The summer of cricket begins. Yes. And the beautiful, satisfying movie Up.
TV
Up
Cricket (Sky Sport 1, Sky 030, 2.00pm). Sky Sport is calling it the Summer of Cricket, and there does seem rather a lot of it to justify the claim. The domestic Twenty20 season starts today with the Auckland Aces vs Wellington Firebirds at Colin Maiden Park, Auckland (provided it’s not rained off). The tournament runs right through January before two one-dayers in February. On the international front, we host Zimbabwe throughout January and South Africa during February. Over in Oz, their Twenty20 domestic tournament is called, with typical bluntness, the T20 Big Bash League and it runs throughout December and January.
Christmas in the Park 2011 (TV3, 7.00pm). It wouldn’t be Christmas without massive crowds and light entertainment. TV3 puts together footage from the two Christmas in the Park events at the Auckland Domain and Christchurch’s Hagley Park. Hilary Barry, Jeremy Corbett and Drew Neemia host, and the line-up includes the cast of the musical Jersey Boys, the Earlybirds, Vince Harder and Massad, Ainslie Allen, Jackie Clarke and Frankie Stevens, and gospel singer Juliagrace.
FILM
Up (TV2, 7.00pm). Pixar Upped the ante with this animation gem that breaks so many rules but gets away with it. You might say it’s about an old man who has lost hope and takes off to Venezuela in his balloon-powered house with a Boy Scout stowaway, but that’s just the start. A sophisticated and satisfying film of many parts and lovely to watch. (2009) 9 – Diana Balham
The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas (TV1, 8.30pm). Mark Herman’s adaptation of John Boyne’s young adult novel is a frequently inaccurate portrayal of the Holocaust, said our reviewer David Larsen, but “gives young audiences better and safer access to these difficult truths than a more literally truthful film might”. (2008) 6 – Diana Balham
aimRenderAd(300, 250, '300X250','ContentRect','/POS=POS2'); if(!$.browser.msie){ ContentRect_frame = $("#ContentRect")[0]; ContentRect_frame.src = ContentRect_frame.src; }Fast Times at Ridgemont High (Four, 8.30pm). “Awesome. Totally awesome!” Sean Penn has all the best lines as a stoned surfer dude in this 1980s high-school comedy classic based on the racy schooldays of Rolling Stone writer Cameron Crowe. With Phoebe Cates, Judge Reinhold, Jennifer Jason Leigh and Nicolas Coppola – the only time Nic Cage was ever credited using his real name. (1982) 7 – Diana Balham
Giant (Stratos, Freeview 21 & Sky 089, 8.30pm). And how. Stratos is playing George Stevens’s classic over two Sundays. At nearly three and a half hours, it’s bigger than, er, Texas, where we find rich cattle rancher Bick Benedict (Rock Hudson), his beautiful wife, Leslie (Elizabeth Taylor), and upstart cowboy Jett Rink (James Dean). Dean famously never completed filming because he was killed in a car crash, which makes this the perfect homage to the outsider. (1956) 8 – Diana Balham
Date Movie (TV3, 9.00pm). Those wacky spoofsters move on to romantic comedies. Slamming your head in a microwave might produce more laughs. (2006) 3 – Diana Balham
RADIO
Spectrum (Radio New Zealand National, 12.15pm). What Happened to the Blind Man? is the story of one person whose life was turned upside down by the Canterbury earthquakes. Blind from birth, Kelvin is a musician who played the recorder near the entrance to the ChristChurch Cathedral and was also a member of the Latin American band Pachamama. Although he wasn’t busking on the day of the February quake, he was trapped in his flat until help came. But after some rural R&R, Kelvin is back in the city and is busking at “a new venue”, as the RNZ publicity intriguingly puts it. – Diana Balham
The Sunday Feature (Radio New Zealand National, 4.07pm). Today it’s the final part of the Royal Society of New Zealand’s three-part series, Talking Heads 2011, entitled Inside Out: The Chemistry of Food, Sex and Ageing. From the Auckland Museum, Kim Hill is in conversation with big-brained folk Kate McGrath – director of Victoria University’s MacDiarmid Centre for Advanced Materials and Nanotechnology; Maurice Curtis – deputy director of the Human Brain Bank at the University of Auckland; and Wayne Cutfield – director of the Liggins Institute, also at the University of Auckland. – Diana Balham
Blue Smoke: The Birth of New Zealand Pop (Radio New Zealand Concert, 7.00pm). Chris Bourke presents the final in the current series of adaptations of his award-winning book. Tonight it’s These Kia Ora Islands, a look at how original songwriting around these parts evolved as bands gained confidence from playing cover versions of overseas hits. – Diana Balham
Young New Zealand (Radio New Zealand Concert, 8.00pm). The final Young New Zealand programme for the year is, appropriately enough, a huge celebration of youthful musicality – the Big Sing Gala Concert 2011. This year, the regional finals attracted a record 8500 students and, from an initial 236 secondary school choirs, 22 were selected to go to Wellington for the national finale. Each group sang an item, followed by a massed-choir item – God Defend New Zealand. For the record, top honours (the platinum award) went to Westlake Girls & Boys High Schools’ choir Choralation for the third year in a row. – Diana Balham
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