47 guide 14-20 Oct 2017 tv films
to a silhouetted samurai
sword battle, all done
with irresistible energy,
audacity and wit.Friday 20 October
Sunshine
(Danny Boyle, 2007)
11.20pm, Sony Movie
Channel
A multinational team
of astronauts, including
Cillian Murphy, Chris
Evans and Rose Byrne,
are on an Earth-saving
mission: to fl y a giant
bomb into the sun’s core
to rekindle its dying
energy. It’s a fantastic
premise, and for a while
Boyle’s accomplished
sci-fi adventure shines
with the philosophical
brilliance of a real Space
Odyssey, before going
a bit Alien-lite.Monday 16
October
Mission: Impossible III
(JJ Abrams, 2006)
9pm, Sky1
Much the same as before,
except this time Tom
Cruise’s agent Hunt must
do the unbelievable with
a bomb ticking in his
head. And this time it’s
personal, toadlike villain
Philip Seymour Hoff man
having the temerity to
kidnap Ethan’s new wife
(Michelle Monaghan).
Full of those clever little
mistaken-identity tricks,
the pace never lets up,
and there’s a stunt atop
a Shanghai skyscraper
that’ll make you whistle.
Tuesday 17
October
Pyaasa
(Guru Dutt, 1957)
2.45am, Channel 4
Pyaasa is a sweeping,
romantic melodrama that
makes a powerful plea
for the artist’s place in
a materialistic society.
Guru Dutt also stars as
Vijay, a struggling poet
whose eff orts to get
published fail miserably,
until one of those
peculiar Bollywood plot
contrivances has him
mistakenly pronounced
dead – at which point he
achieves instant fame.
Wednesday 18
October
Letters to Juliet
(Gary Winick, 2010)
1.55am, Channel 4
Talk about la dolce vita –
this Verona-set romcom
comes with lashings of
there is Oscar-winning
William Holden’s cynical
wheeler dealer Sergeant
Sefton, whose twin
war aims are to survive
and make a quick buck.
It’s a highly individual
demolition of the
traditional war movie.Kill Bill Vol 1
(Quentin Tarantino, 2003)
9pm, TCM
Tarantino’s blood-
drenched martial arts
extravaganza has
wronged woman Uma
Thurman wreaking
vengeance on her
erstwhile boss, Bill (David
Carradine), and the rest
of the Deadly Viper
Assassination Squad who
left her for dead on her
wedding day. Basically
a series of sensational
set-pieces, from a carve-
up in a suburban homezucchero and a touching,
zesty performance from
Vanessa Redgrave.
She’s a grandmother
in Italy, accompanied
by her hunky grandson
(Christopher Egan) to
fi nd her long-lost amore
Lorenzo – a mission that
overpowers the troubled
romance between young
American Amanda
Seyfried and her selfi sh
fi ance Gael García Bernal.Thursday 19
OctoberStalag 17
(Billy Wilder, 1953)
10am, More4
In Wilder’s witty,
satirical PoW drama the
Americans are far from
the heroic types: there’s
no motorbiking Steve
McQueen here. Instead(Paweł Pawlikowski, 2013) Monday, 2.55am, Film4
In early-1960s Poland, novice nun Anna (the suitably beatifi c Agata
Trzebuchowska) is sent to contact her only known relative before
taking her fi nal vows. Her Aunt Wanda (Agata Kulesza), a boozy
magistrate, reveals that Anna is in fact Ida, and Jewish; together the
pair set off to fi nd out what became of her parents after the war.
Shot in what feels like authentic 60s monochrome, this is a beautiful,
bitter journey into a family’s hidden past and into a nation’s dark
history, antisemitism and all.Hidden gem Ida