Shot in black-and-white over seven years, Brittany Shyne’s film is poetic and political in its portrayal of families fighting to maintain a vanishing way of life

Brittany Shyne’s stunning documentary observes Black farmers in the American south over the course of seven years, and portrays the beauty and the hardships of working with the land. The black-and-white cinematography lends a visual sumptuousness to the rituals of harvest: we see giant machines extracting cotton buds from open bolls, leaving behind a whirl of white fluffs fluttering in the air. The painful legacy of slavery in the country means that the choreography of farm work is rich with poetic and political meaning. Owning land is more than an economic matter; it also allows for autonomy of labour and preservation of heritage, to be passed on to future generations.

Hardworking as the farmers are, however, systematic discrimination continues to hinder their financial security. While their white neighbours have easy access to federal support, Black farmers are faced with near-insurmountable red tape, resulting in much longer waiting times for funding. With the landslide effect of operational costs and taxes, many have had their land taken away from them. One particularly poignant sequence follows 89-year-old Carlie Williams, who has farmed since his teens, as he struggles to negotiate the price of prescription glasses. Most of the subjects in the documentary also hail from older generations; the implication is that, with all its precariousness, this line of work is no longer viable for younger people.

This shocking moment is the outcome of a political, institutional and media environment that is not far off Britain’s

There is not much that can still shock about Donald Trump’s second administration. But the killing of Renee Good earlier this month by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer, as well as the regular, often violent confrontations that ICE stages on US streets, show so much that is unravelling in plain sight. The rule of law, the freedom to protest, and even the right to walk or drive in the streets safely without being assaulted by the state, seems to exist no longer in the towns and cities where ICE has made its presence felt. The most disturbing aspect of all this is how quickly it has happened. But for a government agency such as ICE to become the powerful paramilitary force that it is, several factors need to be in play first. Only one of them is Donald Trump.

ICE may look as if it came out of nowhere, but the sort of authoritarianism that results in these crackdowns never does. It takes shape slowly, in plain sight, in a way that is clearly traceable over time. First, there needs to be a merging of immigration and security concerns, both institutionally and in the political culture. Established in the wake of 9/11, ICE was part of a government restructuring under President George W Bush. It was granted a large budget, wide investigative powers and a partnership with the FBI’s joint terrorism taskforce. The work of enforcing immigration law became inextricably linked to the business of keeping Americans safe after the largest attack on US soil. That then extended into a wider emphasis, under Barack Obama, beyond those who posed national security threats, and on to immigrants apprehended at the border, gang members and non-citizens convicted of felonies or misdemeanours.

Nesrine Malik is a Guardian columnist

With Rob Minkoff, Allers directed 1994’s The Lion King, which remains the highest-grossing traditionally animated film of all time

Roger Allers, the Disney film-maker who co-directed The Lion King and worked on films including Aladdin, Beauty and the Beast and The Little Mermaid, has died aged 76.

Allers’ colleague at the Walt Disney Company, Dave Bossert announced his death on social media on Sunday morning, remembering him as “an extraordinarily gifted artist and film-maker, a true pillar of the Disney Animation renaissance”.

Governments opting for oligarchy while brutally repressing protests over austerity and lack of jobs, charity report says

The world saw a record number of billionaires created last year, with a collective wealth of $18.3tn (£13.7tn), while global efforts stalled in the fight against poverty and hunger.

Oxfam’s annual survey of global inequality has revealed that the number of billionaires surpassed 3,000 for the first time during 2025. Since 2020, their collective wealth grew by 81%, or $8.2tn, which the charity claims would be enough to eradicate global poverty 26 times over.

US army issues prepare-to-deploy orders amid tension over ICE killing, though it is unclear if units will be sent

The Pentagon has ordered about 1,500 active-duty soldiers in Alaska to prepare for a possible deployment to Minnesota, the site of large protests against the government’s deportation drive, two US officials told Reuters on Sunday.

The US army placed the units on prepare-to-deploy orders in case violence in the midwestern state escalates, the officials said, though it is not clear whether any of them will be sent.

• Heckle comes during rendition of Star-Spangled Banner

• US president has threatened tariffs on European nations

Mounting tensions between Europe and the United States moved into the sporting arena on Sunday when a member of the crowd shouted “Leave Greenland alone” as the US national anthem was sung during an NBA game in London.

Actor Vanessa Williams was performing the Star-Spangled Banner before the Memphis Grizzlies faced the Orlando Magic at the O2 Arena when she was interrupted by the heckle. The intervention drew a round of applause and cheers from sections of the crowd.

Trump lawyer Robert Garson told the Telegraph he discussed refuge for those leaving UK over antisemitism

Discussions are reportedly under way within Donald Trump’s administration about the US possibly granting asylum to Jewish people from the UK, according to the Telegraph, citing the US president’s personal lawyer.

Trump lawyer Robert Garson told the newspaper that he has held conversations with the US state department about offering refuge to British Jews who are leaving the UK citing rising antisemitism.

William Brock fatally shot Lo-Letha Toland-Hall in 2024 after wrongly assuming she was involved in plot to rob him

An 83-year-old Ohio man faces sentencing on Tuesday after being convicted of murder in the shooting of an Uber driver who he wrongly thought was trying to rob him.

William J Brock fatally shot the driver after wrongly assuming she was in on a plot involving scam phone calls that deceived them both to get $12,000 in supposed bond money for a relative, authorities said.

