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 Journalists in the Movies
- Adaptation (2002)
- Directed by Spike Jonze. Cast: Nicolas Cage, Meryl Streep, Chris Cooper, Tilda Swinton, Cara Seymour, Brian Cox, Judy Greer, Maggie Gyllenhaal.
Blends fictional characters and situations with the lives of real people: obsessive orchid hunter John Laroche, "New Yorker" journalist Susan Orlean, Hollywood screenwriter Charlie Kaufman and his twin brother Donald. As Charlie struggles to adapt a best-selling book, he writes himself into the movie plot. 114 min. DVD 1647
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- After the Revolution (Hungary, 1989)
- Director András Szirtes. Featuring Andras Szirtes, Ester Karas, Ottiete Frierre. In this experimental, tongue-in-cheek feature made in the wake of the cataclysmic political changes of Hungary, the "hero" is a writer, who has shut himself off from the rest of the world. He is struggling to write a great novel. Every morning he sits down to write after feeding his cat and letting it out into the streets. The point-of-view of the film is that of the cat as perceived through the its eyes, ears and brain. As the writer reviews the material "shot" by the cat it becomes the basis of his novel. In Hungarian with English subtitles. 82 min. 999:2061
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- Barfly (1987)
- Directed by Barbet Schroeder. Cast: Faye Dunaway, Mickey Rourke, Alice Krige, J. C. Quinn, Frank Stallone. Quasi-autobiography of writer-alcoholic Charles Bukowski and life on the skids in L.A.'s bars and flophouses and his choice between that booze-ridden existence or a new life as a poet. 99 min. DVD 3367
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- Barton Fink (1991)
- Directed by Joel and Ethan Coen. Cast: John Turturro, John Goodman, Judy Davis, Michael Lerner, John Mahoney, Jon Polito.
In this hilarious satire set in 1940s Hollywood, Barton Fink is a New York playwright who reluctantly relocates to Hollywood to write screenplays. Ordered to write a low budget screenplay about wrestling, Fink manages to type one sentence and then ... writer's block! His chatty insurance salesman neighbor helps out by teaching Fink about wrestling, but as the clock ticks, his life spins more and more out of control. 116 min. DVD 3336; vhs 999:2122
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- Before Night Falls (2000)
- Directed by Julian Schnabel. Cast: Javier Bardem, Olivier Martinez, Andrea Di Stefano, Johnny Depp, Sean Penn, Michael Wincott. A dramatization of the life of the poet and novelist Reinaldo Arenas, from childhood in Cuba to his death in New York City. His writings and homosexuality got him in trouble with Castro's Cuba and he spent two years in prison before leaving for the United States. 134 min. DVD 1071
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Julian Schnabel (Indepependent View) - interview about the making of this film. Video/C MM100
- Becoming Jane (UK, 2007)
- Directed by Julian Jarrold. Cast: Anne Hathaway, James McAvoy, Julie Walters, James Cromwell, Maggie Smith.
The young Jane Austen wishes to be a writer. Although she is offered many marriage proposals she accepts none until the mischevious Thomas Lefroy shows up and turns her world around. At first she finds him ignorant and self centered but as she gets to know him, they eventually fall in love. Thomas' relatives disagree with the match and threaten to disinherit him if he marries her. Jane's mother also disagrees with the match. Thomas tries to convince Jane to runaway with him but instead, Jane stays with her family and ends her affair with Lefroy. She begins to write some of her greatest works. Lefroy becomes the inspiration for Mr. Darcy in the novel, Pride and Prejudice. 120 min. DVD 9536
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- The Belle of Amherst.
