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Sophie's Choice (1982) More at IMDbPro »

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105 comments in total

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64 out of 70 people found the following comment useful :-
The definitive Meryl Streep, 2 March 2002

Author: MyDarkStar from United States

Without a doubt, Meryl Streep delivers the Greatest Performance By An Actress EVER - period.

The performance is totally naked, where you can almost feel her sorrow come right out of the screen. For all of the heart wrenching scenes in this movie, you never once feel as though Streep is going over-the-top. That says alot for someone who spends just about half of the time in her scenes with a tear in her eye. Everything about her performance just seems so effortless and natural. This especially shows when she is speaking German flawlessly, or English with a very convincing Polish accent.

The fact that Kevin Kline and Peter MacNicol are not completely lost in this movie says alot for their performances. Kline himself delivers a great performance of a man suffering from delusions and bi-polar syndrome. It is one of his greatest performances as well. Peter MacNicol plays the role of a character who pales in comparison to the other characters. MacNicol has the somewhat undesirable task of having to play the character who carries the least amount of baggage. He therefore might be overlooked, when viewing at the movie as a whole. However, MacNicol does a great job with the character, not trying to make more out of it than it is supposed to be. His role is very important to this movie.

But the real story here is Streep. Her performance would be a stand out against any other performance in history. I honestly believe that. Streep just digs down deep here - delivering lines that just put a chill down your spine.

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78 out of 99 people found the following comment useful :-
The finest performance by an actress in the history of film., 28 December 2001

Author: Jen_UK from England

'Sophie's Choice' should be compulsory viewing for any member of the voting panel who decide Academy Award winners. Quite simply, Meryl Streep's performance is THE benchmark for that 'Best Actress' category. I've seen a LOT of films, but not one performance has ever (and will ever) match her's. The manner in which she embodies Sophie goes beyond explanation. It is too accomplished and moving for words. It is almost offensive to think that Julia Roberts was awarded the same statue for ‘Erin Brockovich'!

Aside from the breathtaking central performance from the marvellous Ms Streep, there are so many other reasons to see this film. Kevin Kline and Peter MacNicol are excellent, the cinematography is beautiful (particularly the shots of Brooklyn Bridge) the score is haunting ... I could go on.

Although certain critics have berated 'Sophie's Choice' as a mere platform for Meryl Streep as an actress, I urge you to overlook this view. The film succeeds admirably in bringing to horrific life an event in history which we should all be made aware of. It is undeniable that the phenomenal performance of MS leaves you spellbound, but NOT at the expense of being horrified and affected by what you have seen. All I can say to sum up is: just see it. An intelligent and profoundly moving film which will (I promise you) live on in your memory long after the closing credits.

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45 out of 54 people found the following comment useful :-
Haunting, 2 November 2003

Author: jenjen21 from Birmingham, England

Wow! I am still in absolute shock from this film. Meryl Streep delivers a magnificent performance, with a flawless Polish accent. Kevin Kline and Peter Macnichol are terrific and together the three of them make a highly enjoyable film. The 'choice' Sophie has to make is shattering, a beautifully acted and unforgettable scene. Meryl Streep won the best actress Oscar for her portrayal of the nazi camp survivor, this was richly deserved. The film was incredible with a great score and many moving emotional scenes. The emotions of the characthers, especially Sophie, are incredibly beliveable and bought to life. All 3 of the main performances are haunting and memorable. A must see.

Highly reccomended. 10/10

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42 out of 52 people found the following comment useful :-
Best Performance Ever, 10 February 2005

Author: dakridge from Washington, DC

Meryl Streep's performance as Sophie is simply the finest performance ever captured on film. Period. The subtlety and depth with which she reveals Sophie's wounds are simply spellbinding. She is at once radiantly beautiful, yet deeply wounded. She is charming, yet vulnerable. She is someone you want to love, yet someone whose pain keeps you at a distance.

This film takes the viewer on an intense emotional journey. Anyone, but especially anyone who is a parent, would have to be an emotional rock to not be absolutely haunted by this story. As much as I have studied and pondered the Holocaust, this film has connected me to those events more emotionally than I have ever been before.

