Survival, Revivalle

Spike Lee's 4 Little Girls, an HBO-financed documentary about Birmingham, Alabama, in the rough days between Brown vs. The Board of Education and the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and focusing on the fatal bombing, in September 1963, of the 16th Street Baptist Church, comes to the small screen this week after a limited theatrical release last fall (to qualify, perhaps, for the Oscar nomination it has indeed received). Smartly photographed by Ellen Kuras (I Shot Andy Warhol, Unzipped) and edited and scored, respectively, by frequent Lee collaborators Sam Pollard and Terence Blanchard, the film is artfully made, its occasional excesses of style moderated by the plain force of the content and the passion of the testimony. Pointed without being polemical, it seeks to locate the personal within the political, the local within the historical, and to rescue Cynthia Wesley, Carole Robertson, Addie Mae Collins (all 14, forever) and Denise McNair (11) from mere martyrdom - to memorialize not just the taking of their lives but the lives that were taken. There's no narrator, and scant attempt to put segregation in context, or to "explain" what's plainly beneath; yet the story, told in interviews and newsreels, family photos and the preserved fragments of interrupted adolescence - dolls and diplomas, merit badges, musical instruments - gathers itself from several directions, never less than sensibly, to move with quiet force toward its heartbreaking climax and surprisingly hopeful conclusion. As memories fade, memorials are made; this is a fine gift to posterity and to the present.

PREYABCThursdays, 8 p.m.

BUG JUICEDisney ChannelSundays, 5 p.m., beginning March 1

"Sneak preview," Saturday, February 28, 8:30 p.m.

THE MUSEUM OF TELEVISION & RADIO's 15th ANNUAL WILLIAM S. PALEY TELEVISION FESTIVALDirectors Guild of America7920 Sunset Blvd. (310) 786-1000 (888) ETM-TIXS

March 3-16

4 LITTLE GIRLSHBOPremieres Monday, February 23, 9 p.m.