Films with: Plowright, Joan

American film theatre.

A collection of 5 film adaptations of 20th century plays produced by the American Film Theatre.

DVD 2850

Drowning by numbers

Three generations of women, all with the same name, rid themselves of their unwanted husbands one by one and each in the same way: they drown them. The local coroner agrees to declare each of the deaths accidental in return for sexual favors. But when things don't go exactly as planned, he devises a final game that could result in the undoing of them all.

DVD 11950

Enchanted April

London, the 1920s. Lottie and Rose are two married women who share the misery of empty marriages and decide to rent an Italian castle for the spring to get away. In order to save money, they advertise for two other women to join them. Mrs. Fisher is an elderly widow is struggling with a lonely and regimented existence. She jumps at the chance to join the vacation. Lady Caroline Dester is a gorgeous flapper who has been grabbed one too many times and believes that she is sick of men. They arrive in San Salvatore. The seaside italian castle is drenched in wisteria and sunshine. The women find themselves in a transformative beauty so enchanting that they experience changes in themselves they never thought possible.

DVD 6706

Entertainer

A drama of seedy music hall life centering on Archie Rice, an egotistical, third-rate British music hall performer whose career and personal life are in a down-hill spiral.

DVD 1996

House of Bernarda Alba

Set in rural Spain at the turn of this century, the scene is a cloistered household managed by a newly widowed mother of five daughters. Under the shadow of the church and the tyranny bred from a need to protect the reputation of the family, the matron (Bernarda Alba) represses her daughters by enforcing an eight year mourning period. The tensions build rapidly among the imprisoned women, with a demented grandmother playing a role resembling that of a Greek chorus. Eventually, the natural spirits of the daughters circumvent Bernarda, but with tragic results.

DVD 3927

I am David

David is a 12-year-old boy who escapes from a Communist concentration camp. He has little more with him than a compass, a sealed letter, a loaf of bread, and instructions to carry the letter to Copenhagen, Denmark. David is thrust into a world free of Communism for the first time in his young life as he travels across Europe. For David, this is a spiritual voyage of discovery, where he slowly loses his instinctual mistrust of humanity and begins to smile, share, trust and ultimately, love. Ultimately addresses the cruelties, politics, and suffering of warfare while celebrating the resilience of youth and the unbreakable spirit of a child.

DVD 6947

Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont

Mrs. Palfrey, an elegant, genteel widow, came from Scotland to London to take up residence at the Claremont Hotel. Though she had high hopes for the cosmopolitan pleasures of living in a big city, she is soon filled with a sense of uneasiness and gloom.

DVD 5366

School for scandal

Live TV adaptation of the classic Sheridan satire of 18th century English morals and manners.

DVD 8108

Spiderwick chronicles

Children Jared, Simon, and Mallory Grace move into a secluded old estate, and notice that strange things start happening. Now it's up to them to learn the unbelievable truth about the house, and of the amazing creatures that inhabit it.

DVD 13016

Tea with Mussolini

Based in part on his autobiography, director Franco Zeffirelli's Tea with Mussolini is a story about a group of British and American travelers on an indefinite visit to Italy in 1935. Luca is a boy living in Florence whose family situation is precarious at best; his mother has run off and his father has little time for him. Fortunately, he's a welcome guest with Mary, a English woman visiting Italy to soak up European culture. Mary and her friends enjoy the cultured, creative atmosphere of life in Italy, and their initial response to the rise of fascism is to arrange a polite meeting with Mussolini to make sure he and his soldiers mean well.

DVD 363

Thomas Hardy's Return of the native

Longing to leave the English heath, Eustacia Vye becomes embroiled in a love triangle and unfortunate marriage that lead to tragedy.

DVD 6949