There’s never been a better time to be an armchair cinema fan with more ways to watch movies across TV channels, streaming services and digital downloads than ever before. But sometimes there can be too much choice, and that’s why our experts have hand-picked the very best films to watch each day.
Every week we’ll update this list with the best films available free-to-air on terrestrial TV, along with notable releases on the streaming services and the biggest and best films available to rent and buy, many of which have only just left the cinema.
With a wide selection of films each week from blockbusters to indie hits, action and thrillers to rom coms and sci-fi, there’s something for every film fan to enjoy.
The best films to watch at home this week
Friday
The Big Heat (Sky Cinema Greats, 2pm)
Glenn Ford stars as the rule-breaking policeman who becomes a ruthless avenger when his wife is murdered by the mob boss Mike Lagana (Alexander Scourby). Along the way Ford’s Dave Bannion tackles his moll-beating nemesis, Vince Stone (Lee Marvin), and befriends the defiant femme fatale Debby Marsh (Gloria Grahame). Cop dramas today are still in its debt. (1953)
Malta Story (TPTV, 4.35pm)
Upper lips have rarely been stiffer than they are in this no-frills dramatisation of the Second World War siege and bombardment that earned the island of Malta a collective George Cross. A young Alec Guinness plays an RAF reconnaissance photographer who helps to thwart German and Italian invasion plans after being stranded on the island. (1953)
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The Outfit (BBC1, 10.40pm)
The setting is Chicago in 1956, a mobsters’ menswear store run by a tailor called Leonard (Mark Rylance). The film opens with gangster Richie and his sidekick. Richie toys with Leonard, who is indebted to the patronage of Richie’s father. Within minutes Richie is sporting a gunshot wound and holding an FBI tape that has the identity of the soon-to-be murdered informant. (2022)
Saturday
The Big Sleep (BBC2, 1.10pm)
This crime classic, adapted from the Raymond Chandler novel and directed by Howard Hawks, starts with a man and a woman in silhouette smoking over the credit sequence — a fair indicator of the stylish, moody noir to come. Humphrey Bogart plays the world-weary private detective Philip Marlowe, hired by the dying General Sternwood to look into a case of blackmailing. Marlowe’s investigation means tangling with Sternwood’s wayward daughters, including the “exacting, smart and ruthless” Vivian (Lauren Bacall). Three months after the film wrapped Bacall and Bogart were married. (1946)
The Last Duel (Channel 4, 9.25pm)
Ridley Scott’s film is set in 14th-century France, based on a novel by Eric Jager. It’s the tale of a swaggering squire, Jacques le Gris (Adam Driver), who is challenged to a duel by the dour knight Jean de Carrouges (Matt Damon) after Carrouges’s wife, Marguerite (Jodie Comer), accuses le Gris of rape. The drama unfolds three times, from three different perspectives — those of Carrouges, le Gris and, finally, with the words “the truth” lingering on the screen, Marguerite. You’ll come for Scott’s direction, but stay for Comer’s turn. (2021)
Sunday
The Long, Hot Summer (BBC2, 11.30am)
Paul Newman stars as Ben Quick, an ambitious drifter who arrives in a Mississippi town and catches the eye of the wealthy patriarch Will Varner. Varner comes to see Ben as a better choice to inherit his position than his less ruthless son, Jody (Anthony Franciosa), and schemes to push his daughter, Clara (Joanne Woodward), and Ben together. (1958)
School of Rock (C4, 1.55pm)
Jack Black gives a career-defining performance as a failed guitarist who lands a job as a teacher and resolves to turn his drippy pupils into a rock’n’roll juggernaut. The film was a blip of conventionality for its director, Richard Linklater, who is known for arthouse hits such as Boyhood, and the writer Mike White, who created the dark satire The White Lotus. (2003)
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The Last Black Man in San Francisco (BBC2, 11.45pm)
This love letter to San Francisco begins with an odyssey through the city, viewed from atop the skateboard of its protagonist, the nursing home worker Jimmie Fails. He is played by the real-life Jimmie Fails in a fictionalised version of his story. It describes his obsession with his former family home and how he patches together an existence in the city. (2019)
Monday
Von Ryan’s Express (Film4, 4.20pm)
A rip-roaring slice of Second World War escapism, Mark Robson’s action-adventure stars Frank Sinatra and Trevor Howard as inmates of a prisoner of war camp. There is initially friction between Sinatra’s tough American colonel, Joseph Ryan, and his British opposite number, Major Eric Fincham (Howard), when the former blows their escape plan. However, he makes amends when he spots an opportunity to get them to safety. (1965)
Arrival (Sky Cinema Sci-Fi/Horror, 10.20pm)
America is sent into panic by the arrival of a UFO that looks like a vast river-polished stone. Amy Adams plays Louise Banks, a linguistics lecturer swept up in the night by a military helicopter and tossed into the black maw of the spaceship. (2016)
Allelujah (Sky Cinema Drama, 10.30pm)
Based on Alan Bennett’s witty 2018 play of the same name, Allelujah is set in a fictional Yorkshire hospital that has been deemed “a model for closure” by a government adviser. Step forward Jennifer Saunders as Sister Gilpin, a ward nurse with a patient list of British screen stalwarts (Judi Dench, Derek Jacobi et al) and plans to prove that the Beth is worth saving. (2022)
Borderlands (Sky Store)
Cate Blanchett stars as a flame-haired futuristic bounty hunter called Lilith in Eli Roth’s video game adaptation. When Tiny Tina (Ariana Greenblatt), daughter of an oligarch (Edgar Ramirez), is kidnapped by a former mercenary (Kevin Hart), Blanchett’s character is hired to save the day. This is certainly not the pinnacle of cinema, but it’s decent escapist entertainment.
