𝕾𝕰𝕬𝕹 𝕸𝕮𝕲𝕰𝕬𝕯𝖄

There will surely be few more fascinating acts in music this year than Mustaine choosing to close Megadeth’s final, self-titled album – and his 40-year career – with a Metallica cover. Never change, Dave.

Happy 80th birthday, big man. You would’ve loved Laura’s blue velvet suit.

BREAKING NEWS: Nasty Jack claps back at Fancy Freddie, calling salt-and-vinegar “overrated” and opening up about his love of Frazzles.

Can we call a moratorium on the term “opened up”? Sick of news sites framing every interaction as if it’s some earth-shaking scoop, as if the speaker has divulged something of enormous importance, when it’s usually, like, “READ NOW: Fancy Freddie has opened up about his favourite flavours of crisp”.

Can tell Lee’s talking about Zack Sabre Jr from the thumbnail pull quote alone.

Saw Dying Fetus last night. Can we acknowledge what a feat of graphic design this is? So many metal logos are performatively illegible but when you have such a horrid, provocative name, why not simply batter people with it? Sometimes a designer’s job is to know when they’re not needed.

To my surprise, the most repulsive part of Angel, a 1984 action-thriller(?) about a 15-year-old student sex worker who has been on the streets since she was 12(!), is actually the bit when this guy sucks a raw egg from its shell. The scene lasts 60 disgusting seconds.

i did a single night shoot as a supporting artiste on Greenland 2: Migration ask me anything

Bela Tarr in a pirated DVD store in Peru posing with the owner and a selection of his films

Béla Tarr visiting a store in Peru selling pirated DVDs and posing with the owner and bootlegs of his own work, one of the realest ones, RIP

Oh, what a week! What a lovely week!

Yes, this made me cry.

Giving it all and being broken down one final time, having to endure a procession of your oldest friends and rivals – ghosts of your past, of your future – coming out to literally give you your flowers, and then being left, finally, after all those years, alone in the ring. That’s a real send-off.

There is no greater theatre of drama than the ring, and no more emotionally rich event than the retirement match of a wrestler – a commingling of character work, shenanigans and veil-dropping, honest-to-goodness, real-time reckoning with ageing and mortality. Farewell, then, Hiroshi Tanahashi.

Maniac Cop suffocating a guy in wet cement to show how violence is embedded – by the police! – into the very streets of New York City? Come on!

First flick of 2026. Hadn’t seen this in about a decade. With 10 years and a bunch more Larry Cohen joints under my belt, man, this thing really sings. Big Bob Z’dar is brilliant and director William Lustig shows just the right amount of him. Gimme that sweet, sweet New York scuzz.

I know! Criminal that this film hasn’t been tarted up and given the lavish Blu-ray treatment. Maybe this’ll be the year!

My final film of 2025 – Gaz and Babs in a clear-cut five-bagger. Billy Wilder never misses and this is, for my money, funnier, sweeter and spicier than Howard Hawks’ better-known screwball about a fiery feminine shaking up the life of a fusty academic fella. Can’t wait to watch this again.

Got my old man a nice pullover and a ticket to the new Avatar movie for Christmas. Fleece Na’vi, dad.

And yes, there’s one for Gremlins 2, as well as The Exorcist, The Terminator, Heat, Manhunter, Fellowship of the Ring … truly a blessed YouTune channel.

YouTube video by Jonno 77 Cinema at home: Gremlins (recreating ABC cinema 1984 intro reel)

Watching Gremlins over the holidays? Watch this first. It’s a trailer-for-trailer recreation of the 1984 ABC Cinemas experience, featuring film previews, an ad for a discontinued tropical liqueur, a cracking Young Ones NatWest spot and more. Kitsch. Cosy. Christmassy.

youtu.be/Hnnai7jQGZc?...

The meaning of Christmas? Movies, actually.

He just watched Point Blank – yes he can!

He’s on an impressive run. Can he keep it up? Only time will tell.

There’s one fewer freak out there and that’s a loss for us all.

page 1 of Cultured Mind, Perpetual Feast

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NEW COMIC

Cultured Mind, Perpetual Feast is now available to read over on my website!

www.willtempest.com/shorts/cultu...

Just stumbled across Dr Macro’s High Quality Movie Scans, an archive of 8x10 stills and high-res PDFs of film books and magazines, many from the early 20th century. Amazing resource. Love websites like this. Proper old-internet shit.

www.doctormacro.com/index.html

I can think of no greater schism in my being, no heavier burden, no more loathsome charge than to have to choose between team bat and team rat. Science Magazine, you cleave me in two.

Did I just use the word “cinephile” to caption an image that features a two-disc Porky’s box set? Yes, I’m afraid I did.

Hello! It’s us, your cinephile neighbours, getting shut of a shitload of DVDs and books ahead of our move! Take ‘em all! Don’t be shy!