Check Out the Trailer

Filled with the best of life and the worst of life, this haunting drama deals with they way people view the world versus how it really is. Some have a rosy colored view out of naiveté and others use it out of survival. Director Alan J. Pakula (ALL THE PRESIDENT’S MEN) adapts William Styron’s novel, which is virtually a three-character story that unfolds with one unsettling discovery upon another, only increasing our captivation with the lives of the flawed characters. My memory of this film always focuses on Sophie “big shocking choice,” but upon another viewing I was gripped more with the smaller choices, even frivolous choices, that all the characters must make.

Stingo (Peter MacNicol, PORKY’S) is a young man who has left his Southern home to move to the Northern Sodom, as New York City is called by his father. He has saved a bit of money so that he can work on his great novel. At his apartment in Brooklyn, he meets the bohemian couple Sophie (Meryl Streep, ADAPTED) and Nathan (Kevin Kline, A FISH CALLED WANDA). Sophie is a survivor of Auschwitz and Nathan is her passionate lover, who saved her life when she was suffering from anemia. Their love is volatile; Stingo’s introduction to them is Nathan screaming at Sophie in the hall that he needs her like he needs anthrax. Stingo’s friendship with the duo will change the way he looks at the world, breaking down his naïve expectations.

Read the rest of this entry »