Festive Film Line-Up

There are just 29 days 'till Christmas, which as everyone knows is the season for making merry, stuffing yourself silly and moulding the sofa to the shape of your body as you settle down for a marathon movie-viewing session. Today the BBC entered the fight to secure your festive attention with a first look at its Christmas schedules. A quick glance at the goodies on offer reveals that tabloid reports that the season would include the terrestrial premiere of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone are unfounded. What the BBC can offer you instead are the terrestrial premieres of such films as Mulan, Galaxy Quest, Meet the Parents, Iris, High Fidelity and Belleville Rendezvous. What caught Empire Online's attention was the BBC's digital offering of singalonga versions of The Sound of Music and The Wizard of Oz. Digital viewers will be able to croon along to the showtunes by pressing the red button on their handset which will bring up subtitled lyrics on screen. All together now, "The hills are aliiiive..." Elsewhere on the Beeb you'll be able to catch the film world's finest in a smattering of other televisual offering. Hugh Laurie and Jim Broadbent will star in the kiddie feature The Young Visiters (sic) while luvvy extraordinaire Richard E Grant will be turning up for the Eastenders Christmas Party (we kid you not). Channel 4, as you'd expect, is also doing its best to provide viewers with cinematic treats over the holiday season. Highlights for them include the premiere of Jim Henson's Creature Shop production of Jack and the Giant Beanstalk which stars Matthew Modine, Vanessa Redgrave, Mia Sara, Jon Voight, Honor Blackman and Richard Attenborough. There will also be a feast for animation lovers in the form of an Oscar Wilde's trilogy produced in association with the Irish Film Board, featuring vocal talents from Pete Postlethwaite, Brendan Gleeson, Anna Chancellor, Jim Carter and Fiona Allen. Other Channel 4 films worth watching are the network premieres of Amelie and Buena Vista Social Club, and a whole heap of musical features being broadcast to tie-in with the channel's 100 Greatest Musicals theme - among them Singin' In The Rain, West Side Story and Showboat. And if all that hasn't worn out your retinas, you can also catch Snow Graham Norton which comes this year direct from Tinseltown. Empire Online will be providing you with our annual guide to the season's viewing once all the TV schedules are released next week