Raiders of the Lost Ark (ABC tonight...

Raiders of the Lost Ark (ABC tonight at 8:30) does a flawless, exciting job of capturing the fun of old Saturday matinee serials. Producer George Lucas and director Steven Spielberg (with an assist to Lucas on the script from writer-director Philip Kaufman) have got it just right. They’ve brought a sophisticated, affectionately tongue-in-cheek tone to their virtuoso cliffhangers, lightning pace and a high-adventure plot. Harrison Ford and spunky leading lady Karen Allen couldn’t be better.

The all-time popular The Sound of Music (NBC Monday at 8 p.m.) is back for the holiday season. The 1965 blockbuster, winner of five Oscars and based on the final Rogers and Hammerstein stage musical, stars Julie Andrews in the story of the Trapp Family Singers, who had to flee their home in the Austrian Alps just before the outbreak of World War II.

The Night They Saved Christmas (KTLA Monday at 8 p.m.) is a pleasant 1984 TV movie starring Jaclyn Smith in a fantasy-adventure about a mother and her three children who find themselves on a wondrous journey to the North Pole, where they alone can save Santa Claus (Art Carney, a delight) and his immense toy factory from destruction.

Seldom has a movie looked so good and sounded so dumb as the 1987 The Barbarians (KCOP Tuesday at 8 p.m.), which marked the debut of the Barbarian Brothers, twin bodybuilders David and Peter Paul.

The 1989 TV movie Unconquered (CBS Tuesday at 9 p.m.) is the “fact-based” story of Richmond Flowers Jr. (Dermot Mulroney), a white from Alabama who overcame various physical problems and his senator-father’s backing of black causes to become a high school track star and a football star at the University of Tennessee. Unfortunately, here is a classic case of the black experience filtered through surrogate white eyes.

The Muppets Take Manhattan (KTTV Wednesday at 8 p.m.)--and how! This 1984 delight finds all the Muppet buddies in the Big Apple convinced that Kermit’s college variety show should take Manhattan by storm.

Middle Age Crazy (KTLA Thursday at 8 p.m.), a funny yet compassionate and incisive 1980 comedy that spans three generations, stars Bruce Dern as a contractor for whom turning 40 is a painful milestone. Ann-Margret co-stars.

Although at times uneven, the 1981 Rich and Famous (KTLA Friday at 8 p.m.) is often sparkling, thanks to George Cukor’s direction of Jacqueline Bisset and Candice Bergen as two very different writers who, despite foibles and feuds, manage to sustain a friendship over two decades.

Hang ‘Em High (KCOP Friday at 8 p.m.), a 1968 Western that is as savage as it is well-made, stars Clint Eastwood as a former St. Louis lawman whose unwitting purchase of stolen cattle threatens his life.