- Directed by Charles S. Dubin. Julie Harris as America's first notable poetess, through an examination of her diaries and letters and observations on her life and family. Against a handsome set depicting Dickinson's Amherst, Massachusettes home, this portrayal shrewdly balances the agony of the secluded poet with the bright moments when Dickinson could see the joy in life. 1994. 90 min. DVD 8609
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- Behind the Lines (Regeneration) (1997)
- Directed by by Gillies Mackinnon. Cast: Jonathan Pryce, James Wilby, Jonny Lee Miller, Stuart Bunce, Tanya Allen. As a psychiatrist at a respected Scottish asylum, Dr. Rivers heals shellshocked soldiers so they can be sent back into the trenches. Then he encounters a different kind of patient--a war hero sent to the asylum for publishing an outspoken anti-war pamphlet. As each struggles to cope with the war, the line between patient and doctor begins to blur. Taken from Pat Barker's 1991 novel "Regeneration" and based on true events. (Characters based on Wilfred Owen and Siegfried Sassoon, two of England's most important WW1 poets). 95 min. DVD 4936
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- Capote (2005)
- Directed by Bennett Miller. Cast: Philip Seymour Hoffman, Catherine Keener, Clifton Collins, Jr., Bruce Greenwood, Bob Balaban, Mark Pellegrino, Chris Cooper. Based on true events. Truman Capote was a popular writer for The New Yorker. In 1959, when he learns about the horrific and senseless murder of a family of four in Halcomb, Kansas, Capote and his partner, Harper Lee, travel to the town to do research for an article. However, as Capote digs deeper into the story, he is inspired to expand the project into what would be his greatest work, "In Cold Blood." He arranges extensive interviews with the prisoners, especially with Perry Smith. However, his feelings of compassion for Perry conflict with his need for closure for his book which only an execution can provide. That conflict and the mixed motives for both interviewer and subject make for a troubling experience that produced an literary account that redefined modern non-fiction. 114 min. DVD 5329
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- The Childhood of Maxim Gorky (Detstvo Gorkogo) (1938)
- Director, Mark Donski. Cast: Alexei Lyarsky, Varvara Massalitinova, Mikhail Troyansky, J. Alexeyeva.
The Childhood of Maxim Gorky (Detstvo Gorkovo) was the first of Russian director Mark Donski's trilogy based upon Gorky's memoirs. Alexei Lyarsky plays the young Maxim, who grows up under the czarist regime with his grandparents as guardians. Continually demeaned by his martinet grandfather, Maxim is drawn to his warm-hearted grandmother, who instills in him the willingness to pursue his writing muse. Gorky's (and Donski's) deep abiding love for Russia is conveyed through the film's remarkably romanticist landscape shots along the Volga River. Includes the silent short "Moscow clad in snow" (5 min.), featuring documentary scenes of Moscow from 1909, filmed for Pathe Frères. 86 min. DVD 7620
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- Children of the Century (Les enfants du siècle) (1999)
- Directed by Diane Kurys. Cast: Juliette Binoche, Benoit Magimel, Stefano Dionisi, Robin Renucci, Karin Viard, Isabelle Carre, Patrick Chesnais, Arnaud Giovanetti, Denis Podalydès, Olivier Foubert, Marie-France Mignal, Michel Robin.
A dramatization of the love affair between the authors George Sand and Alfred de Musset that scandalized their families, friends and the salons of Paris in nineteenth century France. 137 min. DVD 8161
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- The Color of Pomegranates (Nran guyne) (Soviet Union, 1969)
- Directed by Sergei Paradzhanov. Cast: Sofiko Chiaureli, M. Aleksanian, V. Galstian. Stylized biographical drama of the life of noted eighteenth century Armenian poet and troubadour Sayat Nova. Based on his writings, the film which depicts the poet's life in eight sections from childhood to death, is rich with symbols of sacred and secular Armenian life. 88 min. DVD 6262
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- Deconstructing Harry (1997)
- Directed by Woody Allen. Cast: Caroline Aaron, Woody Allen, Kirstie Alley, Bob Balaban, Richard Benjamin, Eric Bogosian, Billy Crystal, Judy Davis, Hazelle Goodman, Mariel Hemingway, Amy Irving, Julie Kavner, Eric Lloyd, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Tobey Maguire, Demi Moore, Elisabeth Shue, Stanley Tucci, Robin Williams.
Harry Block has gone through three wives, six psychiatrists and dozens of girlfriends during his long literary career. But when Harry writes a bestseller about his best friends, his best friends become his worst enemies. 96 min. DVD 105; vhs 999:2015
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- The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (Le scaphandre et le papillon)(France, 2007)
- Directed by Julian Schnabel. Cast: Mathieu Amalric, Emmanuelle Seigner, Marie-Josee Croze, Anne Consigny, Patrick Chesnais, Niels Arestrup, Olatz Lopez Garmendia, Jean-Pierre Cassel, Marina Hands, Max von Sydow, Isaach De Bankole.
A drama based on the true story of the French editor of Elle magazine, Jean-Dominique Bauby, who in 1995 at the age of 43, suffered a stroke that paralyzed his entire body, except his left eye. Using that eye to blink out his memoir, Bauby eloquently described the aspects of his interior world, from the psychological torment of being trapped inside his body to his imagined stories from lands he'd only visited in his mind. Based on the novel "Le scaphandre et le papillon" by Jean-Dominique Bauby. 112 min. DVD 9852
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- Dreamchild(UK, 1985)
- Directed by Gavin Millar. Cast: Coral Browne, Peter Gallagher, Ian Holm. Alice Hargreaves, the inspiration of Alice in Wonderland, visits New York at age 80, and reminisces about her friendship with Lewis Carroll and his fantasy creatures. In a wondrous blend of fantasy and reality, she confronts the unsettling memories of her past -- and the Rev. Dodgson (Lewis Carroll), whose affection for Alice created a beloved literary classic. 90 min. 999:3048
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- Factotum (2005)
- Directed by Bent Hamer. Cast: Matt Dillon, Lili Taylor, Marisa Tomei, Fisher Stevens, Didier Flamand, Adrienne Shelly, Tom Lyons, Karen Young.
