Movie Spotlight

Witty and hilarious, the 1994 Princess Caraboo (Showtime Sunday at 11:35 a.m.) is based on a true story: In 1817, a proud, beautiful but dirty-faced young woman (Phoebe Cates) shows up in Bristol. She is in mortal danger from the harsh laws of the time and must rely on the kindness of a well-intentioned aristocrat (Wendy Hughes). The deliciously ambiguous Cates and the film itself keeps us guessing about the authenticity of the princess right up to the climax.

With The Bridges of Madison County (NBC Sunday at 8 p.m.) Clint Eastwood (as director as well as co-star), Meryl Streep, and Richard LaGravenese pooled their resources and turned the novel of the same name into a surprisingly moving 1995 feature. Few books have been shrugged off so casually as Robert James Waller’s slender story, but Eastwood and his colleagues have transformed the material into a highly satisfying film, despite some awkwardness in its framing story.

Thanks to Frank Capra’s wit and imagination, The Strong Man (AMC early Tuesday at 1:30 a.m.), a 1926 silent, is comedian Harry Langdon’s best picture, in which he falls in love with blind girl Priscilla Bonner and is pursued by Gertrude Astor’s hilarious gold-digger.

The 1992 Mr. Saturday Night (TMC Wednesday at 5:05 p.m. and early Thursday at 5:15 a.m.), a look at a half-century in the life and times of battling comic Buddy Young Jr. (Billy Crystal) is as funny a film as Crystal has done. He not only stars in the film but also makes his debut as a director--an instance of overreaching. Crystal shows us the unappealing, egocentric side of Buddy, but his heart isn’t in making the comic a moral monster.

No Greater Love (NBC Friday at 9 p.m.), a 1996 TV movie based on a Danielle Steel novel, stars Kelly Rutherford as a woman whose parents and fiance go down with the Titanic and who must then care for her siblings, mend her broken heart and run the family newspaper business alone. Just what you’d expect of a Steel heroine.

Let It Ride (USA early Friday at 2:30 a.m.) is a very funny 1989 movie, directed by commercials legend Joe Pytka, that got lost in the shuffle. A 1989 Runyonesque 1989 racetrack comedy, it was dumped by Paramount despite its hilarity and a terrific performance by Richard Dreyfuss as a Miamian who just can’t stay away from the horses. With Teri Garr.

Despite a moment of memorable gore, Daryl Duke’s 1978 The Silent Partner (Cinemax early Tuesday at 3:40 a.m.) is a nifty Hitchcockian thriller in which Elliott Gould, Susannah York and Christopher Plummer excel.