• 
• 
• 
• 

For inexplicable reasons The Mist was given a very low-key release so this TV screening gives King's fans a chance to see what happens when Hollywood actually gets his intentions right. It has no major stars but it has a cast of excellent actors who bring substance to this story of a community beset by panic.

Set in a rural lakeside town on which an abnormally heavy fog descends, the action takes place mainly in the town's supermarket where the people realise that there is something violent hiding in the mist.

Trapped in the supermarket aisles, they begin to fight hysterically. There's an ultra-religious zealot who starts blaming the sinful residents and spews out her scandalous accusations.

There are tough guys who think they can fight their way out and there are the few who try to find a plan. It's powerful and deeply frightening - if you are a King fan, don't miss one of his favourite movies.

Blockbusters

Die Hard : Sunday, 20:00, e.tv

After moderate success on TV and in fairly mediocre movies, Bruce Willis found his Hollywood niche playing John McClane in a sensational hostage thriller directed by tough guy John McTiernan.

McLane is having marital problems and is looking for some downtime with his family during the upcoming Christmas holiday. Instead he finds himself caught up in a crisis. Terrorists hijack a Christmas party full of rich and powerful people in one of the most striking buildings in Los Angeles - and guess who is one the hostages . his wife, of course. He is the sole officer in the building and starts a one-man war against a squad of trained killers. The film's high-energy, macho melodrama is as keenly enjoyable today as it was in 1988.

X-MEN: THE LAST STAND Saturday, 20:00, M-Net Action

The final movie in a trilogy can sometimes seem like a downer. Not this time. It has a new director, Brett Ratner, and the script has a tight, provocative twist. There is a disclosure about a new serum that can change the mutants back into "normal" people, a move that is supposed to end the hostility between the humans and the mutants. But who wants to live in a conformist world where no one is special? The X-Men view this serum as a form of fascist ethnic cleansing. The film is a fantasy version of the pervasive racial and religious conflict that dominates our daily news. With that powerful topical issue held high, the film is not just another comic book extravaganza, it is a titanic battle for those who believe they have the right to be what they are and live as they choose - and that's a powerful message in a thrilling film.

CLASSICS

BONNIE AND CLYDE Sunday, 22:00, SABC3

In the Hollywood revolution of the '60s, there was no film more influential than Arthur Penn's Bonnie and Clyde (1967). He ditched the old judgmental Hollywood format and followed the story of Clyde Barrow (Warren Beatty) and Bonnie Parker (Faye Dunaway, pictured right), a couple of restless drifters in the harsh years of the Great Depression who decide to become bank robbers. They were daring and successful, and they were also boastful. They became a media sensation in those early days of the tabloids and radio. They were celebrity crooks that the public seemed to love because they were acting out what most people did not dare to do. The film exposes their weakness and folly as well as their glamour. It ended with the notorious slow-motion scene of their death - a scene that changed the rules about how screen violence is depicted. It was a unique trendsetter.

THE BIG LEBOWKSI Wednesday, 20:00, M-Net Stars

The Coen brothers are unique in Hollywood, with their twisted, surrealist sense of comedy and their fascination with people who live on the edge. In 1981 they concocted this crime caper, a thriller that has lost its marbles but not its edge. Jeff Bridges plays Jeff "The Dude" Lebowski, a 40-year-old man who still thinks he is a '60s hippie - always high and work-shy. He is ambushed by goons who demand money from him. They think they are confronting a loser who owes money to a porno gangster. The point is that the goons have grabbed the wrong Lebowski. There is another Jeff Lebowski, who really is a low-life who owes money to the porno king, but he's quite happy to let "The Dude" pay the price.

It's a mad, surrealistic, bizarre comedy with a cast that includes John Goodman, John Turturro and Philip Seymour Hoffman. It's one of the Coen brothers' greatest hits.

ARTHOUSE

GRACE IS GONE Monday, 21:30, M-Net

Films about Americans fighting in the Middle East seldom get good box-office or media attention unless they are controversial. Despite critical raves, this film slipped onto the circuit and off again very quickly. It does a twist on a familiar format. In this case it is John Cusack (right) who is the stay-at-home spouse while his wife, Grace, is on the battlefront. When he learns about her death, he cannot muster the will to tell his daughters. He takes the kids on a wild run to a holiday theme park. On the road he must try to cope with his grief and with the task of telling the children that their mother is dead. It may sound like a downer, but it is a film of great honesty, pathos and, well, grace. It's not Yank propaganda, it is about the consequences of that propaganda, and that makes it distinctive.

THE NATIVITY STORY Tuesday, 20.00, MM2

It's a nice thing to find a Christmas tale devoid of the commercial kitsch that goes with the holiday season. Catherine Hardwicke, who made such interesting films as Thirteen and The Lords of Dogtown, as well as the first Twilight movie, has taken the New Testament story at face value. It's a realistic portrayal of a desert people living close to poverty, under the heel of the repressive Roman occupation. Mary is portrayed as a teenager in a highly traditional and poorly resourced village. Joseph is a hard-grafting carpenter. The angels of the Annunciation seem like ordinary people, and when it is found that Mary is pregnant, the villagers want to stone her. It will not be to the taste of people who like their nativity story to look like a pageant, but this is a careful, honest and, in a sense, daring way to tell the story of this season.