What’s on TV this weekend

World Athletics Championships
BBC One, 6.30pm/BBC Two, 10pm
Welcome to the main event: Usain Bolt’s last competitive 100m final at 9.45pm (provided he makes it through the heats and semi-finals, of course). Old foes including Yohan Blake and Justin Gatlin are likely to line up alongside the young pretender Andre De Grasse in an unmissable race in the London Stadium that will mark one of the greatest of all sporting careers drawing to a close. Although injury has denied Greg Rutherford the chance to defend his long-jump title, there will be British interest in the fast-improving Katarina Johnson-Thompson as she completes her first day of the heptathlon.

Paul O’Grady’s Hollywood
Channel 4, 8pm
In effect another twist on the list-show format, O’Grady begins his survey of Tinseltown genres with a look at the weepie, a format rustled up to draw women into the cinema when movie theatres were deemed a little disreputable. The choice of films seems to be split between the howlingly obvious (Titanic, Brief Encounter, Bambi) and those chosen based on who’s available to chat (Jon Voight for The Champ, Bernard Cribbins for The Railway Children, some supporting player from Beaches). Yet it’s breezily assembled and O’Grady’s links to camera are as assured as ever.

I Know Who You Are
BBC Four, 9pm, 10pm
BBC Four’s Saturday night foreign-language slot was once more or less a guarantee of quality, but a few too many sub-par imports tarnished the brand a little. This beguiling Spanish thriller marks a return to form. It is a sinuous, occasionally overheated and impressively thoughtful exploration of amnesia, so often the prop for more flimsy dramas. In tonight’s penultimate double-bill Giralt finds a connection between Ana and another missing person’s case, while a link is established between Juan Elias and the man Ana saw at Casa Castro.

Cambridge Folk Festival
Sky Arts, 9pm
Sky Arts continues to sweep up coverage of the UK’s second-tier festivals with highlights from last weekend’s concerts at Cherry Hinton Hall. Folk has become a far broader church since the days when Dylan was booed for plugging in his guitar, and these days the term incorporates bluegrass, gospel, country and blues, all of which will be represented on the channel over the next two nights. Mark Radcliffe and Julie Fowlis will introduce performances from Jake Bugg, Indigo Girls, Lisa Hannigan, and Jon Boden and the Remnant Kings.

Catch-up TV, by Chris Bennion

Nathan Barley
channel4.com
Charlie Brooker is well known these days for his dystopian sci-fi series, Black Mirror. However, he arguably gave us his most horrifying glimpse of the future with Nathan Barley, the sitcom he co-wrote in 2005 with the satirist Chris Morris. Centring on the horrendous Shoreditch trustafarian and wannabe film-maker Nathan Barley (who is played by Nicholas Burns and describes himself as a “self-facilitating media node”), the show so neatly skewered the rise of the hipster as well as spoofing magazines such as Vice and Dazed & Confused that it now seems more like a documentary. Julian Barratt is excellent as a jaded magazine journalist, while the show also features early appearances from Ben Whishaw, Richard Ayoade, Benedict Cumberbatch and Nina Sosanya. Superb.

Film choice, by Wendy Ide

The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies (15, 2014)
ITV, 8pm
Bilbo Baggins faces the final curtain as Peter Jackson’s Hobbit trilogy goes out with not merely a bang, but a 45-minute baroque, virtuoso battle scene. Five armies of dwarfs, elves, men, eagles, orcs and wargs — plus Billy Connolly in a ginger wig riding a hairy pig — lay into one another in the mother of all sword fights. Yet among the clash of steel and iron there is also breathing space for personal drama. The takedown of Smaug the dragon leads to a Black Friday-style rush by men, dwarves and elves on the gold and treasure in the mountain of Erebor. The dwarf king, Thorin Oakenshield (a terrific Richard Armitage), becomes crazed by the “dragon-sickness”, a Midas-like greed that pervades the mountain, and his psychological torment takes centre stage as he hungers after the powerful Arkenstone. (144min) Kate Muir

What We Did On Our Holiday (12, 2014)
BBC Two, 10.30pm
What happens to children when the grown-ups can no longer be trusted to behave like adults? In this engaging but slight British comedy the answer is extreme. While Dad (David Tennant) and Mum (Rosamund Pike) bicker, Uncle (Ben Miller) micromanages and Auntie (Amelia Bullmore) assaults supermarket shoppers with a pumpkin, the kids arrange a send-off for their deceased grandad (Billy Connolly). The set-up is fun and the children are terrific, but it fizzles out in the third act. If you’ve ever hankered after a feature-length episode of the BBC sitcom Outnumbered, here you have it. (93min)