This drama centers on Hank Chinaski, the fictional alter-ego of author Charles Bukowski, who wanders around Los Angeles, trying to live off jobs which don't interfere with his primary interest, which is writing. Based on the novel by Charles Bukowski. 94 min. DVD 6751
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- The Farewell (Abschied (Brechts letzter Sommer)) (Germany / Poland, 2000)
- Directed by Jan Schutte. Cast: Josef Bierbichler, Monica Bleibtreu, Klaus Pohl, Jeanette Hain, Elfriede Irall, Margit Rogal, Samuel Fintzi. In addition to his prodigious output as a playwright, poet and theatrical producer, Bertolt Brecht maintained no fewer than three mistresses at any one time throughtout his adult life. Takes place in a single day, toward the end of his life, in the late summer of 1956, as Brecht prepares to leave his lakeside home and return to Berlin for the fall theater season. Surrounded by the women who form his extended family, he is the center of a quiet storm. 87 min. DVD 4334
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- Finding Neverland (UK / USA, 2004)
- Directed by Marc Forster. Cast: Johnny Depp, Kate Winslet, Julie Christie, Radha Mitchell, Dustin Hoffman, Freddie Highmore, Joe Prospero, Nick Roud, Luke Spill, Ian Hart, Kelly Macdonald. Well-known playwright James M. Barrie finds his career at a crossroads when his latest play flops and doubters begin to question his future. Then by chance he meets a widow and her four adventurous boys. Together they form a friendship that ignites the imagination needed to produce Barrie's greatest work. Traverses both fantasy and everyday reality, melding the difficulties of adult life with the spellbinding allure and childlike innocence of the boy who never grows up. 101 min. DVD 3665
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- Heart Beat (1979)
- Directed by John Byrum. Cast: Nick Nolte, Sissy Spacek, John Heard. Part ode to the Beat Generation, part domestic comedy, this film, based on the memoirs of Carolyn Cassady, tells of her life with Neal Cassady and Jack Kerouac. They were three unconventional people who thumbed their noses at the conventional 1950's, sharing a lifestyle that foreshadowed the social and sexual upheavals of the 60's. 999:2745
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- Hamsun (Germany / Norway / Sweden / Denmark, 1996)
- Directed by Jan Troell. Cast: Max von Sydow, Ghita Norby, Nette Hoff, Asa Soderling, Eindride Eidsvold, Gard Eidsvold, Sverre Anker Ousdal, Erik Hiviu, Edgar Selge, Ernst Jacobi. Based on true events this is the story of Knut Hamsun, Norway's most beloved author, who supported Hitler during World War II and was regarded as a traitor after the war. Although Hamsun believed it was his destiny to rescue his country from the ravages of a World War, he and his wife Marie faced the angry wrath of a betrayed nation and the private drama of their turbulent relationship. 153 min. 999:2675
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- Henry & June(1990)
- Directed by Philip Kaufman. Cast: Fred Ward, Uma Thurman, Maria de Medeiros, Richard E. Grant, Kevin Spacey. Upon meeting unconventional American author Henry Miller in Paris in 1931, a young writer named Anais Nin boldly embarks on a passionate voyage of self-discovery, and faithfully records every experience in her diary. 137 min. DVD 346
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- The Hours (2002)
- Directed by Stephen Daldry. Cast: Meryl Streep, Julianne Moore, Nicole Kidman, Ed Harris, Toni Collette, Claire Danes, Jeff Daniels, Stephen Dillane, Allison Janney, John C. Reilly, Miranda Richardson.
