TV Movie Guide: 19 - 25 October | Movie News

Twelve Monkeys
10:25pm, SBS

M, AD, CC
USA, 1995
Genre: Sci-Fi
Language: English
Director: Terry Gilliam
Starring: Bruce Willis, Madeleine Stowe, Brad Pitt, Jon Seda, Vernon Campbell
What’s it about?
Bruce Willis stars as a prison inmate from the future who is sent back in time to stop a deadly virus from decimating the world’s population. Also starring Brad Pitt in an Academy Award-nominated performance as a patient in a psychiatric hospital, this modern sci-fi classic was directed by Terry Gilliam (Brazil, The Fisher King) and is a loose remake of Chris Marker’s landmark 1962 short film La Jetée.

THURSDAY 20 OCTOBER

Bleed for This
12:00pm, SBS VICELAND

M, AD, CC
USA, 2016
Genre: Drama
Language: English, French
Director: Ben Younger
Starring: Miles Teller, Aaron Eckhart, Katey Sagal, Ciaran Hinds, Ted Levine
What’s it about?
Champion boxer Vinny Pazienza (Teller) is told he may never walk again after a car accident leaves him with a broken neck. Against all odds and doctor’s orders, renowned trainer Kevin Rooney (Eckhart) agrees to help Vinny return to the ring. Executive produced by Martin Scorsese, and scored by acclaimed singer-songwriter and composer Julia Holter.

Queen Of The Damned
9:30pm, NITV

M
USA, 2002
Genre: Horror, Fantasy
Language: English
Director: Michael Rymer
Starring: Aaliyah, Stuart Townsend, Marguerite Moreau 
What’s it about?
After many years of sleeping in his coffin, the vampire Lestat (Townsend) awakens only to find that the world has changed, and he wants to be a part of it. He gathers a following and becomes a rock star, only to find that his music awakens the ancient Queen Akasha (Aaliyah), and she wants him to become her king. A co-production between the US and Australia (and directed by Angel Baby’s Michael Rymer) that was released posthumously after Aaliyah’s tragic death, and dedicated to her memory. 

FRIDAY 21 OCTOBER

Martian Child
7:30pm, NITV (repeats Saturday 22 October, 10:00am)

PG
USA, 2007
Genre: Drama, Family
Language: English
Director: Menno Meyjes
Starring: John Cusack, Bobby Coleman, Amanda Peet, Oliver Platt, Sophie Okonedo, Anjelica Huston
What’s it about?
A widowed science fiction writer (Cusack) questions the wisdom of adopting a socially awkward child (Coleman), who is convinced that he is an extra-terrestrial. Together, the two teach each other about acceptance.

Venus: Let’s Talk About Sex
10:25pm, SBS VICELAND

MA15+
Denmark, Norway, 2016
Genre: Documentary
Language: Danish
Director: Lea Glob, Mette Carla Albrechtsen
What’s it about?
Two female directors make an open casting call for an erotic film based on true sexual experiences. 100 curious women respond to the casting ad, but the auditions take an unpredictable turn from the original plan. Slowly the women start to take over the interviews, leaving the directors silent. The young women’s immediacy to understand themselves suddenly becomes an intimate arena where an unexpected choir of honesty creates the potential to rethink the language of female sexuality.

SATURDAY 22 OCTOBER

When I Stutter
4:25pm, SBS

PG
USA, 2017
Genre: Documentary
Language: English
Director: John Gomez
Starring: Gail Wilson Lew, Jason Peterson, Rachel Martinez, Richard Alvarado, Scott Palasik
What’s it about?
This documentary reveals the humanity that exists within people who stutter. Filmed over the course of nearly five years, this documentary shares the stories of 19 people who stutter that run the range of human emotion from despair to hopefulness to ultimately, triumph.

Spiders
8:30pm, NITV

MA15+
USA, 2013
Genre: Science Fiction, Thriller
Language: English
Director: Tibor Takács
Starring: Patrick Muldoon, Christa Campbell, William Hope, Sydney Sweeney, Pete Lee-Wilson
What’s it about?
After a Soviet space station crashes into a New York City subway tunnel, a species of venomous spiders is discovered, and soon they mutate to gigantic proportions and wreak havoc on the city.

Streaming after broadcast at SBS On Demand:

Marshall
11:15pm, SBS

PG, AD, CC
USA, 2017
Genre: Drama
Language: English
Director: Reginald Hudlin
Starring: Chadwick Boseman, Josh Gad, Kate Hudson, Sterling K. Brown, James Cromwell
What’s it about?
In the year 1941, a nearly bankrupt NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People) sends its only lawyer, thirty-two year old Thurgood Marshall (Boseman), to conservative Connecticut to defend a black chauffeur (Brown) against charges of rape and attempted murder brought by his wealthy socialite employer (Hudson). In need of a high profile victory, but muzzled by the trial court, Marshall is joined by Samuel Friedman (Gad), a young Jewish lawyer who has never before tried a criminal case. Based on a true story.

