Look for a real treat on Friday with the immortal classic comedy, Some Like It Hot, named the No. 1 comedy of all time by the American Film Institute. Also, for boomer nostalgia, a few fun old Disney live action movies -- Bedknobs and Broomsticks, Son of Flubber, and The Shaggy DA.

On Saturday, I'm setting the TiVo for The Thin Man, the deliciously witty detective story that sparked a series of sequels and launched Dick William Powell and Myrna Loy as a sparkling screen couple. I'll get my classic 1950s paranoid sci-fi fix with Invasion of the Body Snatchers (The original 1956 version, although I love the 1978 Donald Sutherland version just as well.

And Sunday, two utterly charming and very different love stories - Heaven Can Wait, the 1978 remake of Here Comes Mr. Jordan, with Warren Beatty as an angel; and The Shop Around the Corner, the Ernst Lubitsch comedy with a very young Jimmy Stewart (remade much later as You've Got Mail.)

Enjoy!

Had it with The Nutcracker? So over A Christmas Carol?

Here's somethinga little different for the holdiays. The guys from Rifftrax, formerly of Mystery Science Theater 3000 fame, will be riffing on the deeply weird and wonderful stop-action tradition Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer in a live performance December 16th, broadcast to theaters around the country.

It's another of those live events from the people at Fathom, who have a very interesting business model. They've done other live Rifftrax events, and sports, concerts, operas and classic movie anniversarys showings, like Wizard of Oz.

I hope this is working out for them, because a lot of what they're doing is great fun. (I'll pass on Glenn Beck's Christmas Sweater and opera, though. Each just plain crazy in its own way.)

Oh, I hope I can get to this.

In April, Turner Classic Movies is headed for Hollywood and its first annual classic film festival. They're kicking it off with a newly-restored version of A Star is Born, the 1954 George Cukor version with Judy Garland and James Mason.

They're also screening the newly restored version of Fritz Lang's silent sci-fi masterpiece, Metropolis. This is the version they discovered in Buenos Aires last year, with 30 minutes of footage that hasn't been seen in decades.

Tickets are already on sale -- a touch pricey, but it looks like a great event.

With a ton of Hollywood royalty in attendance, legendary Lauren Bacall has finally received her Oscar - four months before the annual televised Academy Awards program to be sure, but many, many years overdue.

With Alec Baldwin, Tom Hanks, Steven Spielberg, Norman Jewison, Warren Beatty, George Lucas, Quentin Tarantino and many more paying homage, Bacall took home her statuette from the Governor's Award ceremony. B-movie prince Roger Corman, producer John Calley and genius cinematographer Gordon Willis were also honored.

IIn one way, it's too bad. There were probably genuine, emotional moments here that would probably have served the academy better than some of the lame schtick and over-produced musical numbers the show usually comes up with.

Nevertheless, I have high hopes for this year's show. Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin will co-host. The two men who are constantly battling for the title of "Hosted More Saturday Night Live Shows than that Other Guy" award are funny, intelligent, accomplished performers. If they can't make it funny and good, no one can.

Of course, that's what I said about Jon Stewart....

Bacall at the ceremony, by Kevork Djansezian/Getty Images

On Friday, look for Turner Classic Movies to air The Great White Hope, the moving story of the bias that faces a victorious black boxer and his white mistress. Depressing but excellent with James Earl Jones and Jane Alexander.

Saturday, there's a jackpot of good stuff, with Burt Lancaster as a no-account drifter turned faux preacher in Elmer Gantry; the rollicking British film Tom Jones, with Albert Finney and Susannah York (a surprise Best Picture winner in 1963), and A Man for All Seasons, with Paul Scofield's acclaimed performance as Sir Thomas More

TiVo alert for early Sunday (4:45 a.m. Eastern) when They Shoot Horses, Don't They? airs, a gritty look at the dance marathon craze of the Depression era with Jane Fonda. Brighten things up later Sunday with the original Parent Trap, with Hayley Mills playing a dual role in one of her Disney outings; and polish it off with Member of the Wedding, a fine adapation of the Carson McCullers novel.