In the House (15, 2012)
BBC Two, 1am
The films of the writer and director François Ozon have almost always had an edge of playful irreverence and iconoclasm. Central to this story is the illicit fascination with the lives of strangers that we all harbour to some extent. Failing artist Jeanne(Kristin Scott Thomas) and literature teacher Germain (Fabrice Luchini) are middle-class sophisticates. The writing assignment submitted by 16-year-old student Claude is the most exciting thing to happen in their marriage for years. Claude admits to a fascination with another schoolboy, Rapha. He inveigles his way into the boy’s house and observes Rapha’s father’s China obsession with amusement. He studies Rapha’s mother with rather more complex emotions. (103min)

Radio choice, by Catherine Nixey

Keep on Running
Radio 4 Extra, 9am
Natalie Haynes never wanted to run a marathon. “They’re really far.” That’s not the only reason. Haynes is a Classicist, so she knows what happened to the first marathon runner, Pheidippides: he dropped dead. “This story probably isn’t true,” she says, “but it is the kind of thing that plays on the mind of the Classicist runner.” Naturally, then, as she enters her forties, that is what she has started doing. Why do people do it? This programme attempts to answer by speaking not just to professionals, but also those whom marathon organisers term (with a dash of Classical disdain) “the masses”. We also hear from KV Switzer, the first woman to run the Boston marathon, something considered impossible and unfeminine. Not as “unfeminine” as what happened: the race director ran after her, grabbed her and screamed: “Get the hell out of my race!”

The Myth of Homosexual Decriminalisation
Radio 4, 8pm
July 27, 1967 was a great day in the history of gay rights: the Sexual Offences Act 1967 was passed, decriminalising male homosexual behaviour. Or was it so great? Here, the campaigner Peter Tatchell takes a less celebratory, more sceptical look at this supposed landmark. After “homosexual acts” (as the legalistic language calls them) were supposedly decriminalised, convictions for same-sex offences actually increased dramatically. Moreover, it was not until 2001 that the age of consent was lowered to the same age as for heterosexual men.

Ross Poldark finds himself fighting on several fronts in the series finale

ROBERT VIGLASKY/BBC

Sunday’s TV, by Chris Bennion

Poldark
BBC One, 9pm
“You would have me pontificate and play the hero, and make some grand dramatic gesture. I am not that man, Demelza. I have never been that man.” Giss on, Ross Poldark! Aidan Turner’s lupine hunk is a man built on grand dramatic gestures, especially when a series finale comes round, and tonight is no different because Ross finds himself fighting on several fronts. The French are making advances on the Cornish coast, Lieutenant Armitage is making advances on Demelza, and George Warleggan is making advances on anything that reminds him of Ross — in this case it is the forge run by Ross’s brother-in-law, Drake Carne. Returned from Westminster, where, predictably, he has been voting against the interests of the common man, George (how marvellously, snivellingly reprehensible Jack Farthing has been this series) takes umbrage at the forge, which borders his land, and demands that his hairy henchman, Tom Harry, do something about it. “It is a direct provocation!” he squeals. Meanwhile, Prudie is determined to play matchmaker between Demelza and Armitage; and the odious vicar, Ossie Whitworth (hats off too to Christian Brassington — deliciously awful), finds out that his philandering comes at a price. Ross, however, has no time for this. The “Frenchies” are coming and he has been tasked with leading a ragtag squad of volunteers to protect Cornwall from a potential invasion. It just so happens that having an armed militia around, at a time when the peasants are revolting, is rather handy for George. It has been another marvellous series; perfect Sunday-night viewing. Keep pontificating, Ross Poldark.

BBC Proms 2017: National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain
BBC Four, 7pm
The UK’s finest young musicians get their chance to shine this evening as the conductor Thomas Adès leads the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain through an exciting and challenging programme. First is the London premiere of Francisco Coll’s Mural, a large-scale work described as “a grotesque symphony, in which Dionysus meets Apollo”. After that is a work from Adès himself, Polaris, which is inspired by the North Star and conjures a vast interstellar landscape. The highlight will be Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring. Hopefully the riots will be kept to a minimum.

Secrets of Silicon Valley
BBC Two, 8pm
At what price progress? The tech journalist Jamie Bartlett presents this fascinating two-part investigation into the giants of Silicon Valley and, among the Californians dreaming of apparently socially minded start-ups, he finds a bleak vision of the future. Companies such as Uber and Airbnb call themselves “disruptors” — business models that force progress by ripping up the old order. Yet what feels like Utopia in the valley can be chaos in the real world. With the next wave of “disruption” focusing on artificial intelligence and automation, Bartlett asks how long these businesses can remain unchecked.

Diana: In Her Own Words
Channel 4, 8pm
Channel 4’s contributionto the teetering pile of Princess Diana documentaries has already made quite a splash. The reason being that it is centred around the extraordinary videos Diana made with her speech coach, Peter Settelen, in 1992 and 1993. There are interviews too, with staff and confidants who knew her well, but it is those tapes that fascinate. She is relaxed, speaking as if to a friend, almost gossiping at times, as she lays bare her courtship with Prince Charles and their disastrous marriage. Diana, quite genuinely, as you’ve never seen her before.

