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Pick of the week
Bugonia

A scruffy conspiracy theorist (Jesse Plemons) and a CEO-maybe-alien (Emma Stone) face off in this wild black comedy. Plemons is Teddy Gatz, a warehouse worker and beekeeper, distraught about the damage done by corporations such as the one Michelle Fuller (Stone) heads up. Teddy’s internet “research” has convinced him Fuller is an Andromedan colonist intent on enslaving humanity, so along with his autistic cousin Don (Aidan Delbis), Teddy plans to kidnap her and negotiate Earth’s liberation. Technically, Bugonia is a remake of a Korean film, but the mischievous mood comes unmistakably from Yorgos Lanthimos, the lauded film-maker behind Poor Things and The Favourite.
Saturday 4 July, 10.25am, 8pm, Sky Cinema Premiere

***

Tombstone

This tough-talking 1990s western is one of several movies to retell events surrounding the legendary Gunfight at the OK Corral, when Wyatt Earp (Kurt Russell) and his deputised lawmen attempted to disarm a gang of cattle rustlers in the saloon town of Tombstone, Arizona. But what sets this version apart from all the others is a scene-stealing turn from Val Kilmer as sickly souse Doc Holliday, a brief-but-brilliant voiceover narration from the great Robert Mitchum, and several of the most tremendous ’taches this side of the Rio Grande.
Sunday 5 July, 9pm, Film4

***

Blade Runner

Los Angeles, 2019. The permanent neo-noir night. It’s the job of cop turned bounty hunter Rick Deckard (Harrison Ford) to track down and “retire” rogue replicants. But what if Rick can’t tell the humans from their bioengineered counterparts? Ridley Scott’s 1982 film was a relative flop on first release, but is now widely considered among the greatest sci-fi films of all time. This 2007-issued “final cut” blends influences as disparate as German expressionism, Italian futurism and “Hong Kong on a very bad day” into a visually iconic whole.
Sunday 5 July, 10pm, BBC Two

***

My Summer of Love

Emily Blunt’s big-screen debut boded well for the magnificent career to follow. She plays Tamsin, an alluring posh girl who hooks up with tomboy Mona (Natalie Press) over one sultry season in West Yorkshire’s Calder valley. Paddy Considine is Phil, Mona’s ex-convict brother, whose recent religious conversion seems to conceal a simmering propensity for violence. All in all it’s the modern-day, lesbian Wuthering Heights of our dreams, with Bafta-winning direction from Paweł Pawlikowski, who just picked up his second best director award at this year’s Cannes.
Wednesday 8 July, 12.05am, BBC Two

***

Wicked: For Good

Does pink complement green – or does it clash? This concluding part to the Broadway musical adaptation inspired by The Wizard of Oz is an impressive feat of tonal blending. At its heart is the fraught bond between Glinda the Good (Ariana Grande) and Elphaba AKA the Wicked Witch of the West (Cynthia Erivo), but there are other vibrant strands woven in, including backstories for familiar characters such as the Cowardly Lion, the Tin Man and Dorothy herself.
Friday 10 July, 7.25am, 6pm, Sky Cinema Premiere

***

Leave Her to Heaven

Demonic daddy’s girl Ellen (Gene Tierney) creates havoc of all sorts in this 1945 noir-melodrama, cited by Martin Scorsese as an all-time favourite. Cornel Wilde is Richard, the unsuspecting novelist who falls for a beautiful Boston socialite on the train to Jacinto, but soon lives to regret his impulsivity. Leon Shamroy’s sumptuous Technicolor cinematography won that year’s Academy award and director John M Stahl has fun bringing in allusions to the great femme fatales of Greek mythology, including Hippolyta, Medea and the sirens who lure men to a watery grave.
Friday 10 July, 11am, Film4

***

The Bodyguard

Once intended as a vehicle for Steve McQueen and Diana Ross, The Bodyguard had a 20-year journey to the screen before finally materialising in 1992 as Whitney Houston’s film-acting debut. She plays a famous actor and singer who, despite being threatened by a stalker, resists the restrictions placed upon her by her new head of security, Frank (Kevin Costner). Until, of course, the two get intimate. While initially dismissed as hokey by critics, The Bodyguard now stands as a timeless tribute to the power of soaring ballads and interracial romance.
Friday 10 July, 8pm, Sky Cinema Greats