Movies On Demand, 3:00 a.m. ET
MOVIE PREMIERE: Francis Ford Coppola and George Lucas have something in common besides their lifelong friendship, their huge impact on filmmaking in the 1970s and beyond, and their appetite for telling epic stories that stretch over several films. They also both like to go back and revisit, re-edit, and reframe some of their older works – Lucas by adding new special effects and other elements to old Star Wars entries, and Coppola by fiddling with his Godfather movies. Back in the late 1970s, not long after the releases of The Godfather in 1972 and The Godfather, Part II in 1974, Coppola sold to NBC a re-edited miniseries version, including outtakes from those first two films, as The Godfather Saga. Then, in 1990, he produced and directed a new film, The Godfather Part III, even though he considered it an epilogue to the first two films, rather than part of a trilogy. Paramount disagreed, and rejected Coppola’s working title of The Death of Michael Corleone, which is how the film ended up with the Part III title. Now, on its 30th anniversary, Coppola has reclaimed both the movie and his original title, and, once again, done the Godfather Saga treatment of reassembling and adding footage to present a revised narrative. But yes, Spoiler Alert from 1990, Al Pacino’s Michael Corleone still dies. Robert Duvall doesn’t appear in the third Godfather film, but Diane Keaton and Talia Shire do reprise their roles, and new co-stars include George Hamilton, Andy Garcia, Bridget Fonda, and, most controversially, Coppola’s daughter, Sofia Coppola. But watch, also, for the character of Dominic Abbandando. He’s played by Don Novello, who, before appearing in The Godfather Part III, showed up everwhere from Saturday Night Live and Shelley Duvall’s Faerie Tale Theatre to It’s Garry Shandling’s Show and the revival of The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour, each time playing the same alter ego character, Father Guido Sarducci.
Epix, 5:45 p.m. ET
Two of writer-director James L. Brooks’ classic comedies are shown tonight as an Epix double feature, and they show both the consistency and maturation of an artist who made these films a decade apart. Broadcast News was made in 1987, and showcased Holly Hunter (pictured, with Albert Brooks and William Hurt); As Good As It Gets was made in 1997, and won a Best Actress Oscar for Helen Hunt. Oh, and Jack Nicholson won a Best Actor Oscar for As Good As It Gets as well – and had appeared in a small supporting role in Broadcast News a decade before. Brooks didn’t win Oscars for either of these films, but don’t feel bad for him. Before either of these films, he already had won a Best Picture Oscar in 1984 for Terms of Endearment, and two additional Oscars for directing and writing the film. Oh, and Shirley MacLaine won an Oscar for Terms of Endearment as well – and so, in the Best Supporting Actor category, had Jack Nicholson.
TCM, 8:00 p.m. ET
The first screen adaptation of Charles Dickens’ holiday classic story, A Christmas Carol, was a silent British film short in 1901, titled Scrooge, or, Marley’s Ghost. American filmmakers first got to it in 1908, with a brief silent Chicago-based version called A Christmas Carol, and the Edison Studios produced its own silent short version in 1910. Another silent British version, this one called Scrooge, was released in England in 1913. The first sound version was produced in England in 1935, and also was called Scrooge. America countered three years later with 1938’s A Christmas Carol, the first internationally successful version of the Dickens tale, starring Reginald Owen as Ebenezer Scrooge. That’s the version TCM is showing tonight, in prime time. Gene Lockhart co-starred as Bob Cratchit, and his real-life daughter June can be seen as Cratchit’s daughter Belinda. Leo G. Carroll also co-stars, as Marley’s Ghost (pictured, with Owen’s Ebenezer). Eventually, both June Lockhart and Leo G. Carroll ended up appearing in two classic TV shows: Carroll in Topper and The Man from U.N.C.L.E., and Lockhart in Lassie and Lost in Space. And if you think I’ve gone on too long about the cinematic history and trivia surrounding A Christmas Carol, all I can say is… humbug.
HBO, 9:00 p.m. ET
DOCUMENTARY PREMIERE: Writer-director Tommy Oliver profiles another Philadelphian, Mike Africa Jr, whose parents were part of the revolutionary MOVE movement that led to an explosive showdown with city police in 1985. And when I say explosive, I mean that literally – and I was a TV critic for The Philadelphia Inquirer at the time, watching incredulously as the Philly police dropped “incendiary devices” on a row house in which MOVE members and their families, including women and children, were barricaded. 40 Years a Prisoner explores and explains what led to that showdown, what happened during it, and what happened to surviving MOVE members in the decades afterward – including Africa’s parents.