Ghost (1990)

Five, 9pm

Cheesy but effective, Ghost stars Patrick Swayze as a recently murdered New Yorker who tries to contact his grieving partner, played by Demi Moore, from beyond the grave.

Although patently absurd and unintentionally comic in places, Jerry Zucker’s hugely popular supernatural weepie occupies a realm beyond conventional notions of good taste and film criticism. An Oscar-winning Whoopi Goldberg co-stars. (128min)

Kingpin (1996)

Channel 4, 11pm

Bill Murray and his garish comb-over wig provide many scene-stealing highlights in this offbeat cult comedy from the bad-taste maestros Peter and Bobby Farrelly.

An inspired parody of rags-to-riches sports dramas, Kingpin stars Randy Quaid as an Amish bowling hotshot and Woody Harrelson as the washed-up former champ with a rubber hand who grooms him for a career-making showdown with Murray’s seedy ten-pin superstar. (113min)

Nayak (1966, b/w)

Channel 4, 1.15am

The great Indian arthouse director Satyajit Ray casts a caustic eye over his cinematic peers in this slender but prescient drama about the price of celebrity. Uttam Kumar plays a troubled Bengali matinee idol consumed by doubts about his shaky future in a shallow, corrupt Bollywood film industry.

Sharmila Tagore co-stars as a cool-headed, indifferent journalist who confronts Kumar’s worst fears on a train journey to Delhi. (120min)

MultiChannel

Hud (1963, b/w)

Film4, 9pm

The late Paul Newman worked on a ranch for several weeks in preparation for his breakthrough starring role as a cynical rancher’s son locked in tragic generational conflict with his straight-arrow father, played by Melvyn Douglas.

An excellent early platform for Newman’s moody charisma, Hud is based on an early novel by the celebrated modern-day western writer Larry McMurtry, who would later adapt Brokeback Mountain. (112min)

Elephant (TVM, 1989)

Sky Arts, 9pm

The final film by the influential British director Alan Clarke, best known for campaigning dramas, including Scum and The Firm, is a powerful short featuring almost no dialogue or character detail.

Produced by the future Trainspotting director Danny Boyle and scripted by the novelist Bernard MacLaverty, the plot consists of a series of brutal sectarian murders on the streets of Belfast. Gus Van Sant later paid oblique homage to the film with his Columbine-inspired 2003 drama of the same name. (39min)

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