In 1929, Virginia Woolf is starting to write her novel, 'Mrs. Dalloway,' under the care of doctors and family. In 1951, Laura Brown is planning for her husband's birthday, but is preoccupied with reading Woolf's novel. In 2001, Clarrisa Vaughn is planning an award party for her friend, an author dying of AIDS. Taking place over one day, all three stories are interconnected with the novel: one is writing it, one is reading it, and one is living it. Based on the book by Michael Cunningham. Special features (ca. 4 hrs): Commentary by Meryl Streep, Julianne Moore and Nicole Kidman; commentary by directorStephen Daldry and novelist Michael Cunningham; introduction by the filmmakers; 4 featurettes: "Three women", "The mind and times of Virginia Woolf", "The music of The hours", "The Lives of Mrs. Dalloway"; theatrical trailer. 114 min. DVD 1717
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- Indecent Acts(1995)
- Director, William Parry. In 1895, Oscar Wilde, the most famous writer of the victorian age, was found guilty of homosexual crimes and sentenced to two years hard labor. This film, through readings and reconstruction of the courtroom scene, contrasts the treatment that Wilde suffered with that of contemporary gay sex offenders. 54 min. Video/C 6337
- The importance of reinventing Oscar : versions of Wilde during the last 100 years / edited by Uwe Boker, Richard Corballis, ... Amsterdam ; New York : Rodopi, 2002. (Main Stack PR5824.I466 2002)
- Waldrep, Shelton. "The Uses and Misuses of Oscar Wilde." In: Victorian afterlife : postmodern culture rewrites the nineteenth century / John Kucich and Dianne F. Sadoff, editors. pp:49-63.
Minneapolis : University of Minnesota Press, c2000. (Main Stack PR461.V5 2000)
- Infamous (2006)
- Directed by Douglas McGrath. Cast: Sigourney Weaver, Toby Jones, Gwyneth Paltrow, Lee Pace, Daniel Craig, Juliet Stevenson, Michael Panes, Hope Davis, Sandra Bullock, Isabella Rossellini, John Benjamin Hickey, Peter Bogdanovich, Jeff Daniels.
While researching his book "In Cold Blood", writer Truman Capote develops a relationship with convicted murderers Dick Hickock and, in particular Perry Smith, while both men waited for their date of execution on death row. Based on the novel "Truman Capote: in which various friends, enemies, acquaintances and detractors recall his turbulent career" by George Plimpton. 118 min. DVD 7325
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- Iris (UK / USA, 2001)
- Directed by Richard Eyre. Cast: Judi Dench, Jim Broadbent, Kate Winslet, Hugh Bonneville, Penelope Wilton. Adapted from the memoirs of literary critic John Bayley, the film recounts his courtship of and long marriage to British novelist Iris Murdoch. The scenario tacks back and forth from the young Iris - ready to seduce one and all with her coy command of words and sex appeal--to the elder Iris - slowly giving way to the cruel erasure of Alzheimer's. 91 min. DVD 1275
- Julia (1977)
- Directed by Fred Zinnemann. Cast: Jane Fonda, Vanessa Redgrave, Jason Robards, Hal Holbrook, Rosemary Murphy, Meryl Streep. "From "Pentimento," the memoirs of late playwright Lillian Hellman, JULIA covers those years in the 1930s when Lillian attained fame with the production of her first play "The Childrens' Hour" on Broadway. Not surprisingly, it centers on Lillian's relationship with her lifelong friend, Julia. It is a relationship that goes beyond mere acquaintance and one for which the word "love" seems appropriate. While Julia attends the University in Vienna, studying with such luminaries as Sigmund Freud and Albert Einstein, Lillian suffers through revisions of her play with her mentor and sometimes lover Dashiel Hammett at a New England beachhouse. After becoming a celebrated playwright, Lillian is invited to a writers conference in Russia. Julia, having taken up the battle against fascism, enlists Lillian en route to smuggle money through Nazi Germany which will assist in the Anti-Fascist cause. It is a dangerous mission especially for a Jewish intellectual on her way to communist Russia. During a brief meeting with Julia on this trip, Lillian learns that Julia has had a child which is called Lilly. Shortly after returning to the States, Lillian is informed of Julia's murder. The details of her death are shrouded in secrecy. Lillian sadly travels to England to search for her namesake the child she had promised Julia to care for." [IMDB] 117 min. DVD 5057
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- Kafka (Ireland / UK / Italy / Germany, 1991)
- Directed by Steven Soderbergh. Cast: Jeremy Irons, Theresa Russell, Alec Guinness, Joel Grey. In 1919 Prague, Czechoslovakia, Jeremy Irons plays Kafka, an insurance clerk and aspiring writer leading a staid and reclusive life, until his closest friend mysteriously disappears without a trace. A seductive co-worker leads Kafka to a group of anarchists who speak of a "cover-up of monumental proportions" controlled from within a castle outside the city. Searching for the truth, Kafka ventures behind the castle's walls and discovers a terrifying secret. 100 min. 999:3365
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- The Last Time I Committed Suicide (1997)
- Directed by Stephen T. Kay. Cast: Thomas Jane, Keanu Reeves, Adrien Brody, John Doe, Claire Forlani, Jim Haynie, Marg Helgenberger, Lucinda Jenney, Gretchen Mol. Beat icon Neal Cassady is forced to choose between the lustful life of a drifter or the all-elusive American dream in this drama loosely based on several incidents from Cassady's life, as well as a letter that Neal sent to Jack Kerouac about some complicated events in his love life. 93 min. 999:2724
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- Leaving Las Vegas (1995)
- Directed by Mike Figgis. Cast: Nicolas Cage, Elisabeth Shue, Julian Sands.