Okay, this is just bizarre.

A perfume company called Antiquity is engineering scents based (allegedly) on DNA drawn from celebrities, including Marilyn Monroe, Katharine Hepburn, Joan Crawford, Elvis and Albert Einstein.

Of course, the formula by which they do this is a trade secret; why anyone would want such a thing is a mystery.

It's just another odd outgrowth of the American obsession with superstars that goes far beyond their actual contributions to art (or science.)

Besides, we all know what Marilyn smelled like. Asked what she wore to bed, she famously replied: "Five drops of Chanel No.5."

By George Marks for Getty Images' Retrofile

Listen, my children:

Once, there was a golden time in the infancy of television, when there were just three channels. And even though there was a lot of dreck on the air even back then, occasionally a great piece of art would find its way onto the airwaves - TV programs as good as some of the best classic movies. Millions of Americans saw them together, and together were moved.

Okay, those days are gone, but Criterion is putting out a collection of some of those legendary teleplays, with terrific writers, superb casts and great direction. Rod Steiger in Paddy Chaefsky's Marty, Andy Griffith in No Time for Sergeants, Rod Serling's groundbreaking Patterns, Mickey Rooney as the utterly despicable Comedian, and more.

The old kinoscopes don't have the fidelity of film, but I'm sure the wizards at Criterion have made them as crisp and clean as possible.

TV has been good since, but never better.

DVD cover for 'Requiem for a Heavyweight,' also in the collection

Actually, you might want to start early. Tonight - Thursday - Turner Classic Movies has some good stuff with its featured star of the month, Grace Kelly, including Dial M for Murder, and my personal favorite of the Grace Kelly-Alfred Hitchcock collaborations, Rear Window, in which she stars with James Stewart.

Early Friday morning, you can catch Princess Grace in the delightful caper film To Catch a Thief, this time paired with Cary Grant. In the evening, catch a nice Katharine Hepburn-Spencer Tracy pairing, Woman of the Year.

On Saturday, you can't beat James Cagney's immortal gangster flick, White Heat. Also Saturday, TCM reprises its special '1939 - Hollywood's Greatest Year,' an original documentary about that magical year for classic movies, 1939.

Sunday is somehwat uninspired, but Mogambo, a steamy love triangle with Clark Gable isn't too bad.

Enjoy!

The Criterion Collection is putting out one of its gorgeous editions of my favorite movie about angels. (No, it's not It's a Wonderful Life although that's terrific too.)

It's German director Wim Wenders' pensive, brooding, elegaic Wings of Desire, a poem of a movie that tells the story of an angel come to earth in Berlin, who falls in love with a beautiful circus performer.

Bruno Ganz is heartbreaking as the angel, and Peter Falk puts in a surprising, gentle turn as himself. To say any more would ruin this slow-moving, visually enchanting film for the first-time viewer. I never saw the American remake, City of Angels, with Nicholas Cage and Meg Ryan, so I don't know how they compare. But I can recommend the German film with all my heart.

I'll always connect The Wizard of Oz with Thanksgiving. When I was growing up, one of the networks always ran the classic movie at Thanksgiving time. (That was back when there were just three networks, children.)

I always wanted to see it on the big screen, and for those who haven't had the pleasure, another opportunity is coming up from the folks at Fathom. On November 17th, a live, high-def simulcast of the movie will be shown in theaters around the nation - along with a taped intro from Turner Classic Movies's Robert Osborne, as well as a documentary about the making of the movie.

It's in honor of the 70th anniversary of the film, one of the magical Hollywood films of 1939, and, in my humble opinion, one every movie buff will want in an essential classic movie library.

ELO's Oz-inspired 'ruby slippers' album cover