Gareth Thomas: Hate in the Beautiful Game
BBC Two, 10.30pm
This report into homophobia in football is dispiriting, but vital viewing. Gareth Thomas, the former Wales rugby international who came out in 2009, asks why football lags so far behind the rest of sport, and society, in its attitude to homosexuality. Thomas gamely attempts to get the ears of the powers-that-be. The FA won’t take his calls, the Premier League will meet only off-camera, while his chat with the Professional Footballers’ Association proves that football is woefully ill-equipped to help gay players: “I don’t know whether to laugh or cry,” says Thomas, “I am dumbfounded.”

Catch-up TV, by Joe Clay

Against the Law
BBC iPlayer, to August 26
“Any man who takes a criminal path should be mindful of the consequences.” These are the first words we hear spoken by Peter Wildeblood, but the illicit path he chose was not that of a bank robber or murderer — his crime was to be homosexual. Wildeblood was a Fleet Street journalist who in 1954 was imprisoned for 18 months for inciting two airmen “to commit serious offences with male persons”. When he was released, Wildeblood wrote a brave book about his treatment during the trial, which Brian Fillis has adapted for this powerful, explicit drama, with the tremendous Daniel Mays as Wildeblood. The drama is broken up with the real-life testimonies of gay men, recounting what life was like before the decriminalisation of homosexuality that Wildeblood was instrumental in bringing about.

Film choice, by Wendy Ide

Frozen (PG, 2013)
BBC One, 1.40pm
It’s hard to imagine that there is anyone left in the world who hasn’t seen this sparkly delight from Disney. That probably won’t stop people watching in their droves — it is the summer holidays after all. Princess Anna (voiced by Kristen Bell) is a wide-eyed innocent whose innate optimism tends to cloud her judgment. Her beloved older sister, Elsa, has other problems: born with a dangerous gift, she locks herself away from those who love her. The story is slight, but the visual execution is spell-binding. From the ice-cutting scene that opens the film, to the creation of Elsa’s glistening retreat, to the ice storm of a climax, this frosted fantasy is enough to bring you out in goosebumps. (102min)

The King’s Speech (12, 2010)
Channel 4, 9.50pm
British cinema loves a plucky underdog. And it can seemingly find them anywhere, even in the most lofty sections of society. Colin Firth is superb in the central role of the man who would become King George VI. He’s arrogant, snobbish and devastatingly insecure about the debilitating stammer that has made life in the public eye acutely painful. Firth strikes a perfect balance between the King’s abrasive traits and the vulnerability that coaxes our empathy. Two supporting performances are equally strong: Helena Bonham Carter as his bustling, supportive wife, and Geoffrey Rush, as the colourful speech therapist who became the King’s friend and ally. The screenwriter David Seidler, a stutterer as a child, became the oldest person to win the Oscar for Best Screenplay. He was 73. (118min)

Point Break (18, 1991)
Channel 5, 11.05pm
Action fans, genuflect. For here it is. The movie that redefined the nature, structure and style of modern action cinema. And with more quotable lines per minute of footage than most so-called classics (remember, “I, am an F, B, I, agent!”?) Point Break has become something of an institution. And yes, the plot about a four-man gang of surfing bank robbers, led by Patrick Swayze’s Zen antihero Bodhi, is ridiculous. And yes, the line readings of special agent Johnny Utah, played by Keanu Reeves, are often bizarrely monotone. Still, this is a beautiful, near perfect, action film directed by Kathryn Bigelow (pre-Hurt Locker) with frenzied intensity, and it never once seeks to patronise its own material or its audience. (120min) Kevin Maher

Radio choice, by Catherine Nixey

The Moth Radio Hour: Leaving, Loving & Coming Home
Radio 4 Extra, 7pm
There are several reasons to be suspicious about The Moth, the American podcast in which people tell true stories, live on stage, without scripts. First, there is the subtitle from its website: “The Art and Craft of Storytelling”. A sentence that it’s hard to read without feeling a little queasy: it smells so much of the sort of worthy activity a local library might run. Then there is the moral conundrum: this radio hour comes from an American podcast that you can download free, anywhere, at any time, on your phone or computer. So why is the BBC paying money so that it can offer the same thing — but in a more restricted format? And then the case for the defence: the stories are variable, but often glorious. Today’s are on the topic of home.

Love Henry James: The Portrait of a Lady
Radio 4, 3pm
You don’t, alas, get many gerunds in romantic novels. Naturally, one of the few writers to brave them was Henry James. Why, Isabel asks Ralph, has his father left her all that money? “It’s a kind of compliment,” he replies, “on your so beautifully existing.” A sentence to make Latin teachers the world over sigh with happiness — although one that probably won’t help to rehabilitate James in the hearts of those who were already suspicious of him. In this, the second part of the BBC’s adaptation, Sacha Dhawan is pitch-perfect as Ralph.