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Tuesday
Official Competition (Film4, 9pm)
An impossibly sophisticated film starring Antonio Banderas and Penélope Cruz, whose performances are flat out hilarious. Cruz is Lola Cuevas, an eccentric director of dramas; Banderas is Félix Rivero, a blockbusting action star who’s been hired to bring some populism to Lola’s latest work. Cruz has rarely been stronger on screen. A blast. (2021)
A Star Is Born (BBC1, 10.40pm)
This melodrama that tells the tale of an ingénue who is nurtured by a fading male icon. Ally (Lady Gaga), a part-time waitress, writes songs and has a stunning voice but doesn’t think that she’s pretty enough to be a megastar. Luckily she meets the mumbling millionaire booze bucket Jackson Maine (Bradley Cooper, who also directs). (2018)
Second Coming (Film4, 1.25am)
Written and directed by the playwright Debbie Tucker Green, Second Coming is an impressive piece of storytelling. At first glance the family at the heart of this are normal: hard-working, black and British. Then comes an unexpected element: the mother, Jackie (Nadine Marshall), becomes pregnant. Her husband, Mark (Idris Elba), can’t be the father, but according to her, neither can anyone else. (2014)
Wednesday
My Cousin Rachel (C4, 1.30am)
In Roger Michell’s adaptation of Daphne du Maurier’s 1951 novel, Sam Claflin plays the orphan turned Cornish estate owner Philip. When Philip learns that his benefactor and ostensibly adoptive father, Ambrose, has died, possibly at the hands of Ambrose’s new half-Italian, half-Cornish wife, Rachel (Rachel Weisz), and that she is making her way from Italy to Cornwall, the stage is set for a monumental smackdown. (2017)
Pig (Film4, 11.20pm)
In this movie disguised as a revenge thriller, Robin Feld, a forest-dwelling badass played by Nicolas Cage, emerges from the woods to hunt down the criminals who stole his truffle-hunting pig. Yet it wrong-foots the viewer at every turn and dives instead into a world of culinary snobbery in Portland. (2021)
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The Outsiders (Film4, 1.10am)
Often overlooked as part of Francis Ford Coppola’s “Eighties slump”, this classic gang film set in 1960s Oklahoma is one of his best. It’s beautifully shot, written and paced, but the cast really is the thing: Tom Cruise, Rob Lowe, Emilio Estevez, Patrick Swayze and Matt Dillon. Lowe is the gang’s lothario, Swayze the wise mother hen and Cruise the stunt-obsessed maniac. (1983)
Inside Out 2 (Disney+)
This charming sequel follows our key emotions — Joy, Sadness, Fear, Disgust and Anger — as they struggle within a now 13-year-old Riley. Things take an unexpected but humorous turn when other feelings — Anxiety, Envy, Embarrassment and Ennui — join the party. Tender and smart, it’s a film that knows what it wants to achieve, pulling on the heartstrings and making you giggle.
Thursday
Fire Down Below (Film4, 2.35pm)
There are four stars in this adventure drama: Robert Mitchum, Jack Lemmon, Rita Hayworth and the Trinidadian location. The Korean War veterans and bosom pals Felix (Mitchum) and Tony (Lemmon) run a smuggling operation around the Caribbean, having a nice old time of it, drinking rum and taking it easy. Enter Irena (Hayworth). Both chaps take a fancy to her, leading to trouble in paradise. (1957)
The Adjustment Bureau (Sky Cinema Sci-Fi/Horror, 8pm)
This sci-fi romance stars Matt Damon as the politician David Norris, who meets the ballerina Elise Sellas (Emily Blunt). David is smitten, but fate has other ideas. Literally. Fate comes with its own squad of enforcers: the men of the Adjustment Bureau, whose job it is to make sure everyone follows their preordained route in life. (2011)
Far and Away (Sky Cinema Drama, 9.55pm)
In this period drama Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman play Irish immigrants seeking their fortune in 1890s America. Cruise is Joseph Donnelly, a worker whose home is burnt down by the landlord over unpaid rents. Kidman is Shannon, the rebellious daughter of said landlord who takes Donnelly with her to America. (1992)
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