Saturday

Monsoon, BBC Two, 10pm

Cambodian-born writer-director Hong Khaou elegantly builds on themes from his acclaimed debut feature Lilting with a tender, contemplative drama about a dutiful son's return to Ho Chi Minh City more than 30 years after he fled during the Vietnam War. Kit (Henry Golding) left the country of his birth at the age of six during the conflict. He has few memories of his formative years and intends to scout potential locations to scatter the ashes of his late mother. During the first leg of the trip, Kit meets American singleton Lewis (Parker Sawyers), whose father fought in the war. The two men spark a passionate dalliance until Kit moves onto Hanoi. As he quietly makes his way through Vietnam, Kit rediscovers his cultural roots and acknowledges where his heart belongs.

Sunday

Balloon, BBC Four, 10pm

In this 2018 film director Michael Bully Herbig dramatises the incredible true story of two families from the German Democratic Republic, who escaped to West Germany in September 1979 in a home-made hot air balloon. East Germans face jail for attempting to flee their communist homeland. The brave few must run a gauntlet of landmines, barbed wire and bullets. Bricklayer Gunter Wetzel (David Kross) and his electrician friend Peter Strelzyk (Friedrich Mucke) hatch a daring scheme with their respective wives Doris (Karoline Schuch) and Petra (Alicia von Rittberg). It takes 18 months for the Wetzels and Strelzyks to realise their outlandish vision, including two failed attempts. Finally, the time comes for the two families and their four children to soar into the night-time sky.

Monday

The Bourne Ultimatum, ITV4, 9pm

The third instalment of the gripping thriller series is a corker. Matt Damon reprises his role as lethal assassin Jason Bourne, and this time, a meeting with a journalist awakens the former hitman's memories. Once again, he embarks on a deadly game of cat-and-mouse as he attempts to uncover who he really is, why he became embroiled in Project Treadstone and why the people who employed him now want him dead. Many 'threequels' are mere rehashes of old successes, but this surpassed all expectations. Damon is breath-taking in the leading role, and Paul Greengrass directs with aplomb. Julia Stiles offers strong support to Damon's maverick agent and David Strathairn is mesmerising.

Tuesday

Enemy Of The State, ITV4, 11.45pm

Lawyer Robert Clayton Dean (Will Smith) bumps into an old friend while out shopping but, unknown to him, said friend slips a disc containing footage of a politically motivated crime into his bag. It's not long before every government agent in the district is charged with locating our hero and retrieving the disc at any cost. With technology like satellite tracking at their disposal, the agents always seem to be one step ahead. Can Dean evade the officials long enough to expose the truth? This twisting conspiracy thriller is smartly scripted and well-paced, and boasts an impressive supporting performance from Gene Hackman which harks back to his role in Francis Ford Coppola’s 1974 classic, The Conversation.

Wednesday

Mistress America, Channel 4, 12.35am

This likeable New York-set comedy from 2015 is directed by Noah Baumbach, who has made a name (and a niche) for himself turning out dialogue-heavy films which concentrate on the lives and loves of urbane, well-heeled American Millennials. Greta Gerwig, patron saint of urbane, well-heeled American Millennials, is Baumbach’s partner and she acted in and/or co-wrote most of his early films before branching out on her own as a director with Lady Bird and the acclaimed Little Women. This, then, is their last film as co-collaborators and as well as scripting and co-producing Gerwig stars alongside Lola Kirke. Kirke, by the way, is the daughter of Bad Company drummer Simon Kirke and the younger sister of Jemima Kirke, who starred in Lena Dunham’s zeitgeisty Girls, a TV series about urbane, well-heeled New York Millennials. There’s also a bit part for another scion of British rock royalty in the form of Mickey Sumner, daughter of Sting. Social realism on the gritty streets of New York Mistress America is not.

It is very funny, however, thanks largely to the razor-sharp script, Kirke’s engaging performance and to that ineffable something which powers any film in which Gerwig appears – a mixture of her cool-but-goofy demeanour (think Miranda Hart-meets-Diane Keaton in Annie Hall) and a bustling energy that fills every scene. She has charm and she has smarts and it makes for a very watchable combination.

