Heavens, but this is heavy going. Demi Moore is "Hester", sent on to a Massachusetts colony ahead of her husband to set up their new home. Determined to stand on her own two feet, she invites the enmity of the community by insisting on living on her own. Her only ally seems to be the preacher "Dimmesdale" (Gary Oldman) and he becomes more crucial when it looks like her husband has been killed in a shipwreck and when, shortly thereafter, she becomes pregnant. Determined not to reveal the identity of the father, she endures the disdain from her somewhat puritanical neighbours and both her and her daughter are shunned. Suddenly, enter Robert Duvall ("Roger") her long lost, and not very likeable, husband who decides that vengeance shall be his - and a burning might soon be in the offing. Despite an half decent cast, with some very solid supporting characters from the likes of Edward Hardwicke and Joan Plowright, the story is stolid in it's delivery. The opportunities to illustrate and expose the superstitious and hypocritical standards of the day; of the population who lived in a male-dominated, god-fearing society are lost in a stodgy dialogue with repetitive scenarios that look good, but take the story forward with the speed of a rhino stuck in treacle. This suffered from too much resource, too long a filming schedule and a very weakly delivered narrative and at the end I may well have volunteered myself for the flames.
Oskar Matzerath is a very unusual boy. Refusing to leave the womb until promised a tin drum by his mother, Agnes, Oskar is reluctant to enter a world he sees as filled with hypocrisy and injustice, and vows on his third birthday to never grow up. Miraculously, he gets his wish. As the Nazis rise to power in Danzig, Oskar wills himself to remain a child, beating his tin drum incessantly and screaming in protest at the chaos surrounding him.
In 25 AD, Judah Ben-Hur, a Jew in ancient Judea, opposes the occupying Roman empire. Falsely accused by a Roman childhood friend-turned-overlord of trying to kill the Roman governor, he is put into slavery and his mother and sister are taken away as prisoners.
A radio astronomer receives the first extraterrestrial radio signal ever picked up on Earth. As the world powers scramble to decipher the message and decide upon a course of action, she must make some difficult decisions between her beliefs, the truth, and reality.
Photographer Robert Kincaid wanders into the life of housewife Francesca Johnson for four days in the 1960s.
Manhattan explores how the life of a middle-aged television writer dating a teenage girl is further complicated when he falls in love with his best friend's mistress.
Gus Van Sant tells the story of a young African American man named Jamal who confronts his talents while living on the streets of the Bronx. He accidentally runs into an old writer named Forrester who discovers his passion for writing. With help from his new mentor Jamal receives a scholarship to a private school.
Miss Marple believes she's seen a murder in a passing-by train, yet when the police find no evidence she decides to investigate it on her own.
Miss Marple and Mr. Stringer are witnesses to the death by heart attack of elderly, rich Mr. Enderby. Yet they have their doubts about what happened. The police don't believe them, thus leading Miss Marple to yet again investigate by herself.
A murderer is brought to court and only Miss Marple is unconvinced of his innocence. Once again she begins her own investigation.
The true story of Henry Hill, a half-Irish, half-Sicilian Brooklyn kid who is adopted by neighbourhood gangsters at an early age and climbs the ranks of a Mafia family under the guidance of Jimmy Conway.
The spoiled daughter of a Georgia plantation owner conducts a tumultuous romance with a cynical profiteer during the American Civil War and Reconstruction Era.