Matchbox the Movie to Poor Things: the seven best films to watch on TV this week

In the wake of the pink powerhouse that was Barbie, toy giant Mattel is going all-in on adaptations. Before we get the pleasure of Polly Pocket on screen, the line of tiny toy vehicles is given some dramatic spit and polish in Sam Hargrave’s breezy caper. Amiable muscleman John Cena plays CIA covert agent Sean, who returns to his home town for a funeral and reconnects with four childhood friends known as the Matchbox Gang, including Jessica Biel’s paramedic – and youthful crush – Aimee. Unfortunately, Sean is the fall guy after a nuclear warhead vanishes, so his mates are thrown into his globe-trotting world of spies, close-quarter violence and, naturally, shiny fast cars.
Out now, Apple TV

Animals

Ben Affleck’s knotty kidnap thriller was put on hold in 2024 after it clashed with Spike Lee’s similarly themed Highest 2 Lowest, itself a remake of a Kurosawa classic. It’s finally here, with Affleck casting himself (original pick Matt Damon was stuck on an island in the Med) as an attorney standing for LA mayor and Kerry Washington as his wife. The plot revolves round their son being taken for ransom, as moral and political calculations seriously muddy the waters. Gillian Anderson walks off with her scenes as a cool, collected English fixer called upon to help.
Out now, Netflix

Poor Things

A risk-taking performance from Emma Stone is at the heart of this deeply weird yarn from Yorgos Lanthimos. She plays Bella, a young woman who died but was revived with the brain of her unborn baby by the Frankenstein-esque Godwin (Willem Dafoe). As she learns to walk and talk, she yearns to discover more about life. Lothario Duncan Wedderburn (a hilariously louche Mark Ruffalo) has designs on being her svengali – but Bella has a mind of her own. A delightful, disconcerting comedy adapted from Alasdair Gray’s novel, set in a stunning, not-quite-realistic Victorian era.
Saturday 10 October, 10pm, Channel 4

Red Rooms

In Montreal, Canada, a man goes on trial for the murder of three teenage girls, the torture and killing of whom he had filmed for paying customers on the dark web. Pascal Plante’s increasingly disturbing psychological drama follows the proceedings – and the media frenzy surrounding it – through the eyes of model Kelly-Anne (Juliette Gariépy), who is a regular attendee at court. But why is she there? Is she a groupie of the (clearly guilty) accused? A true-crime obsessive? Or something darker? Gariépy’s enigmatic performance keeps us guessing almost to the end.
Saturday 10 October, 11.20pm, Film4

Killing Anna

“I weaponise myself, my trauma.” Annsar Shahhoud, a Syria-born researcher in genocide studies at the University of Amsterdam, is the focus of Sam Benstead’s remarkable documentary. After being sent videos of massacres by the Assad regime, she set up a fake Facebook account – under the name of Anna Sh – befriended Syrian officials and militia, and got them to admit their role in the mass murders of civilians in Damascus. The toll on Annsar is clear, but so is her will to bring the truth to light.
Monday 12 October, 11.05pm, Channel 4

Masterplan

Settle back and let the estimable Stanley Tucci work his charms on you … just like his gentleman thief, Roger Cavendish, lures his long-lost children – hacker Chiara (The White Lotus’s Simona Tabasco) and explosives expert Jay (Victor Belmondo) – into a preposterous plot to steal the Mona Lisa from the Louvre in Thomas Vincent’s heist comedy. The restored criminal family’s tentative bonding is mere window dressing for the main business of gadgetry, disguises and uncertain motives. Much of this is from the Mission: Impossible playbook, but with Tucci in charge it often sparkles.
Friday 16 October, Prime Video

Moss & Freud

Derek Jacobi has already portrayed, superbly, one titan of post-second world war British art, Francis Bacon (in 1998’s Love Is the Devil). Now, in James Lucas’s fascinating snapshot of the early 2000s, he has a good stab at late-period Lucian Freud. The true story of supermodel Kate Moss (a well cast Ellie Bamber) sitting for a painting by him is a study in similarity and contrast: she’s the hard-partying doyenne of British fashion; he’s the austere old master. But he has his own wild side to reckon with, while she finds a kind of stability through their regular meetings.
Friday 16 October, HBO Max