Your night in: Every movie on TV tonight rated or slated
From excellent adventures to a wartime epic, there are plenty of great movie offerings on TV tonight, while streaming options include a meticulous murder-mystery and supercharged sequel.
Leigh Paatsch
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HACKSAW RIDGE (MA15+)
****
8.30pm Ch 7
A harrowing and highly impacting war drama from Mel Gibson, reclaiming his mantle as a compelling filmmaking talent after a lengthy absence from behind the camera. The central focus is on the 1945 Battle of Okinawa, the most telling and terrifying flashpoint in the Pacific during America’s WWII clashes with Japan. Unusually, Gibson frames the ensuing blood-soaked spectacle through the remarkable actual experience of a soldier whose only reason to be there was to save lives, and not take them. US army medic Desmond Doss (played by Andrew Garfield) famously survived a punishing two-day period at the height of fighting without once picking up a weapon to defend himself. Instead, this devoutly religious conscientious objector single-handedly carried 75 wounded men from his company to safety, miraculously avoiding unrelenting attacks from the enemy. Away from its quieter, more conventional stretches, Hacksaw Ridge raises the battlefield realism stakes above and beyond the ferocious mark set by Steven Spielberg’s Saving Private Ryan. Co-stars Sam Worthington, Luke Bracey, Teresa Palmer.
BILL & TED’S EXCELLENT ADVENTURE (M)
***
7.30PM GO!
A very young Keanu Reeves and some guy called Alex Winter call upon the aid of time-travel technology to ensure they pass their high school history class. A spectacularly stoo-pid slacker comedy that actually gets better as it goes along, if only because the ungainly chemistry of the two leads really does grow on you. They don’t make movies like this any more. (Or do they? There is actually a new Bill & Ted instalment starring Reeves and Winter ready for release when the big lockdown ends!)
PINEAPPLE EXPRESS (M)
***
9.20PM GO!
Seth Rogen stars as a pot-addicted process server on the run from a murderous drug lord. Meanwhile, James Franco steals the show as a blissfully out-of-it dealer. This fitfully hilarious, sporadically surreal comedy is everything a weed-wacked viewer could possibly want from a night on the couch. Plenty of strong laughs for unimpaired onlookers as well, but be prepared for a jarring, violent finale.
BELLE (M)
**1/2
5.50PM WORLD MOVIES
Viewers won’t be shaken by this true story so much as mildly stirred as they follow the title character’s unusual path through British society in the 1700s. Orphaned as “a young person of colour” – the era’s polite label for those not lucky enough to be born white – Belle (Gugu Mbatha-Raw) has been raised in the privileged household of a powerful judge. When her esteemed guardian (Tom Wilkinson) is forced to rule on a landmark case with major implications for the legality of human slavery, Belle has an opportunity to change the course of history for the better. A pedestrian period drama stuffed to the brim with heated words and frosty glances exchanged in lavishly appointed drawing rooms. If an episode of Downton Abbey booted back a few centuries appeals, step right up.
THE SALVATION (M)
{not rated}
7.50PM WORLD MOVIES
Don’t know anything about this one. Here’s the synopsis in case it might be of enough note to float your boat: “In 1870s America, a peaceful American settler (Mads Mikkelsen) kills the man who murdered his family, which incurs the wrath of a sadistic gang leader hellbent on revenge. His cowardly fellow townspeople then betray the settler, forcing him to face the outlaws alone.” Co-stars Eva Green.
MATCH POINT (M)
****
9.30PM WORLD MOVIES
Jonathan Rhys Meyers stars as a social climber who infiltrates London’s upper class by marrying well, then almost blows it all with a poor choice of mistress (a spectacularly sensuous Scarlett Johansson). A mesmerising mix of moral drama and dark humour, with a shock ending to die for.
Five movie picks for streaming or rental to get you through the evening.
