CAPTAIN BOYCOTT (1947, b/w)
Channel 4, 1.45pm
A true 19th-century figure whose name passed into the dictionary, Charles Cunningham Boycott is played by Cecil Parker in this lively historical romp. The tyrannical agent for an absentee English landlord in Co Mayo, Boycott angered farmers on his estate with high rents and mass evictions, eventually suffering ostracism by his community, backed by a local politician Charles Parnell (Robert Donat) and farmer Hugh Davin (Stewart Granger). (92min)
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JOHNNY ENGLISH (2003)
ITV1, 9pm
Expanding on a comedy character created by Rowan Atkinson for a series of credit card commercials, Johnny English blends gentle espionage spoof with lukewarm James Bond parody. Atkinson stars as the eponymous English, an incompetent spy faced with the task of stealing back the Crown Jewels from an evil French mastermind, played by John Malkovich in full pantomime villain mode. Natalie Imbruglia, Tim Pigott-Smith and Ben Miller co-star in the director Peter Howitt’s mildly entertaining lark, which boldly goes where Austin Powers and many others have gone before. (88min)
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THE GODFATHER (1972)
Five, 9pm
Francis Ford Coppola’s operatic adaptation of the author Mario Puzo’s dynastic Mafia saga turned a generation of Method actors into superstars and defined the gangster film for decades to come.
Impeccably acted by a cast of heavyweights including James Caan, Robert Duvall and an Oscar-winning Marlon Brando, it stars Al Pacino in a career-making role initially declined by Jack Nicholson, Warren Beatty and Robert Redford. Exquisitely photographed in sombre hues by Gordon Willis, The Godfather spawned two official sequels and countless inferior imitations. It remains an offer that is very hard to refuse. (175min)