THE HUNT FOR RED OCTOBER (1990)
BBC One, 11.35pm
This clunky but efficient adaptation of the novelist Tom Clancy’s Cold War submarine thriller arrived just as the Soviet empire crumbled, rendering it instantly outdated yet strangely topical.
Sean Connery plays a poker-faced Russian sub commander steaming towards America with plans to either defect or unleash nuclear Armageddon. Alec Baldwin stars as Jack Ryan, the quick-thinking CIA agent caught in the superpower crossfire. (134min)
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VIDEODROME (1982)
Channel 4, 1.20am
An unnerving cautionary tale about media overload, David Cronenberg’s psychosexual thriller slips into a kind of hallucinatory nightmare about halfway through. James Woods stars as Max Renn, a cable TV executive who uncovers a subversive snuff movie trade only to find himself slowly evolving into a grotesque hybrid of human being and video recorder. Cronenberg has gone on to direct some notorious films, such as The Naked Lunch and Crash, but none can beat this self-penned effort for edgy paranoia and queasy body horror. The Blondie singer Debbie Harry also stars. (89min)
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MultiChannel
BRIGHT LIGHTS, BIG CITY (1988)
TCM, 9pm
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The novelist Jay McInerney adapted his own semi- autobiographical bestseller about cocaine-fuelled party animals in 1980s Manhattan, but the film still falls short of the book. Michael J. Fox is miscast as Jamie Conway, a young publishing worker with literary ambitions. Numbing the pain of divorce and family tragedy, Conway pushes himself to the brink of collapse on the city’s glitzy club scene. James Bridges directs this mildly engaging period piece of yuppie navel-gazing, which co-stars Kiefer Sutherland and Phoebe Cates. Tom Cruise turned down the lead role, reportedly objecting to the drug scenes. (110min)