Film choice

12 Angry Men (1957, b/w) FILM4, 5.05PM ★★★★★

 Sidney Lumet’s courtroom drama goes behind the closed doors of the jury room as an 18-year-old is put on trial for stabbing his abusive father to death in what seems like an open and shut case. Henry Fonda, as one of the jurors, begs his colleagues to suspend judgment and look closely at the facts. What results is a study in humanity as each of the jurors faces his own prejudices. Lee J Cobb co-stars.

Let Me In (2010) HORROR CHANNEL, 10.45PM ★★★

 Matt Reeves’s remake of the 2008 Swedish vampire hit Let the Right One In, one of the most startling films of the Noughties, is missing the alluring otherness of that original. Relocated to snowy New Mexico and set in 1983, it stars Kodi Smit-mcphee as an outcast who befriends an odd girl (Chloë Grace Moretz). She’s soon unmasked as a vampire; all kinds of dark consequences follow.

The Hand That Rocks the Cradle (1992)

5STAR, 11PM ★★★

 After a doctor kills himself amid a flurry of allegations of molestation, his widow poses as a childminder to wreak sinister revenge on the family of one of the accusers. Rebecca De Mornay is elegantly malicious as the insurgent nanny, who attempts to take the place of the mother of the family. You always know where it’s heading, but it’s an above-average thriller.