Associated Press contributed

Tariff threats over the Arctic island expose the limits of coercive diplomacy. Europe’s united response and pushback shows fear is fading

For all Donald Trump’s bluster about restoring American strength, his attempt to bully European allies over Greenland reveals a deeper weakness: coercive diplomacy only works if people are afraid to resist. Increasingly, they aren’t. And that is a good thing. Bullies often back down when confronted – their power relies on fear. Mr Trump’s threat to impose sweeping tariffs on Europeans unless they acquiesce to his demand to “purchase” Greenland has stripped his trade policy bare. This is not about economic security, unfair trade or protecting American workers. It is about using tariffs as a weapon to force nations to submit.

The response from Europe has been united and swift. That in itself should send a message. France’s Emmanuel Macron says plainly “no amount of intimidation” will alter Europe’s position. Denmark has anchored the issue firmly inside Nato’s collective security. EU leaders have warned that tariff threats risk a dangerous downward spiral. Even Italy’s prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, seen as ideologically close to Mr Trump, publicly called the tariff threat a “mistake” – adding that she has told him so.

Errors in measuring microplastic pollution can be corrected. Public trust in science also needs to be shored up

It is true that science is self-correcting. Over the long term this means that we can generally trust its results – but up close, correction can be a messy process. The Guardian reported last week that 20 recent studies measuring the amount of micro- and nanoplastics in the human body have been criticised in the scientific literature for methodological issues, calling their results into question. In one sense this is the usual process playing out as it should. However, the scale of the potential error – one scientist estimates that half the high-impact papers in the field are affected – suggests a systemic problem that should have been prevented.

The risk is that in a febrile political atmosphere in which trust in science is being actively eroded on issues from climate change to vaccinations, even minor scientific conflicts can be used to sow further doubt. Given that there is immense public and media interest in plastic pollution, it is unfortunate that scientists working in this area did not show more caution.

The US president’s trade war for Greenland tells us that the time for fence-sitting or wishful thinking is over

One way or the other, President Trump said, he will have Greenland. Well, at least now we know it’s the other; not an invasion that would have sent young men home to their mothers across Europe in coffins, but instead another trade war, designed to kill off jobs and break Europe’s will. Just our hopes of an economic recovery, then, getting taken out and shot on a whim by our supposedly closest ally, months after Britain signed a trade deal supposed to protect us from such arbitrary punishment beatings. In a sane universe, that would not feel like a climbdown by the White House, yet by comparison with the rhetoric that had Denmark scrambling troops to Greenland last week it is.

That said, don’t underestimate the gravity of the moment.

Gaby Hinsliff is a Guardian columnist

AI is asbestos in the walls of our tech society, stuffed there by monopolists run amok. A serious fight against it must strike at its roots

I am a science-fiction writer, which means that my job is to make up futuristic parables about our current techno-social arrangements to interrogate not just what a gadget does, but who it does it for, and who it does it to.

What I do not do is predict the future. No one can predict the future, which is a good thing, since if the future were predictable, that would mean we couldn’t change it.

Demonstrations against the Iraq war proved protest works. Now we must halt destruction before it more powerfully starts

In spring 2004, Gen Anthony Zinni uttered about Iraq the dreaded words in US politics: “I spent two years in Vietnam, and I’ve seen this movie before.” A year after George W Bush’s declaration of “mission accomplished” – when the war had hit its peak popularity at 74% – the invasion had descended into quagmire, marked by a raging insurgency, the Abu Ghraib torture scandal and US casualties nearing 1,000. For the first time, a majority of Americans judged the war a “mistake”. In this, they echoed what millions of Americans, predicting fiasco, had been saying since before its start.

By the summer of 2005, with Iraq exploding in civil war, public support further eroded. Vietnam comparisons abounded. Running against the war, Democrats had blowout wins in the 2006 midterms. The new Congress empaneled the bipartisan Iraq study group, which concluded that the war had to end. Its fate was sealed by the election of Barack Obama, who made good on his pledge to withdraw US troops (though US forces later returned to take on the Islamic State).

Jeremy Varon is the author of Our Grief Is Not a Cry for War: The Movement to Stop the War on Terror (University of Chicago Press, 2025)

As survivors face pressure to sell their land in Altadena, a historic Black community, experts say we’re witnessing ‘climate gentrification’

Ellen Williams’ left hand played with her long dark hair as her right hand guided the steering wheel, her phone resting face-down in her lap. Born and raised in Altadena, an unincorporated area in Los Angeles county, she didn’t need to look at a map as she drove to where her home of 22 years burned down.

We passed empty lots with gaping holes where foundations once stood. The banging of hammers rang through the neighborhood and wood frames rose from the dirt, the smell of fresh lumber in the air. Perched on street corners were signs declaring: “Altadena is not for sale.”

• Mid-level and senior officials uncomfortable with award

• Fifa says it still ‘strongly’ supports the peace prize

There is a growing sense of embarrassment among mid-level and senior officials within Fifa over the awarding of its peace prize to Donald Trump. The US president was handed the award at the World Cup draw in Washington DC in December with the Fifa president, Gianni Infantino, telling Trump: “We want to see hope, we want to see unity, we want to see a future. This is what we want to see from a leader and you definitely deserve the first Fifa Peace Prize.”

Since then, the US has launched airstrikes across Venezuela and captured the country’s president, Nicolás Maduro, and his wife, Cilia Flores, and flown them to the US, where he was put in jail. Maduro appeared in court on 5 January, pleading not guilty to drugs, weapons and “narco‑terrorism” charges. Trump has also threatened to invade Greenland because he said the US needs the territory “very badly”.