Ben Sanderson, an alcoholic Hollywood screenwriter whom lost everything because of his drinking, arrives in Las Vegas to drink himself to death. There, he meets and forms an uneasy friendship and non-interference pact with prostitute Sera. 112 min. DVD 5035
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- Letters from the Park (Cartas del Parque) Gabriel García Márquez Collection. (Cuba / Spain, 1988)
- Directed by Tomás Gutiérrez Alea. Two shy young lovers enlist the help of the local poet to write passionate letters to each other, but soon the woman becomes the object of the poet's affection, and all are faced with a perplexing dilemma. 85 min. 999:490
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- The Life of Emile Zola (1937)
- Directed by William Dieterle. Featuring Paul Muni, Gale Sondergaard, Joseph Schildkraut, Gloria Holden, Donald Crisp, Erin O'Brien Moore, Henry O'Neill, Morris Carnovsky, Louis Calhern. Explores the career of the novelist who championed the cause of France's oppressed. History knows Emile Zola as the lone man who cried out, "I accuse!," in the famous Dreyfus Case where the French army deliberately persecuted an innocent Jew. 117 min. DVD 6805; vhs 999:2864
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- Lost Weekend (1945)
- Directed by Billy Wilder. Cast: Ray Milland, Jane Wyman, Phillip Terry, Howard da Silva, Doris Dowling, Frank Faylen. A would-be writer's dissatisfaction with his life leads him on a three-day binge. This film gives an uncompromising look at the devestating effects of alcoholism. 100 min. DVD 535; vhs 999:433
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- Molière (France / Italy, 1978)
- Directed by Ariane Mnouchkine. Cast: Philippe Caubère, Jean Daste, Josephine Derenne.
How did Moliere, a child born in 1622 to working-class parents, become such a well-known author? This film dramatizes the life of an honest man who struggles incessantly to practice his art in a century of hypocrisy and repression. 290 min. DVD 4590; vhs Video/C 952
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- Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle (1994)
- Directed by Alan Rudolph. Cast: Jennifer Jason Leigh, Campbell Scott, Matthew Broderick, Peter Gallagher, Jennifer Beals, Andrew McCarthy, Wallace Shawn, Martha Plimpton, Sam Robards, Lili Taylor, James LeGros, Gwyneth Paltrow, Heather Graham, Stephen Baldwin, Tom McGowan, Rebecca Miller. Dorothy Parker, a brilliant writer with a razor-sharp tongue, shares a professional but intimate relationship with comic genius Robert Benchley. But when she meets Charlie MacArthur, she falls hopelessly in love, a condition even literary genius can't seem to cure. 124 min. 999:3393
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- My Brilliant Career (Australia, 1979)
- Directed by Gillian Armstrong. Cast: Judy Davis, Sam Neill, Wendy Hughes, Robert Grubb, Max Cullen, Aileen Britton, Peter Whitford, Patricia Kennedy. Sybylla Melvyn struggles with the conflicts that we all have between ambition, family, love, and guilt in a most remarkable manner. Sybylla grows to understand that life is a series of trade-offs, and that no one can have it all, and that no one can please everyone. Simple yet universal themes told with charm, wit, and vulnerability. 100 min. DVD 4025
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- My Life and Times with Antonin Artaud (En compagnie d'Antonin Artaud) (France, 1993)
- Directed by Gérard Mordillat. Cast: Sami Frey, Marc Barbe, Julie Jezequel, Valerie Jeannet, Clotilde de Bayser, Charlotte Valandrey.
