A butler who sacrificed body and soul to service in the years leading up to World War II realizes too late how misguided his loyalty was to his lordly employer.
In a Florence pensione circa 1900 with English guests, George Emerson (Julian Sands) and his dad (Denholm Elliott) offer their rooms with views to Lucy Honeychurch (Helena Bonham Carter) and her chaperone, Charlotte Bartlett (Dame Maggie Smith). Lucy and George get acquainted, but Lucy returns to England. George and Lucy meet again, but now she's engaged.
Director:
James Ivory
Stars:
Maggie Smith,
Helena Bonham Carter,
Denholm Elliott
Rich Mr. Dashwood dies, leaving his second wife and her three daughters poor by the rules of inheritance. The two eldest daughters are the title opposites.
A tale of nineteenth-century New York high society in which a young lawyer falls in love with a woman separated from her husband, while he is engaged to the woman's cousin.
Director:
Martin Scorsese
Stars:
Daniel Day-Lewis,
Michelle Pfeiffer,
Winona Ryder
C.S. Lewis, a world-renowned Christian theologian, writer and professor, leads a passionless life until he meets spirited poet Joy Gresham from the U.S.
Director:
Richard Attenborough
Stars:
Anthony Hopkins,
Debra Winger,
Julian Fellowes
In the mid-19th century, a mute woman is sent to New Zealand along with her young daughter and prized piano for an arranged marriage to a wealthy landowner, but is soon lusted after by a local worker on the plantation.
At the close of World War II, a young nurse tends to a badly-burned plane crash victim. His past is shown in flashbacks, revealing an involvement in a fateful love affair.
Director:
Anthony Minghella
Stars:
Ralph Fiennes,
Juliette Binoche,
Willem Dafoe
Two bikers head from L.A. to New Orleans through the open country and desert lands, and along the way they meet a man who bridges a counter-culture gap they are unaware of.
Following the death of her adoptive parents, a successful young black optometrist establishes contact with her biological mother -- a lonely white factory worker living in poverty in East London.
Director:
Mike Leigh
Stars:
Timothy Spall,
Brenda Blethyn,
Phyllis Logan
Rule bound head butler Stevens' (Sir Anthony Hopkins') world of manners and decorum in the household he maintains is tested by the arrival of housekeeper Miss Kenton (Dame Emma Thompson), who falls in love with him in pre-World War II Britain. The possibility of romance and his master's cultivation of ties with the Nazi cause challenge his carefully maintained veneer of servitude.Written by
Keith Loh <loh@sfu.ca>
Director James Ivory described this movie's principal character, James Stevens (Sir Anthony Hopkins), "as a bit like a priest who puts his life almost on an altar. He serves his lord unconditionally, and in this case, his lord is literally a Lord (Darlington (James Fox)). Perhaps it's a mentality that we don't know so well in the United States, except in the military, or indeed, in the priesthood. Within Stevens' life there is a very, very small area that is his, and the rest of the time he belongs to, or is committed to, a larger idea, or ideal: that of unquestioning service to an English aristocrat: his master, right or wrong." See more »
Goofs
When Mr. Stevens arrives in the market town on his way to Clevedon, a modern "National Westminster Bank" sign is seen on a building in the background as he is getting his case out of the car. See more »
Quotes
Miss Kenton:
Why do people clap when the lights come on?
Stevens:
For some people the evening is the best part of the day...
See more »
Very deliberate but marvelous study of a lifetime butler in an English noble household. The film does a wonderful parallel examination of the man's life set against the tumult of the 1930s that effectively did away with the British Empire and made him and others like him, as people curiously obsolete.
An extremely rare example of sanity when dealing with the subject of War. Most films as we know too well, concentrate on the futility and bottom line cost in humanity, which is to be expected since generally speaking, an artist will always present this point of view. However in most cases, it's an incomplete and wildly immature handling of the topic. This film addresses if you can believe it, the folly of avoiding War thru appeasement, and hammers home what might have been avoided if the British had called Hitler to the carpet early on, instead of playing chess with him. This is the backdrop; the main story is that of the butler, Stevens, an ostensibly simple character played with unimaginable complexity, by Hopkins. The fascinating examination of one man's sense of duty, a devotion that transcends all other obligations and aspirations in his life has never been so poignantly or expertly presented to an audience. Everything about the film, the supporting cast in particular is a rousing triumph. I cannot overly recommend this.
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Very deliberate but marvelous study of a lifetime butler in an English noble household. The film does a wonderful parallel examination of the man's life set against the tumult of the 1930s that effectively did away with the British Empire and made him and others like him, as people curiously obsolete.
An extremely rare example of sanity when dealing with the subject of War. Most films as we know too well, concentrate on the futility and bottom line cost in humanity, which is to be expected since generally speaking, an artist will always present this point of view. However in most cases, it's an incomplete and wildly immature handling of the topic. This film addresses if you can believe it, the folly of avoiding War thru appeasement, and hammers home what might have been avoided if the British had called Hitler to the carpet early on, instead of playing chess with him. This is the backdrop; the main story is that of the butler, Stevens, an ostensibly simple character played with unimaginable complexity, by Hopkins. The fascinating examination of one man's sense of duty, a devotion that transcends all other obligations and aspirations in his life has never been so poignantly or expertly presented to an audience. Everything about the film, the supporting cast in particular is a rousing triumph. I cannot overly recommend this.