8 hours ago
7
Pick of the week
Piece By Piece
We’ve had Robbie Williams played by a CGI chimp so why not Pharrell Williams as a collection of small plastic bricks? This weird but joyous documentary from Morgan Neville uses Lego to encapsulate the life of the wildly successful Neptunes producer and musician. Williams having synaesthesia – he experiences sound as colour – means the film can go off on visual flights of fancy; the beats he creates becoming rainbow fireworks or vibrant waves. All this trippy imagery covers up the fact that his rise to stardom has been fairly frictionless, but contributions from Lego versions of Missy Elliott, Jay-Z, Snoop Dogg et al attest to his offbeat worldview and hyperactive creativity.
Saturday, 8.25am, 4.20pm, Sky Cinema Premiere
Saint Omer
Why would a mother leave her 15-month-old daughter on a beach to drown? That’s the central question in French film-maker Alice Diop’s murky, moving courtroom drama, as a young Senegalese woman, Laurence (Guslagie Malanda), is put on trial. Lecturer Rama (Kayije Kagame) attends in the hope of writing a book about it, but uneasy resonances with her own life – immigrant family, pregnancy, mixed-race relationship – throw her off-track. Even the evasive, inconsistent Laurence appears unsure as to why she committed such a horrific act.
Saturday, 9pm, BBC Four
In a Lonely Place
An unusual romantic lead at the best of times, Humphrey Bogart really pushed the boat out in terms of audience sympathy in this 1950 Nicholas Ray film. His Hollywood screenwriter Dixon Steele is sardonic and bitter, with a history of getting into fights. And when he is suspected of the murder of a hat-check girl, his blithe indifference raises the hackles of the cops. That doesn’t stop new neighbour Laurel (a superb Gloria Grahame) falling for him, but as she gets to know Dixon better her suspicions rise. An edgy mystery, with Bogart an opaque, menacing presence.
Sunday, 2pm, Talking Pictures TV
Stagecoach
Celebrated for making stars of John Wayne and its chief location, Monument Valley, John Ford’s 1939 film also showed that the western could allow for moral complexity in between shootouts. With renegade Apache Geronimo on the warpath, an assortment of ill-matched passengers find themselves on a dangerous journey. These include Wayne’s escaped convict, a sex worker, a drunken doctor, a cavalry officer’s wife and a thieving bank manager. Naturally, the rough and ready types prove more reliable than their social betters when push comes to shove.
Sunday, 12.45pm, 5Action
Happy Gilmore
Just in case the upcoming Netflix sequel doesn’t quite live up to expectations, here’s Adam Sandler’s 1996 slapstick comedy to prove where most of its best jokes originated. Sandler’s Happy is a dreadful ice-hockey player with a hair-trigger temper but he possesses a stupendously hard shot, which when adapted to the game of golf proves an unlikely boon. The disconnect between the etiquettes of the two sports is fertile ground for laughs, as is Sandler’s man-child shtick.
Sunday, 9pm, Comedy Central
Saltburn
Writer-director Emerald Fennell has her gateau and eats it in this dark comedy thriller, satirising the British aristocracy while revelling in their massive houses and insouciant confidence. Barry Keoghan is the cuckoo in the gilded nest, Oxford undergrad Oliver, who is befriended by the genial, upper-class Felix (Jacob Elordi) and taken home to the country pile to meet his folks, Lady Elspeth (Rosamund Pike) and Sir James (Richard E Grant). The subsequent intrigue and flagrant rug-pulling as Oliver struggles to fit in make for a vivacious, vicious experience.
Sunday, 10.30pm, BBC One
Creed
This limber 2015 film is the second of four fruitful collaborations (to date) between director Ryan Coogler and actor Michael B Jordan – and also set in train a new run of boxing dramas set in RockyWorld. Jordan plays Adonis Johnson, the unknown son of Rocky Balboa’s opponent turned friend Apollo Creed. Adonis has the fight gene too, so turns up in Philadelphia to get Rocky (a convincingly weary Sylvester Stallone) to train him. There’s enough ring work for the action fan, but it’s also an exploration of family ties and the meaning of legacy.
Tuesday, 9pm, ITV4
