“Fast and Furious” films have become Loud and Familiar to many of us. Fans of the franchise, of wise-cracking heist movies and of Kevin Hart in particular may enjoy the thriller “Lift,” streaming on Netflix today.
Cyrus Whitaker (Hart), the leader of a world-class burglary crew, appears to have been taken down by a fetching agent (Gugu Mbatha-Raw). Speaking in a posh accent, she explains that she has them all dead to rights for too many charges of theft and identity fraud to count. But, in the logic of such movies, she will let them all go free if they pull off one last heist for the good guys — they must purloin a fortune on its way to a terrorist group. Only they have to steal it midair from the terrorists’ airplane.
Expect plenty of action, violence, loud music and jokes from a cast including Vincent D’Onofrio, Ursula Corbero, Jean Reno, Sam Worthington and more.
— Netflix also introduces “Love Is Blind: Sweden,” a new pit stop in the franchise. As fans of this dating-reality series might know, “Blind” invites singles to get engaged to a complete stranger and then spend the next four weeks getting acquainted, planning their wedding, exploring physical intimacy, sharing high school yearbook photos and picking out china patterns, etc.
Hosted by Jessica Almenas, “Blind” will unspool four episodes tonight, followed by four more next Friday and a weddings episode on Jan. 26. The “Reunion” will air on a date yet to be announced.
Help yourself.
— “The Traitors” returns for a second season on Peacock. Alan Cummings hosts this murder mystery variation on “Clue” with characteristic gusto. Celebrity players are dredged from the world of reality television.
— Apple TV+ streams the 2023 epic “Killers of the Flower Moon,” directed by Martin Scorsese and adapted from David Grann’s bestselling novel by Eric Roth and Scorsese. It recalls 1920s Oklahoma, when members of the Osage tribe had become wealthy from the oil beneath their land and were brutalized in a series of murders that came to be called the Reign of Terror.
The film, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Robert De Niro, Lily Gladstone and Jesse Plemons, has been listed among the year’s best films by publications including The New Yorker and The New York Times. An Indigenous actress, Gladstone was honored with a Best Actress win at the recent Golden Globes and delivered her acceptance speech in the native language of her Blackfeet tribe.
— Shudder, the streaming service dedicated to all things horror, presents “Destroy All Neighbors,” a splatter-comedy starring Jonah Ray Rodrigues as a pretentious prog-rock composer who finds his creativity thwarted by a noisy neighbor named Vlad (Alex Winter of “Bill & Ted” fame). When an angry altercation turns into Vlad’s decapitation, the corpses start piling up.
— Freevee streams the fourth season of the basketball docuseries “Uninterrupted.”
— Parents, take note: The third installment of the third season of “Bluey” streams on Apple TV+.
TONIGHT’S OTHER HIGHLIGHTS
— Community outreach on “S.W.A.T.” (8 p.m., CBS, TV-14).
— The mother of two estranged siblings summons them to a Highlands holiday for a life-changing surprise in the 2023 romance “A Merry Scottish Christmas” (8 p.m., Hallmark, r, TV-G).
— A detective receives phoned-in clues from his niece about a difficult case in the 2019 thriller “Don’t Let Go” (8 p.m., Cinemax) … despite the fact that she was recently murdered.
— Part two of “The American Buffalo” (9 p.m., PBS, check local listings) documents efforts to save the species from extinction.
— Frank withholds support from Erin’s campaign on “Blue Bloods” (10 p.m., CBS, r, TV-14).
CULT CHOICE
A detective (Steve McQueen) and his Ford Mustang GT won’t let the hills and streets of San Francisco keep him from his mobster prey in the 1968 thriller “Bullitt” (8 p.m., TCM), a film that set the standard for automotive chase scenes and also features a great score by Lalo Schiffren.
SERIES NOTES
Gunfire at a wedding ceremony leaves a couple hovering between life and death on “Transplant” (8 p.m., NBC, TV-14) … “WWE Friday Night SmackDown” (8 p.m., Fox, TV-14) … Advice from a cupcake magnate on “Shark Tank” (8 p.m., ABC, TV-PG) … A train crash can’t be contained on “Fire Country” (9 p.m., CBS, r, TV-14) … “Dateline” (9 p.m., NBC) … “20/20” (9 p.m., ABC).
LATE NIGHT
Jimmy Fallon welcomes Kevin Hart, Dan Levy and Zarna Garg on “The Tonight Show” (11:35 p.m., NBC).
Jeremy Allen White, Hannah Waddingham and Carter McLean visit “Late Night With Seth Meyers” (12:35 a.m., r, NBC) … Harland Williams, Bob Zany, Lisa Lampanelli and Godfrey appear on “Comics Unleashed With Byron Allen” (12:37 a.m., CBS).
