SATURDAY
SEPTEMBER 7
2013

BIANCULLI’S BEST BETS

 

Fox, 7:00 p.m. ET

College football already is in full gear, with Saturday night prime-time games presented here on Fox (West Virginia vs. Oklahoma), as well as on ESPN (Notre Dame vs. Michigan, 8 p.m. ET),  ESPN2 (Texas vs. BYU, 7 p.m. ET), and Fox Sports 1 (Louisiana vs. Kansas State, 6:30 p.m. ET). For a whole rundown of the start of the new season, see Gerald Jordan’s Crossing Jordan.
 
  
 
 

HBO, 8:00 p.m. ET

This 2012 Best Picture Oscar-winner, directed by and starring Ben Affleck, is a well-made hrill ride from start to finish – even though the finish departs wildly from the reality of the fascinating true-life story on which it’s based. But the story itself, about a wildly improbable plan to return a half-dozen American embassy employees to safety after the takeover of the American embassy in Iran in 1979, needs no embellishment. And the performances here are wonderful – not only by Affleck, but by supporting actors Alan Arkin and John Goodman, who energize every frame of film in which they appear.

 
  
 
 

TCM, 8:00 p.m. ET

James Dean and Elizabeth Taylor sizzle in this 1956 drama – sometimes together, sometimes separately. And this sprawling tale of Texans wrangling cattle and oil, based on the Edna Ferber novel, was Dean’s last film, and a strong hint of things that might have been.

 
  
 
 

Starz!, 9:00 p.m. ET

Starz timed this series telecast quite cannily, positioning it on both a night, and at a time of year, when almost nothing else fresh is on, in terms of TV fare. So whether this female-centered take on British history is really that involving, it benefits from being, as NBC executive Paul Klein once coined back in the 1970s, a prime example of “L.O.P. – Least Objectionable Programming.”

 
  
 
 

National Geographic, 10:00 p.m. ET

No, I’m not recommending this program. I’m just pointing out because, coming from a National Geographic brand that once mean the very best nature documentaries in the business, this kind of program, and title, is udderly ridiculous.

 
  
 
 
 
 
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David Bianculli

Founder / Editor

David Bianculli has been a TV critic since 1975, including a 14-year stint at the New York Daily News, and sees no reason to stop now. Currently, he's TV critic for NPR's Fresh Air with Terry Gross, and is an occasional substitute host for that show. He's also an author and teaches TV and film history at New Jersey's Rowan University. His 2009 Dangerously Funny: The Uncensored Story of 'The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour', has been purchased for film rights. His latest, The Platinum Age of Television: From I Love Lucy to the Walking Dead, How TV Became Terrific, is an effusive guidebook that plots the path from the 1950s’ Golden Age to today’s era of quality TV.