Boredom in epic proportions

THIS week's seasonal offering is The Greatest Story Ever Told, a strong contender for the title of longest boring movie ever made.

Shrek

THIS week's seasonal offering is The Greatest Story Ever Told (Sunday, 10am, 7Two), a strong contender for the title of longest boring movie ever made.

Originally released with overture, interval music ("entr'acte") and exit music - fashionable embellishments for epics in the 1960s - it came in at just less than four hours, though more recent prints settle for two hours and 20 minutes.

Directed with heavy-handed piety by George Stevens, this plodding account of the life of Jesus has some fine touches of spectacle and a remarkable central performance by Max von Sydow, but is spoiled by too many corny cameo roles, including Shelley Winters's Woman of No Name ("I'm cured!") and John Wayne's Roman centurion ("Truly this man was the Son of Guard"). Truly - even for believers - this movie sucks.

Shrek (Saturday, 6.30pm, Ten) was a landmark achievement in movie animation and storytelling, a key Hollywood film of the 21st century. Mixing pop-cultural references, fairytale characters and state-of-the-art computer graphics (we knew them in 2001), its story of a lovable green-skinned ogre (voiced by Mike Myers) works as comedy, adventure and romance. Cameron Diaz and Eddie Murphy provide voice roles as Shrek's loyal Donkey sidekick and the beautiful Princess Fiona. (Or is it the other way around?)

With an Australian voice cast including Hugh Jackman, Nicole Kidman and Hugo Weaving, George Miller's Happy Feet (Saturday, 7.30pm, Nine) appeared five years after Shrek - another charming fairytale, another triumph of the animator's art. This time the hero is Mumble, a brave little emperor penguin voiced by Elijah Wood.

Born without the ability to sing (as penguins are said to do, in their own mysterious way), Mumble communicates by dancing, and soon masses of penguins are joining in. The environmental messages are fairly relentless - threats to wildlife, overfishing, global warming - but the dance sequences are exhilarating. And Mumble makes a much cuter hero than Shrek. He looks more like a giant blue-eyed panda than a penguin. Kids will love him.

The second and third parts of Francis Ford Coppola's great Godfather trilogy can be seen this weekend. The Godfather Part II (Saturday, 9.30pm, ABC2) is widely considered superior to the first film, itself an acknowledged masterpiece and one of the few American movies of the past half-century to succeed as popular entertainment and high art.

Part II is a sequel and a prequel, intercutting the reign of Don Michael Corleone (Al Pacino) with the early story of his father, Vito (brilliantly played by Robert De Niro). In Part III (Sunday, 9.30pm, ABC2) the original cast is still on hand (with the addition of Coppola's daughter Sofia in the role of Michael's daughter), but the result was strained, melodramatic and unconvincing.

BEST ON SHOW

The Godfather Part II (M)
5 stars
Saturday, 9.30pm, ABC2

Shrek (PG)
4 stars
Saturday, 6.30pm, Ten

Happy Feet (G)
3 stars
Saturday, 7.30pm, Nine