This film, and Ms. Streep's performance, are a gift to humanity.

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33 out of 36 people found the following comment useful :-
Sad, joyous and depressing at the same time!, 3 April 2006

Author: René (rfak) from Vienna, Austria

We, who we never were forced to witness such inhumanity and terror as those who survived the Holocaust, can probably never quite capture what it meant and indescribable it must have been. Director Alan J. Pakula tried with this film to bring us the despair closer, as we witness the struggle of a woman to survive and how she cannot live with her decisions.

Sophies story is told by Stingo (a very young Peter MacNicol), a writer, who moves to New York and befriends quickly his new neighbors Nathan (Kevin Kline) and Sophie (Meryl Streep). Sophie survived Ausschwitz, drinks to much and is completely dedicated to Nathan, who now and then gets terrible moods. They all become good friends, but while Nathan seems to go deeper and deeper into madness Sophie tells Stingo from time to time parts of her story, how she survived and what a terrible choice she had to make.

I wont reveal what the choice is, but for me it was one of most chilling moments I've ever seen on film. It's revealed very late in the movie, at a time where we already root for Sophie, despite being a rather naive and weak character, but we care so much for her it's like it happened to ourselves.

Though MacNicol and Kline are both flawless in their respective parts, the movie is dominated by Meryl Streep, who demands attention in every scene she's in (and is exquisitely photographed by cinematographer Nestor Almendros). She's funny (the movie, despite the bleak and depressing story, is quite joyous), exhilarating, beautiful, but at the same time she always seems to be sad, like a cloud it's hanging over her head.

The end of the movie, however sad it is, is not at all depressing, because somehow we felt throughout the whole movie, that Sophie was doomed from the start, that there was no other solution than this and that it's probably more peaceful for her than to go on and on.

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26 out of 30 people found the following comment useful :-
..only one of the commentaries found its true star..., 1 May 2006

Author: fimimix from United States

...all of the characters in this astounding book/movie were as good or as unimportant as viewers/readers found them to be, simply because William Styron developed them that way: Stingo WAS an unexperienced nerd, having lived an idyllic life in the South with nothing happening in his life, yet aspired to write the Great American Novel; how perfect for a virginous male to so fortunate to live with people who educate him what a horrendous journey life can be. McNichols was perfect for this role, because he was the opposite of Sophie. Nathan was mad and KNEW he was mad, longing with all his soul to be otherwise; a little madness drives people to do astounding things. Kline was perfect; what a shame he has never found another role as good. Sophie was the haunted lady whose life made her that way; Styron's development of her character is masterful. I read an interview in which he was asked how he felt his novel was presented in the film. His reply, "I took the money and ran." He could foresee there would be controversy over his work.

Some viewers, especially the younger ones, cannot appreciate how actresses have developed over the life-time of movie-making. They should watch some of the "silent" films to learn that mime was the only way to express an emotion. Mellodrama, intentionally so - yet, look at the entire work of Bette Davis and Joan Crawford as examples of contrived performances. They were, at last, able to confront one another in "Baby Jane" - attempting to "out-drama" one another made it the wonderful film it is.

There is simply no other actress, that we know of, who is more talented a performer than Streep. Unlike Davis and Crawford, she is not concerned about her "star-power". She becomes whatever character she is playing, no matter if we like them or not. SO WHAT if "Sophie's Choice" was a vehicle to demonstrate her power? Please write another !! William Styron, stand forth ! Because of her absorption into her characters and the many nuances she developed in "Choice", take a look at "The Deer Hunter" to see how powerfully she played an un-extraordinarily plain woman perfectly. Under-playing a character, to make you believe people are actually like that, is the mark of a great actress.

I ardently pray there will be another role for Ms. Streep - even in her older years - that will allow us to become totally engrossed, to get outside of our own lives, to become completely destroyed, delirious, shattered just for a couple of hours, to realize there is still such talent in the world - THAT WE CAN AFFORD TO WATCH, at least.....thank heavens for this magical film.....

