A week on the box: August 31 - September 6

BY JAMES CROOT

Tuesday, August 31

Grand Slam Tennis: US Open
From 3am, Sky Sport 2
New York's Billie Jean King National Tennis Center hosts the final grand slam of the year. With Juan Del Potro unable to defend his men's title this year due to a wrist injury, could this be the year that Andy Murray makes the breakthrough or will Nadal and Federer continue their domination. On the women's side, Kim Clijsters defence has been made much easier with the withdrawal of Justine Henin and Serena Williams. Daily coverage until September 13.

FIH 12th Women's World Cup: Germany v New Zealand
8am, Sky Sport 1
The Black Sticks hit off their campaign at the 12-team tournament in Rosario, Argentina with a match against the vastly experienced German side. The New Zealand hockey team's other group opponents include the Netherlands (Thursday), Japan (Saturday), Australia (Monday) and India (September 8) with the top two qualifying for the semi-finals.

Summer Hours
8.30pm, Rialto

Writer-director Olivier Assayas' 2008 film is something of a curio. Extensive use of hand-held cameras and naturalistic lighting enhances this intelligent and at times compelling family drama. It certainly helps that the acting is top notch with a blonde barneted Juliet Binoche the standout. But slightly undercutting the drama is a persistent message that French art should remain in France and that gifting art to a museum is a great way of avoiding estate tax.

Make Me Smart
9.35pm, Prime
2009 BBC documentary which has the medically trained Michael Mosley aiming to find a way to increase his IQ by the 12 points he needs to secure his place in Mensa. As well as meeting contestants in the UK Memory Championships, he also travels to America to visit institutes which use training, diet and exercise to nurture intelligence in babies.

Wednesday, September 1

Step Up 2: The Streets
8.30pm, C4

Treading a sequel storyline as old as The Next Karate Kid, the male hero of Step Up is replaced by a member of the other gender for this 2008 sequel. The script also keeps to the cookie-cutter formula of kid from troubled background finds redemption, loses their old mates and takes part in the life-defining competition, repackaged in various forms in everything from Stomp the Yard and Stick It to You Got Served and Save the Last Dance.

Survivorman
8.30pm, Discovery
New series of Canadian survival expert Les Stroud's adventures. His idea of a nature outing is a little different, taking off alone for seven days and heading to a punishing corner in the back of beyond with nothing but some camera gear to document his experiences. This season he tests his self-reliance and survival skills in places like America's Sierra Nevada mountains, the Colorado Rockies, the northern tip of Baffin Island and the Australian Outback.

Rock Royalty: The Who: Who's Next
9.30pm, Documentary
1999 documentary that focuses on the songs and story behind The Who's classic 1971 album Who's Next. On its original release, it climbed to the Top 5 on the Billboard chart and remained in the Top 40 for five months. As well as featuring interviews with group members Peter Townshend, Roger Daltrey and John Entwistle, it also has previously unseen performances of some of the hits like Baby O'Riley and Behind Blue Eyes.

Moon TV USA
10.30pm, TV2
Leigh Hart's now long-running sketch-based comedy has shifted locale to the Big Apple for this latest series. As well as regulars - Speed Cooking, Speedo Cop and the Hamster Man, it will also show behind the scenes of a new New York-based Kiwi breakfast show - The Late Night Big Breakfast.

Thursday, September 2

The X Factor Australia
7.30pm, TV3
The UK's popular reality show format comes to Australia. Judges and mentors, Kyle Sandilands, Natalie Imbruglia, Guy Sebastian, and Ronan Keating, hit the road across Australia for a massive audition tour to find contestants (singers of all ages) who might have the X Factor. Also screens on Fridays at 8.30pm.

Hustle
8.30pm, UKTV
New Zealand debut of the sixth series of this popular British show. When Mickey (Adrian Lester) meets a beautiful, clever young woman, it all seems to be too good to be true. And it is. Lucy Britford (Indira Varma) is a, highly attractive, detective inspector, set on getting somewhere in life - the only trouble is that achieving her ambitions rather unfortunately involves catching Mickey and making him answer to all of his past misdemeanours.

QI
9.35pm, Prime
Former Doctor Who David Tennant, joins comedians Bill Bailey and Lee Mack and regular guest Alan Davies for tonight's "Groovy" Christmas Special episode. Discussions include whether Robert Burns wrote Auld Lang Syne and any connections between the songs Puff the Magic Dragon and Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds.

The Best of the Billy T's
10pm, TV3
Brendhan Lovegrove, Cori Gonzalez-Macuer and Dai Henwood are amongst the line-up for this half-hour celebration of the past winners of New Zealand's most prestigious comedy award, the Billy T, given each year to the comedian with the most outstanding potential. Ben Hurly hosts.

Friday, September 3

Spider-Man 2
6pm, Cartoon Network

Right from the graphic-novel-style opening credits reminding us what happened in Part 1, director Sam Raimi (Evil Dead, A Simple Plan) perfectly captures the mood of the Marvel-lous world of Spidey in this superior 2004 sequel. Like Tim Burton's second stab at Batman, Raimi displays more confidence in his surroundings and serves up a super supreme slice of blockbuster action.

The Unsung Heroes of Maori Music
8pm, Maori TV
Maori musicians who have slipped under the mainstream media radar are profiled in this new 13-part series, which tracks their contribution to Aotearoa music. Tonight's episode follows the evolution of Ratana music from the Te Reo Brass Band to the Remnant Set. Those showcased later in the series include Tai and Rim D Paul and Mary and the Maori Hi Five.

