TV Daily

Prime Pick

Now that digital video cameras are affordable to all, a glut of aspiring documentary filmmakers have entered the market, anxious to share their projects with the world. The documentary "Andrew Jenks, Room 335" (7 p.m. EST on Cinemax) represents both the benefits and the drawbacks of this trend. Jenks, who's just 19 years old, starts with a great idea: Why not live in an assisted living facility in Florida for a month one summer, and film everything that happens? His heart is in the right place, but Jenks offers little insight or thoughtfulness about his endeavor, beyond something vague about how older people have a lot to teach us. And despite his obvious rapport with the residents of the facility, the four or five memorable, charming moments of this film are padded with long, repetitive, poorly edited sequences of the residents walking around the halls or playing Bingo. Jenks may not have wanted to dwell on the residents' pasts, but we get to know so little about his primary subjects (or about Jenks himself) that it's tough to feel like we've learned all that much by the time the credits roll. Even so, the film has played at film festivals all over the world, and Jenks and his two young collaborators, Jonah Quickmire Pettigrew and William Godel, clearly learned a lot from their experiences (even if we didn't).

-- H.H.

Also…

Ratings behemoth "American Idol" returns with its seventh season tonight (8 p.m. EST on Fox), starting with the auditions you either love or hate, depending on how evil you are. Part 2 of the three-part miniseries "Comanche Moon," the prequel to "Lonesome Dove," airs tonight at 9 p.m. EST on CBS, while fans of cosmic unknowns should enjoy History's "The Universe" (9 p.m. EST), which examines the mysterious force causing the universe's expansion (Dude!). The Independent Lens series continues with "Mapping Stem Cell Research: Terra Icognita (10 p.m. EST on PBS, check listings), which profiles neurologist Dr. Jack Kessler, whose daughter's spinal injury inspired his groundbreaking experiments with stem cells. And the second season of TBS comedy "10 Items or Less" premieres at 11 p.m. EST.

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