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22 out of 23 people found the following comment useful :-
Meryl Streep raises the bar, 8 July 2006

Author: marissabidilla from United States

After enjoying Meryl Streep and Kevin Kline in the recent ensemble comedy "A Prairie Home Companion," it was great to see their dramatic performances in "Sophie's Choice," the movie that made them famous. Here, they play Sophie and Nathan, a volatile young couple living in a Brooklyn boardinghouse in the summer of 1947. Their story, and eventually the story of the Polish Sophie's time in a concentration camp during World War II, is presented through the eyes of Stingo (Peter MacNichol), their young Southern neighbor.

Though other characters appear, especially during the flashbacks, "Sophie's Choice" is largely a three-person drama that relies on subtle interactions. Meryl Streep can always be counted on to give a nuanced performance, but here, especially, she raises the bar. Speaking three languages (including a very realistic portrayal of how foreigners can hesitate and hunt for words when speaking English), going from a haggard Auschwitz inmate to a pretty "blooming rose," consumed by guilt even during the madcap or romantic moments she shares with Nathan, she gives a brilliant performance of a very complex character. Her big scenes with Nazi officers are of course powerful, but I was equally struck by smaller moments: the heartbreaking little flashes of emotion that reveal Sophie's postwar wounds, or the extraordinary conversation she has with a Nazi's daughter.

Kline throws himself into the role of the "fatally glamorous" Nathan and also displays impressive range: he goes from charming to menacing. MacNichol is not up to these (admittedly high) standards. He can play the wide-eyed innocent, but he always seems somewhat thick-headed and lacking in passion. The movie would be more effective if Stingo seemed more truly changed by his experiences with Sophie and Nathan.

Despite Stingo's weakness as a character, I liked the unusual structure that reveals Sophie's story gradually, in flashbacks that draw closer and closer to the ultimate horror. The movie is nicely shot and some of the Brooklyn scenes look as though they actually could have come from a 1940s movie. But no director from the 1940s would have confronted the brutalities of the Holocaust so directly, and few actresses from any era could have given a performance like Streep's.

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25 out of 29 people found the following comment useful :-
Probably the best Oscar-winning performance ever., 3 November 1998
Author: anonymous from Johnnee

If the Oscars were to take every Best Actress winner ever -- from Janet Gaynor to Helen Hunt -- Meryl Streep would definitely have a good shot at winning against them. She gives a spellbinding, totally believable performance as Sophie, a timid Polish woman who befriends Stingo (Peter MacNicol), while she tells him of her tortured past in a concentration camp. As always, she does her foreign accent without fault, and puts her all in her performance, better than she's ever done. The movie itself is very good, too -- it may drag at times (at 2 1/2 hours), but definitely worth a look.

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24 out of 28 people found the following comment useful :-
22 years later.....still the BEST acting ever, 4 January 2004
Author: Niteout23 from Illinois

This is still one of my favorite movies of all time ....and absolutely the best acting by an actress in all the years since then. Streep is magnificent and flawless. The "choice" scene was so horrifying to me (a mother of a young son and daughter at the time) that it took me several years before I could watch the movie without skipping past that part. It is such a small scene, yet its impact was so haunting and so horrifying - I can't think of any other scene in a movie that has affected me like that. Kline was terrific as well, and the musical score is beautiful and memorable. All in all, a wonderful film, and a perfect 10 from me. What a gifted actress!

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22 out of 29 people found the following comment useful :-
The performance of a lifetime, 25 November 2004

Author: citizen813 (citizen813@yahoo.com) from Santa Monica, CA

Although achingly literary at times, moments of true emotional power are rendered by fluid storytelling, Nestor Almendros's haunting cinematography, Marvin Hamlisch's quietly effecting score, a touching performance by Peter MacNichol, and a seminal performance by Meryl Streep; one that Kim Stanley (the celebrated actress/teacher and Oscar nominated mother to Jessica Lange in 'Frances' of the same year) proclaimed, "the titanic portrayal of her generation."

No matter what your initial feelings about this film, I encourage you to go back and take in Streep's dark dance of loss, madness and, finally, sorrowful redemption.

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