In This Issue:

September 2009

What's New on DVD

Frost/Nixon (2008)

Drama. Brainy/Fast-paced.
Color. 122 mins. Rated R. Directed By Ron Howard. Starring Michael Sheen and Frank Langella.
Based on Peter Morgan's stage play, Ron Howard's "Frost/Nixon" is an intelligent, impressive big-screen realization of a dialogue-heavy script that nevertheless packs in plenty of dramatic suspense, ... Read More >
 

Frozen River (2008)

Drama/Mystery/Suspense. Intense/Moving/Spine-tingling.
Color. 97 mins. Rated R. Directed By Courtney Hunt. Starring Melissa Leo.
Hunt's Oscar-nominated debut is a nailbiting affair, a cross-border thriller dramatizing Indian affairs, gender politics, and the controversial issue of illegal immigration. Set in upstate New York ... Read More >
 

Howl's Moving Castle (2004)

Family. Fast-paced/Moving/Offbeat.
Animated. 119 mins. Rated PG. Directed By Hayao Miyazaki. Starring Christian Bale, Lauren Bacall and Emily Mortimer.
Like all of Miyazaki's hand-drawn animated films, "Howl" is charming, magical, good-humored, visually breathtaking, and swollen with themes about identity, humanity, and finding one's way in the ... Read More >
 

Of Time and the City (2008)

Documentary. Brainy/Offbeat/Witty.
Black & White. 74 mins. Unrated. Directed By Terence Davies.
Part collage, part memoir, "Of Time and the City" takes an intimate, bird's eye view of notable goings-on in the Liverpool, famous as the home of the Beatles. Davies frames each interlude with droll ... Read More >
 

Science is Fiction: 23 Films by Jean Painleve (1996)

Documentary/Foreign/Longer Films/Film Series/Collections/Silents. Brainy/Offbeat/Scenic.
Black & White. 313 mins. Rated Unrated. Directed By Jean Painleve.
Restored and digitized in pristine detail by Criterion, the films collected here reveal the technical genius and vibrant creative energies of Painleve, a polymath with a special interest in zoology ... Read More >
 

Time Limit (1957)

Drama/War/Westerns. Brainy/Intense.
Black & White. 96 mins. Rated Unrated. Directed By Karl Malden. Starring Richard Widmark and Richard Basehart.
The late actor Karl Malden, best known for his long-running stint on "Streets of San Francisco," came from the Elia Kazan school of theatrical realism, and in his one outing as director, creates a ... Read More >
 

Uncounted: The New Math of American Elections (2007)

Documentary. Brainy.
Color. 81 mins. Unrated. Directed By David Earnhardt.
This strenuously argued, eye-opening political doc contends that voting-machine companies, politicos, and others are pulling the wool over our eyes when it comes to maintaining the integrity of our ... Read More >
 

Waltz with Bashir (2008)

Documentary/War/Westerns. Brainy/Intense/Offbeat.
Animated. 90 mins. Rated R. Directed By Ari Folman.
Folman's expertly hand-animated, Oscar-nominated documentary is a memoir of sorts, mixing evocative personal reverie and candid recorded interviews to revisit an infamous event known as the ... Read More >
 

Wendy and Lucy (2008)

Drama. Moving/Offbeat.
Color. 80 mins. Rated R. Directed By Kelly Reichardt. Starring Will Patton and Michelle Williams.
Directed by Kelly Reichardt, who helmed the excellent indie "Old Joy", this deceptively spare, melancholy character study packs an emotional wallop in its eighty minute running time. The usually ... Read More >
 

Wise Blood (1979)

Drama. Brainy/Intense/Offbeat.
Color. 109 mins. Rated R. Directed By John Huston. Starring Brad Dourif and Harry Dean Stanton.
Dourif is brilliant in Huston's "Wise Blood," based on the novel by Flannery O'Connor, playing a man at war with faith, and ultimately with his own ingrained sense of religion and morality. He is ... Read More >
 

Theme of the Month: 10 Great Books, 10 Great Movies

Here's a debate that's always confounded us: which is better, the book or the movie? Though such comparisons seem natural enough, it's hard to make worthy assessments, since the conventions of each medium differ so markedly. Books explore the dense inner lives of characters in a way movies can't; films use sight, sound and motion to create an immediacy books can't. If the story and characters sing, both books and movies can be wonderful…they're just different.

