Tuesday’s TV tips
(2011) Benjamin Mee (Matt Damon) is trying to be strong for his teenage son Dylan (Colin Ford) and young daughter Rosie (Maggie Elizabeth Jones) following the death of his wife.
So Benjamin moves his family into a ramshackle house that comes with a fully functioning zoo, complete with animals and ballsy head keeper Kelly Foster (Scarlett Johansson).
Benjamin sinks all of his money into the zoo, hoping to restore the facility to its former glory in time for an inspection by the notoriously pernickety Walter Ferris (John Michael Higgins).
Benjamin’s accountant brother Duncan (Thomas Haden Church) is horrified but Benjamin refuses to be dissuaded, inspiring alcohol-swigging handyman MacCready, animal handler Robin and Kelly’s teenage cousin Lily to buy into his impossible dream.
It’s the quarter finals and the regional mentors need to get behind their candidates, doing everything they can to improve their products. But will Catherine Fulvio, Martin Shanahan, Domini Kemp and JP McMahon steer them in the right direction?
This year top chef Paul Flynn joins the Lidl judging panel who make their first appearance tonight and the episode ends in a nail-biting finale as one of the regional champions is sent home.
The documentary series exploring classic works of fiction returns, with historian Janina Ramirez investigating The Faerie Queene, Edmund Spenser’s epic Elizabethan poem, which features fantasy elements including elves, nymphs, dragons and questing knights, but may mask the author’s commentary on the brutal Tudor occupation of Ireland.
Janina investigates the allegorical qualities of Spenser’s magnum opus, and uncovers evidence that suggests the poet coded his growing disillusionment with the conflict into his poem’s restless verse.
Investigative journalist Paul Connolly goes undercover to reveal Britain's booming black market trade in designer clothes, dodgy medicines and dangerous booze.
Everyone loves a bargain, and in the first episode Paul reveals how those cheap, knock-off labels come at a price – with the trail going all the way to organised gangs, sweat shop bosses and multi-million pound criminal operations.
He also takes viewers behind the scenes of his investigation, allowing us to see just what it takes to trap Britain's dodgiest street dealers and craftiest criminals.
Paul begins by looking at designer brands and the market traders making a fortune with fakes – everything from luxury handbags to designer clothes are available. And if the sellers haven't got what you want, they can conjure up a counterfeit on the spot.
He goes shopping in streets packed full of dodgy shops, hunts the bosses churning out fake brands in factories and finds people running illegal cottage industries from their homes.
Documentary exploring the secretive world of football hooliganism, which in recent years has largely managed to keep a low profile.
While reports from police state that arrests for disorder have reduced, the game’s European governing body is warning of a potential resurgence of dangerous sporting rivalries previously thought to have been a thing of the past.
This film follows some of the most active youth firms in England, both at home and away, to discover just how far the rules of football hooliganism have changed over the years.
Stellan Skarsgard takes a break from blockbusting Marvel epics like Thor and Avengers: Age of Ultron to star in this compelling crime drama.
He plays John River, a brilliant but troubled police officer, while Nicola Walker almost steals the show as his late colleague, Detective Sergeant Jackie ’Stevie“ Stevenson, a lover of cheesy music and fast food.
When a murder suspect jumps to his death while being pursued by River, the pressure and scrutiny that surrounds him escalates fast.
As the investigation into Stevie’s murder begins to reveal her deepest secrets, our hero has to question everything he thought he knew about his friend.
The excellent supporting cast includes Adeel Akhtar, Lesley Manville and Eddie Marsan.
(2011) Sharp-shooter Ottway (Liam Neeson) is employed by a refinery in Alaska to shoot the wolves that sometimes target the roughnecks as they carry out their exhausting work.
After a gruelling five-week shift, Ottway boards the plane home only for a brutal storm to wrench the craft apart, depositing the widower and seven other men – Burke (Nonso Anozie), Diaz (Frank Grillo), Flannery (Joe Anderson), Henrick (Dallas Roberts), Hernandez (Ben Bray), Lewenden (James Badge Dale) and Talget (Dermot Mulroney) – into the Alaskan tundra.
The men huddle together for warmth but the local wildlife quickly encroaches on the crash site, attacking one of the men.
With the howls of wolves chilling the survivors even more than the icy blasts of wind, Ottway tries to galvanise his co-workers into action.
In 2014, at the tail end of her 30’s and with the recession officially over, Maia Dunphy packed-up ‘nearly’ all of her things and ‘almost ‘ moved to London.
Retaining a Dublin base and flying back ‘home’ regularly for work and play, Maia suddenly found herself slap-bang in the midst of Generation Semigration; a new wave of successful London-Irish who keep a well-shod foot in both lands.
Channel 4’s Born in the Wrong Body strand, which explores the lives of young transgender people in Britain and America, continues.
This time, the spotlight falls on the experiences of three young Britons, who have opted to undergo extraordinary surgical procedures to fulfil their dreams of living as men.
Making use of unprecedented access to the operating theatre, the film outlines the surgeons remove breasts and craft functioning penises for their patients.
The documentary also explores the increasingly confident online community of young trans men, who have started to bare all on social media.
(1996) Academy Award winner Geena Davis stars with Samuel L. Jackson as a typical mother and schoolteacher with a past that's anything but typical -- only she can't remember it and it could come back to kill her in The Long Kiss Goodnight.
Eight years ago, Samantha Caine (Davis--The Accidental Tourist) lost her memory, and since then she has slowly built a new life, even though disturbing flashes of memory and strange, seemingly innate skills haunt her.
When a car accident and a news story start to trigger her memory, she hires detective Mitch Hennessy (Jackson--Snakes on a Plane) to investigate.
But others are watching, and she has only been safe as long as she can't remember.
Starring: Geena Davis, Samuel L. Jackson.
Tonight with Vincent Browne will bring you LIVE expert analysis, and opinion of Budget 2016.
This year’s budget announcement follows months of speculation on whether the election will take place in 2015 or 2016.
With the ERSI warning that the Government should hold back on tax relief and extra spending in the budget alongside public demands for the abolition of the Universal Social Charge, Budget day 2016 promises to be one to watch.
The programme will give a detailed report on the cuts, slashes and extras set for 2016 with a comprehensive look at what this all means for the tax payer.
Brett Nielsen is a sports car enthusiast; record producer; musician, entrepreneur; a single father to two kids, with three ex-wives and he’s in love again.
His mother took Thalidomide in the early 1960s, to counteract the effects of morning sickness, and as a result, he was born with no arms.
Half a century ago, Roger Graef documentary, One Of Them Is Brett, was a portrait of Nielsen as a spirited four-year old, riding a bike, feeding himself, fighting his brothers with his feet.
Though his parents, Barbara and Peter Nielsen moved from Australia to Britain to get him prosthetic arms, Brett immediately rejected them.
And it stayed that way. Now, 50 years later, Roger has tracked down Brett for this follow-up film is about Brett’s life leading up to their reunion.