SUNDAY 23 OCTOBER

The Death of Bruce Lee
9:25pm, SBS

PG, AD, CC
USA, 2021
Genre: Documentary
Language: English
Director: Evan Jackson Leong
What’s it about?
On 20th July 1973, martial arts superstar Bruce Lee died under mysterious circumstances in Hong Kong. Now in the twilight of his life, his brother Robert Lee has enlisted former Hong Kong police detective Philip Chan to comb through previously unseen documents, interview experts and talk to people close to the legendary superstar, in an attempt to revisit what or who killed the Bruce Lee. 

Race
9:30pm, NITV

PG, AD, CC
Canada, Germany, 2016
Genre: Action, Drama, History
Language: English
Director: Stephen Hopkins
Starring: Stephan James, Jason Sudeikis, Carice van Houten, Jeremy Irons, William Hurt
What’s it about?
Based on the story of Jesse Owens (James), the Black American athlete whose quest to become the greatest track and field athlete in history thrusts him onto the world stage of the 1936 Olympics, where he faces off against Adolf Hitler’s vision of Aryan supremacy.

MONDAY 24 OCTOBER

Lion
10:00am, SBS

M, CC
Australia, UK, USA, 2016
Genre: Drama
Language: English
Director: Garth Davis
Starring: Dev Patel, Nicole Kidman, Rooney Mara, David Wenham
What’s it about?
A five-year-old Indian boy (played by Sunny Pawar, and as an adult by Dev Patel) gets lost on the streets of Calcutta, thousands of kilometres from home. He survives many challenges before being adopted by a couple (Wenham & Kidman) in Australia; 25 years later, he sets out to find his lost family. Nominated for six 2017 Academy Awards (including Best Picture), and one of the most commercially successful Australian-made films of all time.

Streaming after broadcast at SBS On Demand:

The Graduate
12:00pm, SBS VICELAND

M, AD, CC
USA, 1967
Genre: Comedy, Drama
Language: English
Director: Mike Nichols
Starring: Dustin Hoffman, Anne Bancroft, Katharine Ross, Murray Hamilton, Buck Henry
What’s it about?
During a party given by his parents to celebrate his graduation, Benjamin Braddock (Hoffman) is seduced by Mrs. Robinson (Bancroft), the wife of one of his father’s closest friends. They have an affair, but Benjamin then falls in love with her daughter, Elaine (Ross). Jealous and angry, Mrs. Robinson does everything to keep the young couple apart. This landmark comedy won Best Director for Mike Nichols (Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Closer) at the 1968 Academy Awards.

Predator on the Reservation
10:20pm, NITV

MA15+, AD
USA, 2019
Genre: Documentary
Language: English
Featuring: Lewis D. Wheeler
What’s it about?
Investigates the decades-long failure to stop government paediatrician Dr. Stanley Weber, who moved from reservation to reservation despite warnings about his predatory behaviour.

TUESDAY 25 OCTOBER

Iron Sky
12:00pm, SBS VICELAND

M
Finland, 2012
Genre: Comedy, Action, Sci-Fi
Language: German
Director: Timo Vuorensola
Starring:  Julia Dietze, Christopher Kirby, Götz Otto, Udo Kier
What’s it about?
In the last moments of World War II, a secret Nazi space program evaded destruction by fleeing to the Dark Side of the Moon. During 70 years of utter secrecy, the Nazis construct a gigantic space fortress with a massive armada of flying saucers. Soon, this unstoppable attack fleet will swarm towards Earth, heralding the triumphant return of the Fourth Reich.

Ellie Simmonds: A World Without Dwarfism?
9:40pm, SBS VICELAND

PG
UK, 2022
Genre: Documentary
Language: English
Director: Kate Monaghan
What’s it about?
Ellie Simmonds, a five-time gold Paralympics winner, investigates a controversial new drug that promises to make children with dwarfism grow closer to average height. Ellie’s form of dwarfism, Achondroplasia, is a genetic condition and is the most common type of dwarfism in the United Kingdom. However, the new treatment raises the question: if cutting edge medicine can stop disability in its tracks – should we use it?

Suicidal: In Our Own Words
11:15pm, SBS VICELAND

MA15+, AD
UK, 2019
Genre: Documentary
Language: English
Director: Rachel Harvie
What’s it about?
Six men, who have 20 suicide attempts between them, tell their stories in a unique moment – the hours, days and weeks of their unfolding suicidal episodes. Men in the UK, aged 20 to 49, are more likely to die from suicide than any other cause of death and this complex and misunderstood mental health condition kills three times as many British men as women – and nothing adequately explains why.