Taylor Hackford’s 1980 debut feature The Idolmaker...

Taylor Hackford’s 1980 debut feature The Idolmaker (Channel 5 tonight at 6), inspired by the life of Bob Marcucci, discoverer and promoter of Fabian and others, has some gritty, satirical commentary on the pop music scene of decades past but is hampered by an ending that seems self-dramatizing fantasy made real. Ray Sharkey, however, is impressive in the title role.

Skin Game (Channel 13 tonight at 6) is an unlikely and exceptional 1971 comedy about two con men (James Garner and Louis Gossett Jr.) posing as master and slave in the South, circa 1857. The remarkable script by Pierre Marton manages to be great fun while laying bare the evils of the institution of slavery--especially in the way it conditions both slave and master to regard the slave as something less than human. Susan Clark is the sparkling leading lady.

A 1989 rerun, Perry Mason: The Case of the All-Star Assassin (NBC tonight at 9) finds Mason (Raymond Burr) defending an injured hockey star (Jason Beghe) accused of murdering a sports mogul (Pernell Roberts).

A sleek, slam-bang adventure fantasy, the 1985 Commando (ABC tonight at 9) offers an array of heroic exploits by an avenging American hunk, played in this instance by Arnold Schwarzenegger. He’s a former U.S. strike force leader whose 11-year-old daughter (Alyssa Milano) is kidnaped by a deposed South American dictator. Directed with jolting efficiency by Mark Lester, the film co-stars Rae Dawn Chong.

Although more inspirational than engaging, the 1988 TV movie Winnie (NBC Monday at 9 p.m.) allows Meredith Baxter Birney to break out of her cool suburban image to play a moderately retarded woman who has been institutionalized for over 30 years; based on a true story.

Love and Bullets (Channel 11 Tuesday at 8 p.m.) is an instance of the familiar made diverting through decent writing, talented direction (by Stuart Rosenberg) and solid principal performances by Charles Bronson, Jill Ireland and Rod Steiger, who plays an Arizona-based underworld chieftain. Bronson is a Phoenix cop off to Switzerland for the FBI to bring back Ireland, Steiger’s long-time mistress. The credible, appealing relationship that develops between Bronson and Ireland gives this 1979 film its substance.

Red Sun (Channel 13 Friday at 8 p.m.) wastes a great idea: placing a samurai in the Old West. Hokey and uneven, it has Toshiro Mifune on an ambassadorial mission to President Grant when his train is held up by Charles Bronson and Alain Delon.

Get out your handkerchiefs for the 1988 TV movie Go Toward the Light (CBS Friday at 9 p.m.), a relentlessly effective tear-jerker about an 8-year-old hemophiliac (Joshua Harris) who contracts AIDS. The boy’s parents are played by Linda Hamilton and Richard Thomas, and they couldn’t be better.