Tonight in HD: April 7

April 5, 2012 0 Comments

SoHo Highlight: Einstein and Eddington (Sky 10, 8.30, 5.1) HBO Films presents a look at the evolution of Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity, and his relationship with British scientist Sir Arthur Eddington, the first physicist to understand his ideas. Andy Serkis plays Einstein and ex-Doctor Who David Tennant a “very tweedy time lord” (Eddington) in a dramatisation that The Independent said “had the familiar flaws of many science biopics … But it got a lot in, from Eddington’s suppressed homosexuality to the difficulties of pursuing scientific truth across hostile front lines”. According to New Scientist, “A few things in the film are altered for the sake of drama … But no matter; the story movingly invokes the passion of the two young scientists, reminds us how creative and exciting science can be, how it is rebellious, sometimes, and world-changing. Above all, perhaps, how it is inseparable from the humans who drive it.” ✮✮✮✮

Movie Premiere: Babylon AD (TV3, 8.30, 5.1) The biggest surprise about this thuggish, futuristic thriller is it’s from the visionary French director of The Crimson Rivers and La Haine, Mathieu Kassovitz. True, his first Hollywood effort, Gothika, didn’t impress, either, but at least it entertained with more verve and coherence than Babylon AD. Vin Diesel plays a gun-for-hire who’s caught up in a Big Apple cult’s cyber genetics conspiracy when he smuggles out of Eastern Europe an unusually gifted young woman (Melanie Thierry) and her kick-ass guardian of a nun (Michelle Yeoh). ✮✮

TradeZone Gone Fishin’/Rheem Outdoors With Geoff (TV3, 5.00/5.30, R) Great outdoors double-bill. ✮✮

Hyundai Country Calendar (TV One, 7.00) A dairying family shares cautionary tales of organic farming. ✮✮✮✮

Terra Nova (TV3, 7.30, 5.1) Maddy starts interning for the colony’s greatest scientist, and her life is put in danger when she discovers a terrible secret. ✮✮✮

Winners & Losers (TV One, 10.30, R, F) Bec and Matt’s happy day finally arrives, but the joy is short-lived as a life-changing discovery, an emotional farewell and a surprise declaration of love threaten to turn the girls’ lives upside down once more. ✮✮

Movie: The History Boys (TV3, 10.35, 5.1, R) If you liked the stage play, you’ll probably give this quirky comedy high marks. But those new to its questionable scenario won’t be won over by the exaggerated performances, grotesque and clichéd characterisations, or dull direction. The perennially unappealing Richard Griffiths plays a maverick history teacher with a predilection for groping his older students’ loins but who is, nonetheless, the stuff of which outstanding grammar school graduates are made – or, in this case, Oxford and Cambridge hopefuls who are as insufferably precocious as they are ridiculously miscast. (2006) ✮✮

Movie: Mail Order Bride (TV3, 12.45, 5.1, R) Big city trouble hits con-woman Diana McQueen (Melrose Place’s Daphne Zuniga) when she decides to call it quits with her relentless boss, Tom Rourke (My Two Dads’ Greg Evigan). But the only way out is to switch places with a friend who had planned on becoming a mail-order-bride to a very unsuspecting groom-to-be, waiting for her on the Old West frontier. Despite a great tagline — “little hustle on the prairie” — critics concurred with DVD Verdict: “Another one of those regurgitated Hallmark Channel movies which looks like it was made simply to fill an hour-and-a-half timeslot.” (2008) ✮✮