Tonight in HD: February 11

SoHo Highlight: The Shadow Line (Sky 10, 9.30, 5.1) Encore screening of Wednesday’s premiere: an amnesiac Detective Inspector investigating the murder of the head of one of the UK’s largest crime organisations wonders who he can trust. You might feel the same about the UK reviewers. The Guardian thought it an “excellent”  thriller  — “the cast is top notch, drawn in by the quality writing, and the twists keep viewers on their toes” —  while The Times dubbed it “a noirish, bizarre, gritty yet heightened, gangster-police- spy-conspiracy mystery”. But The Daily Telegraph thought the writing and direction were laden down with “deep portentiousness“. Chiwetel Ejiofor, Rafe Spall and Christopher Eccleston star. ✭✭✭✭

Two Lovers (TV One, 11.30) Joaquin Phoenix and Gwyneth Paltrow star in an acclaimed Brooklyn-set romantic drama about a bachelor torn between the family friend his parents wish he would marry and his beautiful but volatile new neighbour. "For a filmmaker who has made his reputation with such crime thrillers as Little Odessa and The Yards, James Gray reveals an unexpected gift for the mysteries of romance," the Wall Street Journal said while The Hollywood Reporter fell for the leads: "Phoenix plays the romantic lead with great intelligence and enormous charm, making his character's conflict utterly believable, and Paltrow positively glows as the radiant shiksa who dazzles him.” ✭✭✭✭

The Secret Lives of Dancers (TV3, 4.30, R) A new celebrity boss signals massive changes for the national dance company and recruits Black Swan star Sergio Terrado. ✭✭✭✭

TradeZone Gone Fishin’ (R)/Rheem Outdoors With Geoff (TV3, 5.00/5.30) ✭✭✭

Keeping Up With the Joneses (TV One, 7.00) Little Milton has his first day at school and Cristina is nervous about how he will mix after being the only child at Coolibah; Milton demonstrates the finer points of bull castration. ✭✭✭

Desperate Housewives (TV2, 10.20, R) Repeat of last year’s season finale on the eve of Monday’s season-eight premiere: the ladies welcome Susan back to Wisteria Lane with a progressive dinner party – which leads to a shocking murder. ✭✭

Winners & Losers (TV One, 10.30, R) The girls deal with the ramifications of the car accident. ✭✭

Sky Movies Greats Premiere: American Gangster (Sky 22, 8.30, 5.1) Who would have thought Serpico and Superfly would wind up best friends? Yet that’s what happened when the Big Apple’s most incorruptible cop, Richie Roberts (Russell Crowe), took on ‘70s Harlem drug boss Frank Lucas (Denzel Washington). Their bizarre relationship is just one amazing aspect of this dazzling, albeit disputed, true-life dramatisation of how a family-run empire that was coining $1 million a day from heroin was built on the back of the Vietnam war – and unravelled by an uncharacteristic flight of fancy and hubris on Lucas’ part. The Shadow Line’s Chiwetel Ejiofor co-stars. (2007) ✭✭✭✭