, his life in the US and why he’s thrilled to be typecast

While we embark on the inhumanly long wait for the new season of Line of Duty, which starts shooting in January, you’ll see Martin Compston – the show’s hero and true north – a number of times. Twice as you’ve never seen him before, and once, in Red Eye, in the form that you’ve come to know and love him: brisk and taciturn, brave and speedy, the man you’d trust to save the world while the dopes all around him can’t even see it needs saving.

But first, The Revenge Club, in which he is a revelation. The setting is a support group for divorcees, a ragtag gang united by nothing but the fact that they’ve been summarily dismissed by their spouses. “There’s no other reason for these characters to be in each other’s lives,” Compston says from his home in Las Vegas (more on that later – much more). “They’re all desperate and lonely and in dire need of companionship. They’re all, in their own ways, broken, which makes for this explosive mix.”

Not long ago, artists such as Lil Nas X and Olly Alexander were ruling pop. But success has stalled as acts face industry obstacles and rising homophobia. What now?

At the turn of the decade, gay male and non-binary pop stars seemed poised to take pop music by storm. Lil Nas X broke out with Old Town Road – which blew up on TikTok, sold about 18.5m copies and remains tied with Shaboozey’s A Bar Song (Tipsy) and Mariah Carey’s All I Want for Christmas Is You as the longest-running No 1 single in US history – and artists such as Sam Smith, Troye Sivan and Olly Alexander from Years & Years were all singing about gay love and sex.

But the initial promise has stalled. Lil Nas X’s attempts to build on his smash debut album have fizzled, and he is publicly dealing with mental health issues. In October, Khalid released his first album since being outed by his ex last year but only sold 10,000 copies in the first week in the US. A previous album, 2019’s Free Spirit, sold some 200,000 copies in the first week and led to him briefly dethroning Ariana Grande as the most listened to artist on Spotify.

Health secretary urges resident doctors, who are to strike from 17 December, to accept his offer to end dispute

Wes Streeting has told resident doctors that strikes and a sharp rise in the number of flu cases over the Christmas period could be “the Jenga piece” that forces the NHS to collapse.

The health secretary said the NHS faced a “challenge unlike any it has seen since the pandemic” and urged resident doctors to accept the government’s offer and end their action.

Disappointing UK GDP report shows economy contracted by 0.1% in both September and October

Today’s GDP report also shows the economy only grew by 1.1% over the last year – a weak performance.

The ONS says:

GDP is estimated to have grown by 1.1% in the three months to October 2025, compared with the same three months a year ago. Over this period services grew by 1.5% and construction grew by 1.1%, whereas production fell by 1.3%.

GDP is estimated to be 1.1% higher in October 2025, compared with October 2024.

“The economy contracted slightly in the latest three months, as production fell again and services growth stalled.

“Within production, there was continued weakness in car manufacturing, with the industry only making a slight recovery in October from the substantial fall in output seen in the previous month.

“Overall services showed no growth in the latest three months, continuing the recent trend of slowing in this sector. There were falls in wholesale and scientific research, offset by growth in rental and leasing and retail.”

Mark Rowley says capital is a safe city, and claims of no-go areas are ‘completely false’

Members of the House of Lords have proposed “totally unnecessary” and “very cruel” amendments to the assisted dying bill in a bid to scupper it, Kim Leadbeater, the MP leading the campaign for the legislation, has said. Kiran Stacey has the story.

I have beefed up the post at 9.08am to include the direct quote from Wes Streeting about not being able to guarantee patient safety in the NHS if the strike by resident doctors in England goes ahead. You may need to refresh the page to get the update to appear.

Decision would anger environmental campaigners, who say it would amount to ‘gutting’ of green deal

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The EU’s outright ban on the sale of new petrol and diesel cars from 2035 is poised to be watered down, a senior European parliament politician has said.

The decision, expected to be announced by the European Commission on Tuesday in Strasbourg, would be a divisive move, angering environmental campaigners who argue it would amount to the “gutting” of the EU’s flagship green deal.