THIS STORY HAS BEEN FORMATTED FOR EASY PRINTING

Critic’s corner

By Wesley Morris
Globe Staff / August 4, 2011

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Burden of Dreams 8 p.m., Flix

Werner Herzog was once the sort of heedless nature voyager he saw in the Timothy Treadwell of “Grizzly Man.’’ Treadwell’s boyish narcissism provided Herzog a platform to criticize his subject’s naivete. But Herzog was once a kind of macho narcissist himself. This great 1982 Les Blank documentary finds him mustachioed, near peaks both artistic and topographical, struggling to make the film “Fitzcarraldo,’’ whose production climaxed with the heaving of a steamship over a Peruvian hill. Blank happened upon a folly that, in Herzog’s mind, was to be an epic and, consequently, found the rare making-of film that improves upon the experience of watching the film itself.

The Ultimate Merger 9 p.m., TVOne

I’m sorry, but after “Piers Morgan Tonight’’ (does anything interest him?), this is the least believable show on television. Season two begins with the entertainment correspondent and fitness-video star Toccara looking for a man. You might have missed her on season three of “America’s Next Top Model,’’ but hopefully that’s at least enough to know that casting her as the object of a dating competition is a gimmick. Toccara has a smoldering beauty. She’s hippy, with an equally voluptuous rustbelt accent. I have an issue of Black Men magazine that proves she photographs well. But she can’t, you know, meet the right black man. Which makes her “human.’’

Selling New York 9 p.m., HGTV

Is anyone ever decisive on these real estate reality shows? On this commercial for Warburg Realty, tonight’s indecisive client isn’t just any old moneybags buyer. It’s the boyfriend of broker Leslie Modell Rosenthal’s daughter. There’s got to be a game-show sound for that.

Heidi Fleiss: Prostitutes to Parrots 9 p.m., Animal Planet

It used to be called “Animal Whoring.’’

Zodiac 8 p.m., IFC

We don’t say enough about how the acting is almost as good as the filmmaking.

B.A.P.S. 9 p.m., BET

Really, Halle Berry is a character actress trapped in a superstar’s body.