Presents the last two years of the life of French poet, madman, genius, and theatrical impressario, Antonin Artaud. Based on the diaries of Jacques Prevel, a poet who befriended Artaud in 1946 when he was released from an insane asylum. Special features: Documentary by Gerard Mordillat and Jerome Prieur (1933, 21 min.) "Jacques Prevel, de colere et de haine," an intimate portrait of the poet Jacques Prevel, a very close disciple of Artaud, based on the accounts of those close to him ; booklet including interviews with the directors and profiles of the participants ; optional subtitles ; scene selection. 93 min. DVD 5094
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- Naked Lunch
- Director/writer, David Cronenberg.Cast: Peter Weller, Judy Davis, Ian Holm, Julian Sands, Monique Mercure, Nicholas Campbell, Michael Zelniker, Robert A. Silverman, Joseph Scorsiani, Roy Scheider. Part-time pest-control man and full-time drug addict Bill Lee seeks escape from his troubled existence in 1953 New York and flees to Interzone (a hallucinatory version of Tangiers) where reality and fantasy have merged. It's a strange, surreal landscape inhabited by mugwumps, half-alien, half-insect creatures, man-sized centipedes, carnivorous typewriters and bizarre humans. Compelled to make sense of this alien territory, he writes a book called "Naked lunch." Filled with spectacular special effects and stunning imagery. 115 min. DVD 3630; also VHS Video/C 999:1912
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- Nora (France / USA, 1999)
- Directed by Pat Murphy. Cast: Ewan McGregor, Susan Lynch, Peter McDonald, Roberto Citran. Tells the story of reknowned rebel lovers, James Joyce and Nora Barnacle, following the famous literary pair from the dark streets of Dublin to the sun-kissed Italian coast. Bold, earthy and honest, their volatile sexually-charged relationship broke all social and religious bounds and became the basis for Joyce's masterpiece Ulysses. 106 min. DVD 3483
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- Orphée (Orpheus) (1949)
- Directed by Jean Cocteau. Orpheus is a poet who becomes obsessed with Death (the Princess). They fall in love. Orphee's wife, Eurydice, is killed by the Princess' henchmen and Orphee goes after her into the Underworld. Although they have become dangerously entangled, the Princess sends Orphee back out of the Underworld, to carry on his life with Eurydice. Cocteau's modern version of the Orpheus legend, based on his own play. 86 min. DVD 209; vhs 999:211
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- Permanent Midnight (1998)
- Director, David Veloz. Cast: Ben Stiller, Elizabeth Hurley, Maria Bello, Owen Wilson, Cheryl Ladd, Peter Greene, Janeane Garofalo.
A dramatization of the true story of TV writer Jerry Stahl who makes a fortune writing drivel and sinks into unrepentant drug addiction. 88 min. DVD 9086
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- Piñero
- Directed by Leon Ichaso. The story of the life of a Latino icon, the poet-playwright-actor Miguel Pinero (played by Benjamin Bratt), whose urban poetry is recognized as a pre-cursor to rap and hip-hop. After doing time in hard-core Sing-Sing for petty thefts and drug dealing, Pinero turned his prison experiences into the 1974 Tony-nominated play Short Eyes and founded the famed Nuyorican Poets Cafe on Manhattan's Lower East Side. 2001. 94 min. DVD 1192
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- Il Postino (The Postman) (France / Italy / Belgium, 1994)
- Directed by Michael Radford. Cast: Philippe Noiret, Massimo Troisi, Maria Grazia Cucinotta. In this romantic comedy the postman, Mario, enlists the aid of the poet Pablo Neruda to conquer the heart of the beautiful Beatrice. 103 min. DVD 9136; vhs 999:2064
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- Prick Up Your Ears (UK, 1987)
- Director, Stephen Frears. Cast: Gary Oldman (Joe Orton), Alfred Molina (Kenneth Halliwell), Vanessa Redgrave, Julie Walters, Richard Wilson, Frances Barber, Margaret Tyzack, Wallace Shawn. Based on the true story of the murder/suicide of playwright Joe Orton and his lover, Ken Halliwell. When Orton, after years of unsuccessful collaboration with Halliwell, breaks away and achieves fame and fortune on his own, Halliwell cracks, hammers Orton to death and then kills himself. 105 min. 999:3488
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- Pyaasa (India, 1957)
- Directed by Guru Dutt. Cast: Mala Sinha, Guru Dutt, Waheeda Rehman, Rehman, Johnny Walker. Vijay, an unsuccessful poet, elects to live on streets where a young prostitute, Gulab falls in love with him and his poetry. When a dead beggar to whom Vijay gave his coat is mistaken for Vijay, Gulab has his poetry published in a book which becomes a best seller. Everyone who previously rejected Vijay now gathers to pay tribute to the dead poet, but Visjay disrupts the celebration with a passionate song denouncing hypocrisy and wrongly-placed social values. 146 min. DVD 3541; also VHS 999:2470
- Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Cousins, Mark. "Guru Dutt: Such Sweet Sorrow." Sight & Sound v. ns16 no. 3 (March 2006) p. 30-2
- Khan, P., et. al., The song picture man [Guru Dutt]. Sight & Sound v. ns4 (October 1994) p. 26-8
- Shadowlands(1993)
- Directed by Richard Attenborough. Cast: Anthony Hopkins, Debra Winger, James Frain, Daniel Goode, Scott Handy. Based on the true story of C.S. Lewis, a world-renowned writer and professor who remains untouched by any great passion until he meets and falls in love with Joy Gresham, a feisty, abrasive New York divorcee. 133 min. DVD 6395
- Shakespeare In Love.
