It’s Monday.
It’s time to get down to serious business and there is no more serious business than the movies on TV this evening*.
Let’s take a look at the pick of what’s on…
27 Dresses – Film4 – 6.35pm
Katherine Heigl is a bridesmaid an unspecified number of times.
The Expendables 3 – Sky One – 9pm
Some decent action, plus the baddie is called Conrad Stonebanks (great name) and is played by Mel Gibson.
His back story is simple. Everyone thought he was dead, but now he’s back and wants revenge. Is this the end for the Expendables crew?
We doubt it, there’s another due out in the next year or two.
Rambo First Blood Part II – ITV4 – 9pm
John Rambo once again proves he’s capable of being a very violent man. Loads of a young Stallone with his top off.
The Great Wall – Film4 – 9pm
Not a huge fan of this movie about monsters attacking in China.
We hope the movie Matt Damon is working on in Ireland is a little bit better than this effort.
Lost In Translation – TG4 – 9.30pm
If I had to pick my favourite Bill Murray movies, this comes in second behind Groundhog Day.
A lonely movie star meets a conflicted newlywed, Charlotte, in Tokyo. They form a bond and find escape within the city.
Although now that I think of it, I do really enjoy the original Ghostbusters… so maybe Lost in Translation is my third favourite film of Bill Murray’s. Either way, it’s definitely top five.
Starship Troopers – ITV4 – 11.05pm
Yeah, you probably just think of this as a bad Sci-Fi movie. But it’s a very clever satire of Nazi and right-wing propaganda.
Johnny Rico, a boy from Buenos Aires but played by a very white Casper Van Dien, rises up through the ranks to lieutenant in the Federation war with the arachnids, more commonly called the bugs in the film.
Directed by Paul Verhoeven, he admitted he cast Van Dien and many of the other stars on their looks to emphasise the fascist imagery of Aryan heroes.
In a 2017 interview with Digital Spy, Verhoeven explained: “Basically the political undercurrent of the film is that these heroes and heroines are living in a fascist utopia – but they are not even aware of it!
“They think this is normal. And somehow you are seduced to follow them, and at the same time, made aware that they might be fascist.”
He added: “I took [the actors] because I wanted them to look like the people you see in Leni Riefenstahl’s movie The Triumph of the Will. So it was a ploy, but more based on a visual aspect.”
Being Blacker – BBC Two – 11.30pm
A documentary telling the story of well-known reggae record shop owner and music producer, Blacker Dread, his extended family, friends and the wider Brixton community.
The Guardian described it as “a big, beautiful sprawl of a film, that spans continents as well as generations”.
*There is actually lots of more serious business than movies on TV
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