KNIVES OUT (M)
****
Rent via FOXTEL STORE, GOOGLE, ITUNES, YOUTUBE MOVIES
A sleeper-hit box-office phenom at the end of 2019, Knives Out is cracking murder mystery rife with loose ends, dead ends and one heck of an unseemly end. That comes at the start of this dynamically entertaining affair, when celebrated author Harlan Thrombey (Christopher Plummer) – famous for his murder mysteries, not uncoincidentally – is found deceased in his study, seeming by his own hand. No-one has the inside track on what may have happened save for the late scribe’s nurse (Ana de Armas), and she can barely make herself heard above the ruckus of Thrombey’s not-so-grieving family. The show is comprehensively stolen – and never once returned – by a wired, inspired and kookily amusing Daniel Craig. He plays Benoit Blanc, an unorthodox private detective from the deep south who knows all the answers from the get-go, but remains unsure of the question until the closing scenes. Don’t believe a word anyone says, but be assured a very good time awaits you here. A superb ensemble cast includes Chris Evans, Jamie Lee Curtis, Toni Collette and Don Johnson. Directed by Rian Johnson (Looper).
FAST & FURIOUS PRESENTS: HOBBS & SHAW (M)
***
FOXTEL, AMAZON
Even after eight movies (and their combined box-office gross of over $7 billion) the Fast & Furious series still has plenty of fuel left in the tank. Now that episode 9 won’t drop until mid-2021 due to the coronavirus, this spin-off might give off enough fumes to rev up F & F fans while they wait. It goes quite OK if it is purely a disposable thrill ride you are chasing. The always-popular smile machine that is Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson plays Hobbs, the friendly federal agent who does it by the book, or not at all. The sometimes-tolerable scowl machine that is Jason Statham plays Shaw, a surly ex-soldier-of-fortune who doesn’t do it by the book unless he’s being paid to do so. These sworn frenemies have to learn to get along faster than they might have liked when they learn of a plot to poison the world with a body-liquefying virus. Idris Elba co-stars as an insanely indestructible bad guy, Vanessa Kirby plays Shaw’s super-spy younger sister, and at least three ridiculously audacious action sequences justify the price of admission before fatigue sets in just ahead of the finale.
CHRISTOPHER ROBIN (G)
***
DISNEY PLUS
A gentle celebration of the enduring appeal of the residents of the Hundred Acre Wood. The story begins with a grown-up Christopher Robin (played by Ewan McGregor) doing it tough as an adult in 1950s London. As a distance opens up between Christopher and his wife and daughter, old childhood pals like Winnie-the-Pooh and Tigger reappear to bring it all back together. Overall, a little bit slower and less spectacular than contemporary family films, but a little more memorable.
SNOWPIERCER (MA15+)
****
NETFLIX, STAN
If you’re a newcomer to the eccentric of Parasite director Bong Joon-ho, here’s where you can get more of the great man’s work in one accessible dose. This utterly brilliant, slyly innovative action picture issues a barrage of future shocks in a pressing present tense. In a bid to stop global warming, climate scientists have triggered a new ice age. Everyone dies in the ensuing snap freeze, except for the occupants of a luxury bullet train. In the years that follow, each carriage becomes a nation unto itself. An interior security system – an unofficial set of borders, if you like – keeps everyone in their place. Due to an ambitious combo of the high-concept and the high-octane, this is an experience best seen (almost literally) cold. Stars Chris Evans, Jamie Bell, Tilda Swinton.
THE BEGUILED (M)
***1/2
RENT VIA ITUNES
A finely-crafted drama tiptoeing a high wire dividing the languid from the lurid, The Beguiled can both intrigue and infuriate where it so sees fit. The setting is a remote rural boarding school for girls in Civil War-era Virginia, where two teachers (Nicole Kidman and Kirsten Dunst, both in great form) and their five students (led by a superbly duplicitous Elle Fanning) reluctantly provide safe haven to an injured Yankee soldier (Colin Farrell). Adapted from the 1966 novel by Thomas Cullinan with poise and restraint by filmmaker Sofia Coppola (moving in a very different direction from Clint Eastwood’s 1971 version).
Originally published as Your night in: Every movie on TV tonight rated or slated
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