Kirke plays Tracy Fishko. An aspiring writer and a fresher at women-only Barnard College in New York, her divorced mother Stevie (Kathryn Erbe) is soon to re-marry with the nuptials planned for Thanksgiving, a few months away. Tracy’s soon-to-be-step-father has a daughter of his own, Brooke Cardinas, who also happens to live in New York where she (variously) takes step classes, sings with a band and plans to open a restaurant with her boyfriend. Tracy and Brooke have never met so ahead of becoming official step-sisters when the knot is tied, Stevie asks Tracy to look up Brooke and say hello. Ice broken, Tracy finds herself swept along in Brooke’s slipstream and is inspired to write a short story featuring a character based on her. One thing leads to another, though the Thanksgiving dinner the women thought they had planned turns out very differently indeed. Breathless fun from start to fast-talking finish.

Thursday

High Society, BBC Four, 8pm

A playboy jazz musician (Bing Crosby) tries to win back his socialite ex-wife (Grace Kelly) on the eve of her wedding to another man. To make the situation even more complicated, a cynical reporter (Frank Sinatra) and photographer (Celeste Holm) are attending the ceremony in search of a scoop. This musical is based on the play The Philadelphia Story and the subsequent 1940 film version, and some movie buffs may decide they still prefer the less tuneful original – after all, the starring trio of Katharine Hepburn, Cary Grant and an Oscar-winning James Stewart is pretty hard to beat. But this film does boast some terrific songs from Cole Porter, including True Love and Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?, not to mention a chance to hear Crosby and Sinatra duetting on Well, Did You Evah? The opening scene isn’t too shoddy either: Louis Armstrong singing the title track in the back of a bus on their way to the nuptials.

Friday

Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery, 5STAR, 11.25pm

When 1960s spy Austin Powers (Mike Myers) discovers that his nemesis Dr Evil (Myers again) has cryogenically frozen himself, the agent volunteers to undergo the same process in case the villain comes back in the future. However, when he's thawed out 30 years later, Austin discovers that battling the supervillain isn't his only challenge – he must also adjust to the politically correct 1990s. Uh-oh. The sequels to this 1997 debut offered diminishing returns – Austin Powers In Goldmember, anyone? – but the original spoof became a huge word-of-mouth hit on video after an unremarkable performance at the box office and it’s still a lot of fun. If all you remember are the catchphrases, it may surprise you just how many great gags this comedy really has, and director Jay Roach went on to make Meet The Parents and Meet The Fockers and, more recently, Bombshell.

And one to stream …

Color Out Of Space, Amazon Prime

Adapted from HP Lovecraft’s short story of the same name, and not to be confused with Lovecraft-themed Sky Atlantic series Lovecraft Country, Color Out Of Space stars Nicolas Cage as Nathan Gardner, a refugee from the big city who has relocated with his family to his father’s old farm near Arkham in Massachusetts. Aficionados will recognise the name: Arkham was to the storied Lovecraft what Derry is to Stephen King, a fictitious town around which to weave stories of horror, weirdness and unease.

As well as caring for his wife Theresa (Joely Richardson), who is recovering from a mastectomy, Nathan is raising three children and a flock of alpacas. He feeds them fennel to improve the flavour of the milk. The children – teenagers Lavinia (Madeleine Arthur) and Benny (Brendan Meyer), plus seven-year-old Jack (Julian Hilliard) – make do with his rather erratic cooking.

Lavinia fancies herself a Wiccan and the film opens with her performing a pagan ritual by the riverbank in order to pray for her mother’s return to health. Watching on is young Ward Phillips (Elliot Knight), a hydrologist sent to survey the land near the Gardner’s home. The pair become friends and through Benny and Lavinia Ward meets Ezra, a hut-dwelling stoner hippy drop-out (Tommy Chong of Cheech & Chong fame, hardly playing against type).

After that the stage is set for something strange to happen. It duly occurs when what appears to be a meteor lands on the Gardners’ front lawn with an explosion and a flash of purple light. It pulses with heat and gives off a disgusting smell. The local policeman comes for a peek and brings the mayor with him, but by the time the press turn up the meteor has melted away and Nathan, interviewed by a sceptical reporter, comes over as an alpaca-rearing crank.

From there director Richard Stanley ramps up the unease bit by bit, as Ward discovers something unusual in the water course, Theresa is taken to hospital by Nathan suffering from a self-inflicted wound, Lavinia begins to have visions and Jack sits outside, enthralled by new friends only he can see. It’s all typically Lovecraftian, deftly handled by Stanley.