SATURDAY 18 JULY 2009

SAT 19:00 Only Connect (b00lpk02)
Series 2

Cambridge Quiz Society v Oxford Librarians

Quiz show presented by Victoria Coren in which knowledge will only take players so far, as patience and lateral thinking are also vital.

A team of three lads from the Cambridge Quiz Society pit their wits against a trio of Oxford Librarians with specialisms as diverse as Comparative Slavonic Linguistics, Classics and Theology.

They compete to draw together the connections between things which, at first glance, seem utterly random, from Goldeneye to The Kilns to Hill Top to Haworth Parsonage.


SAT 19:30 Apollo Wives (b00lkvtt)
Ten extraordinary women, all in their seventies, come to Arizona for a special reunion. They are each different but have one thing in common - each was married to an Apollo astronaut. These women were right at the heart of the most ambitious journey ever made, as America shot for the moon.

In exclusive interviews, they tell how it felt to watch their husband blast off into space and about the death, danger and divorce as many of their men struggled to come back to Earth.


SAT 20:30 Liz Smith's Summer Cruise (b00lpjw6)
Award-winning 87-year-old actress Liz Smith does the one thing she has never managed to achieve in her life - go on a proper holiday.

Liz, known and loved by millions as Nana in The Royle Family and Leticia in The Vicar of Dibley, finally fulfils her modest ambition to join a group of like-minded individuals on a summer cruise across the Adriatic to Venice.

The film gives an intimate and personal insight into Liz's life, both past and present, from the moment she plans her holiday, packs her bags and bids farewell to her friends in the security of her sheltered accommodation.

Was the holiday everything she dreamed of?


SAT 21:30 How to Be a Composer (b00lsylj)
Episode 1

Journalist, critic and self-confessed music addict Paul Morley embarks on a year-long pursuit to the heart of his obsession.

Morley begins a year of intense lessons and tutoring from one the most prestigious music schools in the world, the Royal Academy of Music in London, where he joins the composition department as an undergraduate student.

This is the first time Morley has been back in education since the age of 16, and it is by no means an easy year as he feels his way through his first lessons on rhythm and notation before finally composing his own music for an ensemble of young virtuoso musicians.


SAT 22:30 Mendelssohn, the Nazis and Me (b00l7rg2)
Felix Mendelssohn was a passionate Christian. He was also born a Jew. This film, marking the 200th anniversary of his birth, tells the extraordinary story of what happened, generations later, both to Mendelssohn's family and to his music, when the Nazis remembered the Jewish roots of Germany's most celebrated composer.

It also examines how the influences of both Judaism and Christianity affected Mendelssohn's music and was made by documentary-maker Sheila Hayman, Mendelssohn's great-great-great-great niece.


SAT 23:30 The Grandparent Diaries (b00lpk38)
The Littles

Molly Little is a typical 15-year-old - pushing boundaries, battles at home as she rallies for later curfews, shorter hem lines and more phone credit. But her living situation is not, as she and her 10- year-old brother Mitch are brought up by their grandparents in Kent.

Val and Ron have been looking after these two of their seven grandchildren for eight years after their mother Tammy died unexpectedly in 2001 and their father left the family. They are among the 200,000 grandparents in this country bringing up their grandchildren, numbers which are rising.

Tammy was murdered at her home in Cornwall by her estranged partner - the children's father, a paranoid schizophrenic. The children were in the house at the time and Molly was the person who pressed the panic button which brought the police to the house.

Mitch has grown up with his grandparents as surrogate parents, but for Molly, who already had a very close bond with and strong memories of her mother, it has been harder to adjust.

The desire to keep absolute normality for the children has been paramount since Tammy died. Living with the generation gap is not easy, as well their own private struggles to deal with the loss of a mother and a daughter. But clinging to the normal routine of every day life has helped get them through.

Through family archive, actuality, interview and the children's video diary, the film builds up an intimate picture of the family, past and present. It explores how far the love of these two doting (and grieving) grandparents has gone to repair a family coping with a tragic loss. Through the laughter, routines and arguments of daily life, we observe to what degree grandparental love can and cannot fill the breach of a lost member of the middle generation.


SAT 00:30 How to Be a Composer (b00lsylj)
[Repeat of broadcast at 21:30 today]


SAT 01:30 Apollo Wives (b00lkvtt)
[Repeat of broadcast at 19:30 today]


SAT 02:30 Only Connect (b00lpk02)
[Repeat of broadcast at 19:00 today]


SAT 03:00 How to Be a Composer (b00lsylj)
[Repeat of broadcast at 21:30 today]