The Net
8.30pm, Vibe

Sandra Bullock stars in this 1995 political thriller that now seems both laughable and prescient. She plays Angela Bennett, a freelance computer analyst who finds a top secret computer program (on a floppy disk) and then finds her life completely erased. How many Facebook users wish it were that easy?

Food Poker
10pm, Food TV
BBC cooking show which pits four chefs against one another in a game of cards. Every card in the deck features an ingredient. Once the hands are dealt, the chefs then assess their ingredients and decide whether to pitch a dish to the Food Poker Panel or fold. The panel then chooses the two best pitches to go forward to a cook-off.

Saturday, September 4

Oz and James Drink to Britain
7pm, Prime
World famous wine connoisseur, Oz Clark, and Top Gear's James May are back to embark on a heroic quest to discover the drink, or drinks, that define Great Britain. Travelling in style in a Rolls Royce Corniche, with a caravan in tow, the pair tackle their subject with great passion during the eight episodes of this 2009 BBC series.

Top Chef
7.30pm, TV3
After more than a month's absence, the popular reality cooking series returns, having been downgraded to Saturday nights. On tonight's episode the chefs must create a dish featuring Maryland blue crab before working as a team to create a family-style farm lunch. Dishes include hot and sour curried eggplant with peppers and carrot tops and roasted turnips and asparagus with honey.

On Thin Ice
8.30pm, Discovery
Five-part 2009 BBC documentary series which has double Olympic gold medalist James Cracknell and presenter Ben Fogle competing in a race to the South Pole. The challenge they face is immense: a 500 mile cross-country ski, on the world's windiest, coldest, highest  and driest continent, winds of almost 100mph, constant daylight, temperatures as low as minus 50 degrees and a steadily increasing altitude up to the equivalent of 4000m.

Easy Virtue
8.30pm, Rialto

Writer-director Stephan Elliott's (Priscilla: Queen of the Desert) 2009 raucous, radiant and slightly raunchy take on Noel Coward's 1924 play. Reminiscent in style to Stephen Fry's Bright Young Things and substance of Mike Barker's A Good Woman, Easy's virtues come from some clever camerawork (particularly the use of reflection), classy casting and a series of classic comedic moments.  Jessica Biel, Kristin Scott Thomas and Colin Firth star.

Sunday, September 5

Top Gear
7.35pm, Prime
On tonight's series finale, our trio buy old British roadsters to take on a wistful journey through the remnants of the country's sports car industry. Meanwhile, Jeremy tests the sensational, new Ferrari 458 Italian and laid back Hollywood legend Jeff Goldblum is the star in the new reasonably priced car.

Dead Ringers
8.30pm, Rialto 

Chilling 1988 psychological horror film from the deranged mind of Canadian director David Cronenberg.  Loosely based on the lives of Stewart and Cyril Marcus, it has a suitably creepy Jeremy Irons playing identical twin gynaecologists. "Not unlike watching a critical operation - unnerving but also enthralling," wrote the Washington Post's Desson Thomson.

Scarface
8.30pm, C4

Much-loved 1983 drama about a Cuban emigre who turns to life of crime and builds a successful Miami drug empire. Al Pacino chews the scenery, while a young Michelle Pfeiffer co-stars. "Despite its moralistic conclusion, the film has since become de rigueur viewing for crack barons, who know a good shoot-em-up when they see one," wrote Empire magazine's Andy Gill.

The Grudge
10.20pm, TV2 

Sarah Michelle Gellar stars in director Takashi Shimizu's own 2004 remake of his popular Japanese horror. As the Seattle Post-Intelligencer's Sean Axmaker put it, "there is no 'why' in The Grudge, at least not an explanation that provides comfort or cure. It simply is. That's what makes it really scary".

Monday, September 6

International Cricket: England v Pakistan
1.30am, Sky Sport 3
Incredibly England's first Twenty20 outing since they won the world title in mid-May, this match in Cardiff is the first of two games against the unpredictable Pakistanis, who won the previous tournament in 2009. It has just been confirmed that Pakistan will play the Black Caps in three Twenty20 matches in New Zealand this summer.

IRB Women's World Cup Final 
4.05am, Rugby Channel
All going to script the Black Ferns should be out to make it four titles in a row this morning with their likely opponents, hosts and 2006 beaten finalists England. Both teams were in blistering form in the early stages of the tournament. Preceded by the 3rd Place final which kicks off at 2am, but why this isn't on a Sky Sport channel is anyone's guess.

Rick Stein's Far Eastern Odyssey
7.30pm, Prime
On tonight's episode, Rick visits Sri Lanka, where he discovers a wealth of hot and spicy vegetable curries. On the menu is an unforgettable chilli crab, buffalo curd, roast pork and cashew nut curry, before he heads over to the island of Bali and a feast of fresh barbecued fish on a beach.

Helicopter Heroes
8.30pm, Documentary
BBC reality series, presented by Top Gear's Richard Hammond, which focuses on the Yorkshire Air Ambulance. They were the team who rescued him from a wrecked jet car and saved his life by flying him to intensive care in just 15 minutes. As well as Hammond's own brush with death, the series also follows injured bikes, collapsed hill runners and downed hang glider pilots.

 

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