Let us know what you think and better yet, email us your suggestions of great books made into great movies! john@bestmoviesbyfarr.com

Anna Karenina (1935)

Drama/Romance. Moving/Scenic.
Black & White. 95 mins. Rated Unrated. Directed By Clarence Brown. Starring Fredric March, Freddie Bartholemew and Greta Garbo.
Leo Tolstoy's epic romance, though significantly condensed, makes a fitting subject for this glossy, glamorous MGM film adaptation. Garbo, the studio's biggest female star at the time, is perfectly ... Read More >
 

Far from the Madding Crowd (1967)

Drama/Romance. Intense/Moving/Scenic.
Color. 171 mins. Rated Unrated. Directed By John Schlesinger. Starring Peter Finch, Terence Stamp, Alan Bates and Julie Christie.
John Schlesinger ("Billy Liar," "Marathon Man") marshals a hugely talented cast to enact the multiple-suitor scenario in this sterling adaptation of Thomas Hardy's class-conscious novel. The ace up ... Read More >
 

From Here To Eternity (1953)

Drama. Moving/Scenic.
Black & White. 118 mins. Rated Unrated. Directed By Fred Zinnemann. Starring Burt Lancaster, Frank Sinatra, Montgomery Clift and Deborah Kerr.
This stunning adaptation of Jones's smash bestseller virtually swept the 1953 Oscars - and no wonder. All these years later, it remains a fascinating, multi-layered human drama set within the larger ... Read More >
 

Great Expectations (1946)

Drama/Family. Brainy/Moving.
Black & White. 118 mins. Rated Unrated. Directed By David Lean. Starring Alec Guinness, John Mills and Valerie Hobson.
Perhaps the finest Dickens adaptation ever, this rich, fascinating film about chance encounters and changing fortunes begins with a nerve-rattling sequence in a graveyard that's one of the finest ... Read More >
 

Lost Horizon (1937)

Drama/Family. Brainy/Scenic.
Black & White. 135 mins. Rated Unrated. Directed By Frank Capra. Starring Ronald Colman, John Howard and Jane Wyatt.
This epic tale of a lost civilization where people lead long, peaceful lives was heady escape for Americans wanting respite from the growing threat of Fascism abroad. "Horizon" stars the ... Read More >
 

Romeo and Juliet (1968)

Romance. Moving.
Color. 138 mins. Rated G. Directed By Franco Zeffirelli. Starring Leonard Whiting and Olivia Hussey.
My favorite version of this oft-filmed classic is Zeffirelli's Oscar-nominated version. Starring two unknowns in the title roles (17-year-old Whiting and 15-year-old Hussey), the movie remains true ... Read More >
 

Sense and Sensibility (1995)

Romance. Moving/Brainy.
Color. 136 mins. Rated PG. Directed By Ang Lee. Starring Hugh Grant, Alan Rickman, Kate Winslet and Emma Thompson.
Ang Lee's first Engish-language film, "Sense" is a vivid period drama, intelligent and involving, and benefitting from Austen's skewering of English social mores, gossip and materialism. Young ... Read More >
 

The Grapes of Wrath (1940)

Drama. Intense/Moving.
Black & White. 129 mins. Rated Unrated. Directed By John Ford. Starring Henry Fonda and Jane Darwell.
Directed by the brilliant John Ford, this movie is poetry with Henry Fonda giving the performance of his career as Tom Joad and actress Jane Darwell winning an Oscar for her brilliant portrayal of ... Read More >
 

The Last of the Mohicans (1992)

Action/Adventure. Fast-paced/Scenic/Moving.
Color. 114 mins. Rated R. Directed By Michael Mann. Starring Daniel Day-Lewis and Madeleine Stowe.
With director Mann setting a rapid pace for the story, the movie, equal parts action and romance, takes hold of the audience and never lets go. The always intense Day-Lewis makes a riveting, ... Read More >
 

Women in Love (1970)

Drama. Brainy/Scenic.
Color. 131 mins. Rated R. Directed By Ken Russell. Starring Alan Bates, Oliver Reed and Glenda Jackson.
This intelligent, passionate adaptation of the D.H. Lawrence novel by British director Russell fuses romantic classicism with frank talk, as the frolicking foursome openly discuss their philosophies ... Read More >
 

Spotlight

• John finished "The 100 Best Train Movies by Farr" to be released by Kalsbach Publishing in early 2010!

• Visit http://www.reel13.org to see John's recommendations following Channel 13's September 5th screenings of the classic, "Six Degrees of Separation" starring Donald Sutherland and the indie, "Away from Here" starring Julianne Moore.