Pacifism is core to modern European culture, but a ‘no arms’ attitude risks leaving artists and film-makers short of answers when facing military aggression and political threats

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One reason why art – painting, literature, film, theatre, all of it – is so important to society is that it creates spaces that can tolerate difficult answers to difficult questions. This makes art the opposite of politics, where politicians are under constant pressure to give easy answers to difficult questions.

I was thinking about this distinction this month while watching the European film awards, this continent’s answer to the Oscars, which has moved its annual ceremony to January this year as it seeks to position itself as a major tastemaker for grownup cinema.

​In the fiercely competitive market ​of the online multiplayer game, Highguard​’s rocky start means it now has a lot to prove

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In the fast-paced, almost psychotically unforgiving video game business, you really do have to stick the landing. Launching a new game is an artform in itself – do you go for months of slowly building hype or a sudden shock reveal, simultaneously announcing and releasing a new project in one fell swoop? The latter worked incredibly well for online shooter Apex Legends, which remains one of the genre’s stalwarts six years after its surprise launch on 4 February 2019. What you don’t do with a new release, is something that falls awkwardly between those two approaches. Enter Highguard.

This new online multiplayer title from newcomer Wildlight Entertainment has an excellent pedigree. The studio was formed by ex-Respawn Entertainment staff, most of whom previously worked on Titanfall, Call of Duty and the aforementioned Apex Legends. They know what they’re doing. But the launch has been … troubled.

Lover, You Should Have Come Over enters charts at No 97, after becoming popular on social media platform

Jeff Buckley has achieved his first US Hot 100 hit single, 29 years after his death, with Lover, You Should Have Come Over at No 97 this week.

TikTok virality is behind the success, as a new generation of listeners discover Buckley’s spirited, romantic songwriting and pair it with videos on the social media platform. TikTok videos don’t count towards US chart positions, but viral trends drive listeners towards songs on streaming services that do count.

A silent-era classic has been reframed for the vertical scroll of phone screens. Is this innovation, sacrilege, or just another way to repackage cinema history?

‘Some films are slices of life, mine are slices of cake,” said Alfred Hitchcock. Who knew that anyone would take the knife to one of his most beloved silent films, The Lodger: A Story of the London Fog (1927), and turn it into a vertical microdrama?

The Tattle TV app has announced that it will be streaming serial killer drama The Lodger on its phone-friendly vertical platform, telling Deadline that it is “one of the first known instances of a classic feature film being fully reframed for vertical, mobile-first consumption”. So will it set a trend? And if so, how can we stop it?

I’m only joking, of course. There will always be those who see archive cinema as just so much more content to be re-appropriated in new formats. And there will always be old-guard purists – who, me? – who wince at the thought. Still, Tattle TV, you have my attention, so let’s talk about it.

We won’t be getting this mini-Hitch in the UK, or the EU for that matter, due to rights, but lucky US viewers will be able to watch the film that Hitchcock considered “the first time I exercised my style” in a format that largely disregards that style. The Lodger will be presented with its squarish 4:3 image either extended or cut down to fill a vertical phone screen. So there will often be parts of the image missing, which is a problem.

The opening shot of The Lodger is a chilling closeup of a woman screaming, her head tilted so that her entire face fills the frame, lit from behind to emphasise her blond hair. Hitchcock told Truffaut that in The Lodger, he presented “ideas in purely visual terms”. This closeup represents the terror spreading across London as a ripper targets young, golden-haired women. Is the idea intact, even if the image isn’t? Hitchcock, a well-known stickler for carefully composed frames, may well disagree. I would.

A fresh crop of young actors will play the Hogwarts students in HBO’s TV adaptation

The fashion designer was named a Chevaliere de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres on Monday