CINEMA,TELEVISION,THEATER,BOOKS: Cinema

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The Dark at the Top of the Stairs. Robert Preston runs away with this light drama about an Oklahoma harness salesman's troubles in a direction that gloomier Playwright William Inge may not have intended, but the film is good comedy just the same.

Day of the Painter. A waggish, 15-minute tale about the wondrous work habits of a dribble-and-splotch painter.

Under Ten Flags. The German Navy's Van Heflin v. British Admiral Charles Laughton is a better than 'fair sea-fight thriller based on one of the more curious naval footnotes to World War II.

The End of Innocence. Director Leopoldo Torre Nilsson, a Swedish-descended Argentine, shows his debt to Sweden's Ingmar Bergman in a shadowed study of purity, sin and degeneracy.

Ocean's 11. This laughing-gasser about an attempt by Frank Sinatra and his lout troup (Sammy Davis Jr., Dean Martin, Peter Lawford, etc.) to rob five Las Vegas casinos is slapdash slapstick, but that's the way the kookies rumble.

Jungle Cat. Another of Walt Disney's magnificently photographed, though sometimes badly edited and narrated, True-Life Adventures, this time about jaguars in the Amazon jungles.

Sons and Lovers. D. H. Lawrence's searing novel is brilliantly translated to film by Director Jack Cardiff and a fine cast headed by Wendy Hiller and Trevor Howard, whose performances are, respectively, good and great.

Elmer Gantry. Burt Lancaster turns in one of the best performances of his career as Sinclair Lewis' Bible-banging, skirt-chasing evangelist.

Bells Are Ringing. Judy Holliday singing some Comden-Green lyrics is all that this comedy about an answering-service Nightingale offers, but Judy is enough.

TELEVISION

Tues., Sept. 13

Thriller (NBC, 9-10 p.m.).* First of a new mystery and suspense series narrated by onetime Movie Menace Boris Karloff.

Wed., Sept. 14

The Aquanauts (CBS, 7:30-8:30 p.m.). New, full-hour entry in the underwater swim. Keith Larsen and Jeremy Slate are the actors who get wet, for divers' reasons.

Thurs., Sept. 15 Read a book.

Fri., Sept. 16

Moment of Fear (NBC, 10-11 p.m., color). An alcoholic reporter (Donald Harron) tries to warn his wife (Kathleen Maguire) that a gangster is on her trail.

Sat., Sept. 17

Football (ABC, 3:45 p.m.). Georgia plays Alabama.

Campaign Roundup (ABC, 7:30-8 p.m.). The week's political developments discussed in the first pre-election series by such analysts as Quincy Howe and Edward P. Morgan.

Checkmate (CBS, 8:30-9:30 p.m.). Eric Ambler, the noted on-the-run-in-a-raincoat author, has plotted a new suspense series, and this is its first creak. With Tony George, Doug McClure and Sebastian Cabot.

Sun., Sept. 18

U.N. in Action (CBS, 11-11:30 a.m.). The only regularly scheduled network coverage of the United Nations begins its twelfth year, with Stuart Novins.

College News Conference (ABC, 1:30-2 p.m.). Under Secretary of State C. Douglas Dillon is served to the youth.

The Twentieth Century (CBS, 6:30-7 p.m.). Rebroadcast of documentary on the battle of Stalingrad, filmed by German and Russian photographers in 1942-43.