Tonight's TV tips
In the fourth episode of this landmark music documentary series exploring the themes that emerge in Irish song, Mairéad Ní Mhaonaigh parses the national songbook for songs of spirituality.
With musical contributions from Sinead O’Connor, Nóirín Ní Riain, Liam Ó Maonlaí, the Monks of Glenstall Abbey and Galway’s Julie Feeney, she explores why we have a dearth of spiritual music in the Gaelic tradition and wonders whether recent religious upheavals have led to contemporary singers exploring a more personal spirituality in their music.
As a nation of increasingly materialistic consumers, spiralling into debt and obsessed with the era of celebrity, it is easy to understand why so many of us suffer from Money Envy.
This show looks into the burning question we all want to know – would being a millionaire really make us more content in life?
Hosted by award-winning comedian Stephen K Amos, Money Envy examines what it really takes to become a millionaire and our inherent desire to be loaded in an increasingly superficial culture.
We hear from psychologist Cary Cooper who explores the mind set of the wealthy and analyses almost everything from their get up and go attitude, to the downright ruthlessness involved as they make their mark on the high flyers list.
As Wicket, the chief Ewok, in Return of the Jedi, Warwick Davis took his first steps into showbusiness.
That was in 1982, and within a few years he had carved a career for himself as the UK’s leading diminutive actor, with jobs taking him around the world.
Roles in Willow, Star Wars: The Phantom Menace, Ray and Harry Potter eventually paved the way for his own sitcom, Life’s Too Short.
Following his journeys with Karl Pilkington for An Idiot Abroad, Warwick is now back on the box with a new travel strand.
This time he’s joined by his family, wife Sam, kids Annabelle and Harrison and dog Sherlock, to explore exotic holidays in the UK.
First stop is Cornwall. “Cornwall isn’t all about cream teas and scrumpy it’s a county brimming with magic, mystery and plenty of strange surprises if you scratch beneath the surface,” explains Warwick.
Team Davis also visit Readymoney Cove, and discover how smuggling and Piracy made the area world-famous; Penzance, where Warwick meets a group of women known as the ’Yarn Bombers’ or the ’Graffiti Grannies’, and Newquay, where he takes part in a boat race with a difference.
As presenter Phillip Schofield is happy to remind us, even the simplest of tasks can become complicated when undertaken inside The Cube.
However for Joey Essex, who competes in this celebrity edition, it sometimes seems as though no task is simple enough – so it will be interesting to see how he fares under pressure.
Maybe after taking part in I’m a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here, standing in a box that isn’t filled with rats, snakes or insects will actually seem like a bit of a doddle.
Coronation Street’s Kym Marsh (Michelle Connor) is also on the bill, and both will be hoping to win as much of the potential £250,000 jackpot as possible, to help fill the coffers of a charity of their choosing.
Can they hold their nerve as the audience (and ’the Scofe’) scrutinise their every move?
In 2004’s Spider-Man 2, the Marvel Comics legend had to defend New York from the fury of a gifted villain.
A decade later and there’s a sense of deja vu in The Amazing Spider-Man 2. So expect more of the same, this time with our own Andrew Garfield as the hero and Emma Stone also returning as girlfriend Gwen Stacey.
Graham chats to them about the new epic in this week’s show. They are joined by Oscar-winning actor Jamie Foxx, who plays arch villain Electro.
Garfield and Stone’s first Spider-Man collaboration made more than 750million, and analysts are expecting the new movie to easily surpass that; it needs to given the fact the budget is in the 200million ball park.
Plus, singer-songwriter Paolo Nutini provides the music, and if there’s time, more brave members of the public will be going base over apex as they face THAT chair.
After suffering the humiliation of being given the third degree by his girlfriend's father, one man now faces the even more embarrassing task of introducing his own mother and father in this star-studded sequel to the box-office smash Meet the Parents.
After getting off on the wrong foot (to put it mildly) with his prospective in-laws, Greg Focker (Ben Stiller) has finally won the grudging approval of Jack and Dina Byrnes (Robert De Niro and Blythe Danner) to marry their daughter Pam (Teri Polo).
But after clearing the first hurdle, now Greg has to face an even bigger challenge -- introducing the straight-laced Byrnes family to his folks, free-spirited sex therapist Roz (Barbra Streisand) and eccentrically open-minded Bernie (Dustin Hoffman), who blend with Pam's parents not quite as well as oil and water.
Meet the Fockers was directed by Jay Roach, who handled the same chores for Meet the Parents. Starring Ben Stiller, Robert De Niro, Blythe Danner, Teri Polo, Barbra Streisand & Dustin Hoffman.
Ben Stiller, Robert De Niro, Blythe Danner, Teri Polo, Barbra Streisand, Dustin Hoffman.
38%
A thoroughly decent New Yorker is mugged while on a night out with his beloved girlfriend and while fighting off his attacker, suffers a fatal stab wound.
But instead of shuffling off this mortal coil, he refuses to head off into the afterlife, and instead sets about trying to contact his grieving lover, with the help of a wacky medium who can’t believe she can truly talk to the dead.
You’ll laugh, you’ll cry, you’ll hide behind the sofa. Ghost is a modern classic with winning performances from a perfectly cast trio of stars, and just enough darkness at its heart to qualify as a thriller rather than a romance.
Whoopi Goldberg won an Oscar for her performance, while the love scene between Swayze and Moore has become an iconic moment in cinema history.
Patrick Swayze, Demi Moore, Whoopi Goldberg
74%
Matt Damon is well cast as an amnesiac former CIA agent in this frenetic spy thriller, which is loosely based on the novel by Robert Ludlum.
When Jason Bourne is plucked from the Mediterranean with two bullet wounds in his back and a Swiss bank account number sewn into his skin, he has absolutely no idea who he is or how he got there.
While trying to discover his identity, Bourne is pursued by the police and several government agents, who are determined to wipe out their former colleague.
Damon is as good as he’s ever been – and he and the rest of the cast make good use of a well-written script and the action scenes, particularly the car chase, are extremely entertaining.
Matt Damon, Franka Potente, Chris Cooper, Clive Owen, Brian Cox
83%
