Today's TV highlights

11.30AM, TV3
PACIFIC BEAT STREET
The Pasifika fashion, music, sport and culture show has a new recruit in 23-year-old Beatrice Martens, who is a self confessed sports nut. She joins regulars Koryn, Sam and Henry to look at the latest issues affecting young Polynesian New Zealanders.

7PM, TV ONE
COUNTRY CALENDAR
When South Canterbury farmer David Musgrave's 2-year-old son Oliver developed allergies and eczema, nothing would cure him. That's not good when you're a farmer's son - who's going to help with haymaking? In desperation, the family tried flaxseed oil. Not only was Oliver cured, but it sparked a new business opportunity.

9.50PM, TV ONE
NZ FESTIVAL: LEO'S PRIDE
As a singing teacher, Dame Sister Mary Leo had a fierce reputation - she expected total commitment from her opera stars in the making and gave nothing less in return. It was this passion that helped her turn out some of the world's finest sopranos, such as Dames Malvina Major and Kiri Te Kanawa.

Dame Sister Mary Leo's musical talent was evident at an early age and, after being educated by the Sisters of Mercy, she took up teaching music.

In assessing whether a student had what it took to become a singer, she would examine their mouth to see if it had the right shape to produce a great opera singer.

Dame Sister Mary Leo joined the Sisters of Mercy at age 28 and taught at St Mary's College. The college began giving private tuition in the 1930s, so, as well as fulfilling her work as a nun tending to the sick and needy, Dame Sister Mary Leo's great career as a vocal coach began and she helped to launch New Zealand singers on to the world stage. Throughout, she remained devoted to her life as a nun and died in her 90s in 1989.

This documentary has been scored by New Zealand composer Gareth Farr, and Joy Cowley has written the libretto and script.

There are also interviews with many of Dame Sister Mary Leo's well-known pupils.

Dame Malvina, in a recent interview, described how, as a 17-year-old, she came under the tutelage of Sister Mary and before they started the weekly lesson they would talk in a friendly manner to clear her head.

But once the lesson started, "She was a tyrant."

- Graham Hepburn


MOVIES
(rated out of five stars)

8.30PM, TV2
SIGNS
* * *
More things going bump in the night from director M. Night Shyamalan (The Sixth Sense, The Village, Unbreakable). Mel Gibson plays a former priest who quit the clergy for a farming life with his brother (Joaquin Phoenix) and two children and whose paddocks come down with a dose of crop circles. More an exploration of faith in the unseen rather than a watertight sci-fi flick, but it does come through with some bug-eyed-monster action along the way. (2002)

8.30PM, TV3
CAPTAIN CORELLI'S MANDOLIN
* *
Scenic but tepid wartime romance from Louis De Bernieres' novel, with Nicolas Cage as the string-plucking Italian officer stationed on an idyllic Greek island courting the local doctor's daughter, Penelope Cruz. (2001)

8.30PM, SKY MOVIES 1
BIRTH
* * * *
Intense psychological thriller, with Nicole Kidman playing a widowed New Yorker whose second wedding plans are upset when a boy appears claiming to be the reincarnation of her late husband. She becomes convinced that he is telling the truth. Beautiful cinematography. (2004)

8.30PM, RIALTO SKY DIGITAL
STRANGER THAN PARADISE
* * *
Early film from deadpan director Jim Jarmusch about a New York hipster (John Lurie) encountering his 16-year-old Hungarian cousin. Initially, they find it hard to get on, but grow closer on a road trip. Strangely beautiful, with some great comic moments. (1984)

11.05PM, TV3
BLESS THE CHILD
Kind of The Omen-lite, as a 6-year old girl with special powers is abducted by the forces of evil, with aunty Kim Basinger to the rescue. (2000)


SPORT

RUGBY: SOUTH AFRICA V FRANCE
SUNDAY, SKY SPORT 1/RUGBY CHANNEL LIVE 12.50AM
The Springboks haven't been too convincing in their early games but a tough game against the French would set them up nicely for the Tri-nations.