- Directed by John Madden, Cast: Gwyenth Paltrow, Joseph Fiennes, Geoffrey Rush, Colin Firth, Ben Affleck and Judi Dench. When Will Shakespeare needs passionate inspiration to break a bad case of writer's block, a secret romance with the beautiful Lady Viola starts the words flowing like never before! There are just two things he'll have to learn about his new love: she's promised to marry someone else, and she's successfully impersonating a man in order to play the lead in Will's latest production! 1998. 122 min. DVD 59; VHS 999:2440
 Credits and other information about film adaptations of Shakespeare (via the Internet Movie Database)
- The Shining (USA / UK, 1980)
- Directed by Stanley Kubrick. Cast: Jack Nicholson, Shelley Duvall, Scatman Crothers, Danny Lloyd. "A novelist - Jack Torrance take a job interview as winter caretaker of the isolated, old, huge and beautiful Overlook Hotel. In the interview, Jack is told by the manager himself, that the previous caretaker - Grady, chopped his family and later killed himself with a shotgun. Ignoring the story, Jack brings his wife - Wendy and his son Danny. It happens that Danny, has a mysterious power known as "The Shining" that shows him things from the past and future. Some of the visions come from Tony - "the little boy who lives in Danny's mouth". Danny meets Hallorann - the hotel cook in their first day arriving at the Overlook, who also has this "Shining" and he warns him about the hotel and the sinister Room 237. As the days go by, Danny has visions of previous guests and employees who died at the hotel years before, meanwhile Jack starts driving into insanity, turning more and more aggressive, at the point that Danny and Wendy gets convinced that Jack might try to do the same thing, Grady did." [IMDB] 143 min. DVD 198; VHS 999:992
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- The Singing Detective (UK, TV, 1986)
- Directed by Jon Amiel. The hallucinations of a mystery writer stricken with a crippling skin disorder interweave memories of his past with a plot casting him in the role of a suave sleuth who croons with a big band. Vol. 1. Skin -- Vol. 2. Heat -- Vol. 3. Lovely days -- Vol. 4. Clues -- Vol. 5. Pitter patter -- Vol. 6. Who done it. Approx. 70 min. each DVD 1666; also on VHS 999:1750 (6 parts)
- Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Bell, Robert H. "Implicated without choice: The double vision of The Singing Detective." Literature Film Quarterly; 1993, Vol. 21 Issue 3, p200, 9p
 UC users only
- Coward, Rosalind. "Dennis Potter and the Question of the Television Author."
Critical Quarterly, vol. 29, no. 4, pp. 79-87, January 1987
- Creeber, Glen. "The Singing Detective." In: The television genre book / edited by Glen Creeber ; associate editors, Toby Miller and John Tulloch. London : British Film Institute, 2001. (Main Stack PN1992.55.T45 2001)
- Hunningher, Joost. "The Singing Detective (Dennis Potter): Who Done It?" In: British television drama in the 1980s / edited and introduced by George W. Brandt. Cambridge [England] ; New York : Cambridge University Press, 1993. (Main Stack PN1992.65.B682 1993)
- Marinov, Samuel G. "Pennies from Heaven, The Singing Detective and Lipstick on Your Collar: Redefining the Genre of Musical Film." In: The passion of Dennis Potter : international collected essays / edited by Vernon W. Gras and John R. Cook. New York : St. Martin's Press, 2000. (Main Stack PN1992.4.P68.P37 2000)
- Roberts, Rex. "The Singing Detective." Film Journal International, Nov2003, Vol. 106 Issue 11, p56, 2p;
UC users only
- Tonguette, Peter. "Off-Key: What the Critics Missed in The Singing Detective." Senses of Cinema vol. 30, pp. (no pagination), January 2004
- The Singing Detective (2003)
- Director, Keith Gordon. Cast: Robert Downey, Jr., Robin Wright Penn, Jeremy Northam, Katie Holmes, Carla Gugino, Adrien Brody, Jon Polito, Saul Rubinek. Bedridden with an excruciating case of skin-rotting psoriasis, novelist Dan Dark escapes into his vivid imagination. There, gunmen and private detectives pursue their own unusual agendas, often casting himself as the titular "warbler" whose pain and anger is focused like a laser on his cheating wife and anyone else who's made his real and imaginary worlds unbearable. 108 min. DVD 2415
- Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The Squid and the Whale (2005)
- Directed by Noah Baumbach. Cast: Jeff Daniels, Laura Linney, Jesse Eisenberg, Owen Kline, William Baldwin, Halley Feiffer, Anna Paquin. Based on the true childhood experiences of Noah Baumbach and his brother, tells the touching story of two young boys dealing with their parents' divorce in Brooklyn in the 1980s. The patriarch of an eccentric Brooklyn family claims to once have been a great novelist, but ultimately decided to settled into a teaching job. When his wife discovers a writing talent of her own, jealousy divides the family. The two teenage sons are forced to forge new relationships with their parents. Their mom begins dating her younger son's tennis coach. Meanwhile, dad has an affair with the student his older son is pursuing. 81 min.DVD 5326
- Credit and other information from Internet Movie Database
- Stranger than Fiction (2006)
- Directed by Marc Forster. Cast: Will Ferrell, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Dustin Hoffman, Queen Latifah, Emma Thompson.
