Source:
https://scmp.com/article/38224/delightful-light-entertainment

Delightful light entertainment

THE movie menu is refreshingly varied tonight, with a choice of a harrowing Vietnam atrocity story in Casualties of War, undemanding fun with Bill Murray and Dan Aykroyd in Ghostbusters, and - best of all - Francois Truffaut's endearing Hitchcockian mystery Vivement Dimanche! (aka Finally Sunday! and Confidentially Yours).

SHOT in atmospheric black and white, Vivement Dimanche (11.45pm, Original Running Time 111 mins) is based on American Charles Williams' novel The Long Saturday Night, but set in the south of France. Jean-Louis Trintignant (A Man and a Woman) plays an estate agent wanted for murder who goes into hiding while his long-suffering secretary (Fanny Ardant of The Woman Next Door) sets out to find the real killer.

Deft mix of sentiment and dark humour, even as the corpses are piling up, makes for delightful light entertainment.

IT'S not often that Brian de Palma, director of movies like Scarface and Body Double, ventures into areas of moral debate, and if the worthy, but ultimately boring Casualties of War (World 9.30pm, ORT 113 mins) is anything to go by, it's a good job.

Based on a real incident, the film focuses on a American patrol in Vietnam and it's animalistic treatment of a kidnapped Vietnamese girl. Sean Penn is typecast as the nasty Sgt Meserve, whose idea it is to take the girl along to service the men, and so is Michael J. Fox playing the one nice guy.

And that's the film's main problem, the characters are too black and white, the moral debate too neatly resolved. There are occasions when it comes to life - witness Lt Reilly (Ving Rames) talking about what justice means to a black man from America's deep south - but the desperately corny ending is ludicrous.

FLAKY comedy Ghostbusters (Pearl 9.30pm, ORT 107 mins) must have been on TV at least a kazillion times before, so thank goodness it's such an immensely likeable comedy.

Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis wrote the script in which they and Bill Murray play three researchers who are booted out of their university sinecures and go into business as ''paranormal investigators''.

Sigourney Weaver is a musician who needs her ghosts busted, and Rick Moranis is her nerdy neighbour, who's about to have greatness thrust upon him.

It's an admirable mix of Saturday Night Live humour and crowd-pleasing special effects.

HONGKONG current affairs magazine Inside Story (World 8.30pm) speaks to Commander of British Forces Major-General John Foley, who'll reveal the latest developments in the Sino-British talks on transfer of the military sites.

Later, Joanne Gilhooly risks all by hitching a ride with some of Hongkong's illegal road-racers, and asks them if the new motor racing circuit being constructed over the border will encourage them to turn to legal competition.

AFTER four decades of animosity, South Korea and China established diplomatic ties last August, paving the way for greater economic co-operation. The China Business Report (Pearl 7.20pm) goes to Seoul to look into the economic benefits both countries expect from the pact. Host Lorraine Hahn also visits the industrial hub of northeastern China and the city of Shenyang, where much Korean interest is focused.

YOUNGER viewers should tune into East of the Moon (STAR Plus 10.30am) a new, award-winning series based on the best-selling children's book Terry Jones Fairy Tales. It's a colourful, and musical, venture into the world of witches, dragons, goblins and giants.