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3:20 AM Encore Action
The Killer Elite (1975 USA): James Caan and Robert Duvall play tough guys mixed up in CIA monkey business in this shot in San Francisco Sam Peckinpah joint. Caan plays Mike Locken, who with good buddy George Hansen (Duvall) has been working as a freelance operative for the Langley spooks. When George turns out to be a double agent and tries to kill Mike, however, their friendship comes to an end and revenge is now on the menu, assuming Mike can recover from his wounds. Gig Young is excellent as a retired agent, there’s an exciting finale set amidst the ‘mothball fleet’ anchored in the Sacramento Delta, and Burt Young, Mako, and Bo Hopkins are on hand, too.

Saturday 04/23/11

9:00 AM Turner Classic Movies
Tarzan Finds a Son! (1939 USA): It didn’t take long for Tarzan to descend into "B"-movie territory, but the series was still getting "A"-level budgets in 1939. Tarzan Finds a Son! delivers the goods as advertised, with the jungle lord (Johnny Weissmuller) and lady Jane (Maureen O’Sullivan) acquiring — through non-sexual means, we assure you — an heir to the throne. Said sprog is Boy (the recently deceased Johnny Sheffield, later known as Bomba the Jungle Boy), the sole survivor of a plane crash and heir to a vast fortune. Soon enough, the lawyers are hot on his trail, and Tarzan and Jane are confronted by that problem we all must one day inevitably face: penthouse or tree-house? Don’t worry, they make the right decision.

7:15 PM Turner Classic Movies
Sea Fury (1958 GB): The final film of Victor McLaglen’s lengthy screen career — which began in 1920, and also included such sterling adventure flicks as Beau Geste (1926) and Gunga Din (1939) — Sea Fury is a fitting capstone for the great man’s filmography. McLaglen plays Bellew, a crusty salvage boat captain racing against time to beat the Dutch competition to the spoils of a shipwreck. He’s also engaged in a love triangle with First Mate Abel Hewson (Stanley Baker) and hottie Josita (Lucianna Paluzzi), and though one has to squint pretty hard to believe that the 72-year old McLaglen could beat Stanley Baker at checkers, never mind love, ho doesn’t embarrass himself. Look for Robert Shaw in a small role as ship’s crew.

Sunday 04/24/11

9:00 PM Turner Classic Movies
The Godless Girl (1929 USA): This Cecil B. De Mille feature asks the big question: can atheists and bible-thumpers live side-by-side on America’s college campuses? Like many De Mille films, The Godless Girl finds itself torn between the sacred and the profane, and though intended as a plea for tolerance can’t help but betray De Mille’s right-wing prejudices. There are moments — especially in the early going, as flapper Judy Craig (sexy Lina Basquette) stuffs subversive fliers into lockers and generally tries to undermine the authority of almighty God — when the film is a little more daring than your average Sunday School lesson, which you get during the stodgy second act. Things liven up again in final scenes set in a reformatory (because that’s where atheists need to go, y’know). As with many other Cecil B. epics, The Godless Girl is far too long, but remains strangely fascinating nonetheless — must be the influence of that Lina Basquette. She’s 100% woman. Rroww.

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