Kay Effiel is an author writing her latest novel. Her story revolves about an isolated man named Harold Crick. What she doesn't know is that her fictionalized character is real. Harold is an IRS agent who has lived a dull existence. One day he begins to hear Karen's voice as she narrates what she is putting down on paper. Harold enlists the help of a literary professor to find out what is happening and ends up changing things about his life. He begins to have a relationship with his IRS client, a government-hating bakery owner named Ana Pascal. Harold, however, finds trouble when he hears that Karen plans to kill him. 113 min. DVD 9053
- Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Sylvia (2003)
- Directed by Christine Jeffs. Cast: Gwyneth Paltrow, Daniel Craig, Jared Harris, Amira Casar, Andrew Havill, Sam Troughton, Lucy Davenport, Antony Strachan, Blythe Danner, Michael Gambon.
A dramatization of the life story of American author and poet Sylvia Plath. Born in Boston, MA, in 1932, Plath developed a talent as a writer and published her first poem when she was eight years old. That same year, Plath was forced to confront the unexpected death of her father. In 1950, she began studying at Smith College on a literary scholarship. In 1955, she was granted a Fulbright Scholarship to study in England at Cambridge. There, Plath met author Ted Hughes, the two fell in love, and married in 1958. However, marriage, family, and a growing reputation as an important poet failed to bring Plath happiness. 111 min. DVD 2310
- Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Total Eclipse (UK / France / Belgium / Italy, 1995)
- Directed by Agnieszka Holland. Cast: Leonardo DiCaprio, David Thewlis, Romane Bohringer. A drama based on the life of the French writer Arthur Rimbaud, whose philosophy of living life to the extreme inspired the rock generation and of Paul Verlaine, a writer of lesser talent who is torn between his growing infatuation with Rimbaud and the domestic demands of his wife. Together, these two men feed each other's hunger for life and love, trying desperately to straddle the lines between knowledge and self-destruction, creativity and delusion. 112 min. DVD 1074
- Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- Movie Review Query Engine
- Geist, Kenneth. "Total Eclipse." Films in Review. Jan 1996. Vol. 47, Iss. 1-2; p. 68 (17 pages)UC users only
- Turk, Edward Baron
"Agnieszka Holland's Total Eclipse, a Contemporary "Film Maudit"."
The French Review, Vol. 72, No. 2 (Dec., 1998), pp. 260-272UC users only
- Wilde (UK / Germany / Japan, 1997)
- Directed by Brian Gilbert. Cast: Stephen Fry, Jude Law, Vanessa Redgrave, Tom Wilkinson, Jennifer Ehle, Gemma Jones, Judy Parfitt. Notorious poet and playwright Oscar Wilde devours all that life has to offer, but there's only so much that late Victorian England will tolerate. As Wilde delves into a taboo world of unrealized homosexual desire, his life rapidly becomes a turbulent charade. He cannot escape the repercussions wrought by a "pure" society, nor will he hide in shame for being true to his nature. 116 min. 999:3056
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Credits and other information from the Internet Movie Database
- The importance of reinventing Oscar : versions of Wilde during the last 100 years / edited by Uwe Boker, Richard Corballis, ... Amsterdam ; New York : Rodopi, 2002. (Main Stack PR5824.I466 2002)
- Holland, Merlin. "The Film Wilde: A Wasted Opportunity?." Wildean: The Journal of the Oscar Wilde Society. 12: 30-33. 1998 Jan.
- Waldrep, Shelton. "The Uses and Misuses of Oscar Wilde." In: Victorian afterlife : postmodern culture rewrites the nineteenth century / John Kucich and Dianne F. Sadoff, editors. pp:49-63. Minneapolis : University of Minnesota Press, c2000.
(Main Stack PR461.V5 2000)
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