Full BBC Four listings for Saturday 31 October 2026, with times in London local time.

BBC Four’s Saturday is one long build to a three-hour Bergman film

See also: What's on tonight across all channels | Wednesday's TV guide

BBC Four keeps its evening short and its ambitions high: four programmes, starting at 7pm, and the last of them is Fanny and Alexander at 9.20pm. It runs 180 minutes and it is the reason to commit the night to this channel. Ingmar Bergman’s 1982 Swedish film, with Börje Ahlstedt and Gunn Wållgren in the cast, is a drama and a historical film, and also counts as a Christmas film, which makes it a quiet counterweight to the ghost stories on other channels.

It faces Marble Hall Murders on BBC One and Ghostwatch: The Night That Terrified Britain on Channel 5. Anyone choosing between those and a three-hour subtitled film already knows which camp they’re in. Five stars, and the pick of the channel.

The lead-in is better than it looks

Miss Marple at 8.30pm is the programme most likely to hold an audience through to the film. Joan Hickson plays the lead in a series that stands at 12 episodes to date, and it’s on BBC Four on three days of the past fortnight and this week, so this is the channel’s long-running comfort slot rather than a one-off. It runs 50 minutes and sits against The Voice UK on ITV1, which tells you the two audiences barely overlap. Four stars.

Full Circle with Michael Palin at 7.40pm is the same story. Palin’s 1997 documentary series ran for 10 episodes, and BBC Four has it in four of the days listed, which makes it a fixture of the channel’s evenings more than a one-off. It’s 50 minutes and a good way to start. I’d rate it just below Marple because it faces more competition at 7.40pm, with Ghosts on Dave and Serie A on BBC Two both starting around the same time.

And the opener

Fungi: The Web of Life takes the 7pm slot for 40 minutes. BBC Four isn’t telling us much more than the title, and I’d rather say so than guess. It’s a sensible way into an evening of long sitting-down television.

The small hours

Anyone still up after the film is in for Top of the Pops, which turns up three times in a row from 1.50am, with Sounds of the Seventies and a one-hour Disco: Soundtrack of a Revolution ahead of it. From 5.30am the channel’s holding strand takes over for more than thirteen hours, until the evening starts again.


Also on TV tonight at 9pm

  • BBC One: Wisdom of the Crowd (from 8.30pm)
  • BBC Two: Live: Serie A Football (from 7.40pm)
  • ITV1: The Voice UK (from 8.30pm)
  • Channel 4: New: The F Ward
  • Channel 5: Britain’s Killer Hurricane of 1990 (from 7.45pm)
  • ITV2: Suicide Squad
  • ITV3: Midsomer Murders (from 8pm)
  • ITV4: Live: ITV Racing Live (from 8pm)
  • E4: Celebrity Gogglebox
  • More4: 24 Hours in A&E

Every channel tonight, side by side · Films on TV tonight · Tomorrow’s TV


Frequently asked questions

What’s on BBC Four tonight?

On Saturday 31 October 2026, BBC Four shows Fungi: The Web of Life at 7pm, Full Circle with Michael Palin at 7.40pm, Miss Marple at 8.30pm and Fanny and Alexander at 9.20pm.

Is there a film on BBC Four tonight?

No. BBC Four has no films in its evening schedule on Saturday 31 October 2026.

What time does BBC Four’s evening start?

The evening schedule starts with This is BBC Four at 6.58pm.