Jami Gertz stars in “Lost Holiday: The Jim and Suzanne Shemwell Story” (8 p.m., today, Lifetime) as the uptight Suzanne Shemwell, who appears to have Christmas and its attendant pageants, meals and decorating down to a tightly controlled flow chart.

When her estranged husband, Jim (Dylan Walsh), visits, it becomes easy to see why these two couldn’t stay together. Things really get interesting when Jim convinces Mrs. Stick-in-the-mud to take an impromptu snowmobile excursion in the nearby Idaho hills. They’re quickly lost and discover that getting along may be key to their survival. While the ending is obvious, you can’t be blamed for rooting for the coyotes to get Suzanne. Based on a true story.

¢ Genie Francis stars in “The Note” (8 p.m., today, Hallmark) as a columnist for a nameless newspaper with the quietest newsroom in the history of journalism.

After her boss threatens to take away her job because she’s not making an emotional connection with her readers, a plane crashes into a nameless nearby body of water, filling the airwaves with tragedy and tears.

Brooding meditatively by the water soon after, the columnist discovers a note in a plastic bag floating near a shredded piece of life preserver. The author had been on the plane and trying to convey his very last thoughts to his loved ones.

Inspired by this message in a baggy, the columnist asks her readers just what they would write in a similarly poignant situation. Fame and romance follow.

But wouldn’t they just use their cell phones to leave that last message? Hey, this is Hallmark, a network associated with a maker of sentimental stationary. They want these things in writing.

¢ Tom Brokaw recalls one of the most tumultuous years in American history in the two-hour documentary “1968” (8 p.m., Sunday, History).

Separated by four decades of hindsight, Brokaw recalls his early years as a reporter, covering the San Francisco music scene in a suit and tie and later following the presidential campaigns of a year punctuated by military setbacks in Vietnam, student protests, assassinations and the early stirrings of the women’s movement.

The documentary seems most natural when Brokaw keeps it personal, recalling a classmate killed on his second tour of duty in Vietnam. It seems the most canned when he interviews such celebrities as the Smothers Brothers, Arlo Guthrie and Bruce Springsteen, public figures who seem to have their recollections honed to a well-turned sound bite. Jon Stewart is funny, as usual, and gets serious for a minute to argue that it’s only the absence of a military draft that prevents a student revolt against the Iraq war.

“1968” offers a lot of familiar footage and little new insight. Brokaw’s examination ignores the staggering demography of the period. (It also ignores the rest of the world. Riots in Paris, Prague and Mexico City are covered in a single sentence.)

Tonight’s highlights

¢ Liz bonds with an older writer (Carrie Fisher) on “30 Rock” (8 p.m., NBC).

¢ “Saturday Night Live” (8:30 p.m., NBC) presents “The Best of Will Ferrell.”

¢ A comic reflects on the world on “Dave Attell: Captain Miserable” (9 p.m., HBO).

Sunday’s highlights

¢ Confusion in Croatia on “Amazing Race” (7 p.m., CBS).

¢ “Dino Autopsy” (8 p.m., Eastern, National Geographic) looks at a mummified reptile.

¢ Samuel L. Jackson hosts “2007 Video Game Awards” (8 p.m., Spike).