Four-Star Films : ‘Oliver!’

In 1968 producer John Woolf and director Carol Reed brought Dickensian England to life on a vast and remarkable scale in the adaptation of the Lionel Bart musical version of “Oliver Twist.” No small part of its charm is that the snakes in the grass have all the best lines. Having stolen everything else in sight, the well-known Anglo-Saxon villain, Fagin, and his pint-sized sidekick, the Artful Dodger, also steal the picture. As Fagin, Ron Moody is a wry, sly pleasure to watch in one of the great entertaining performances; as the Dodger, Jack Wild is a beguiling lad in the best tradition of Peck’s Bad Boy. Even so, Mark Lester’s (pictured) Oliver Twist is a picture of cherubic and attractive innocence, exuding likability with every quavering line, and the subsidiary casting seem uniformly first-rate (TMC Wednesday at 8:10 a.m.).

Other four-star films airing this week:

A Hard Day’s Night / AMC, Sunday, 9 a.m. and 6:15 p.m.

Battleship Potemkin / TMC, early Tuesday, 6:30 a.m.

The Gold Rush / AMC, early Wednesday, 3:05 a.m.

A Streetcar Named Desire / AMC, Thursday, 8 a.m.

The Bicycle Thief / TMC, Thursday, 7:25 p.m.

All About Eve / AMC, Saturday, 2 and 10:30 p.m.