Peyton Place
by Mark Robson
from 20th Century Fox
Nominated for nine Academy Awards in 1957, Peyton Place has become synonymous with torrid soap opera. Though the novel by Grace Metalious is even more sensational, the movie provides plenty of tantalizing story turns--secrets, adultery, rape, bitter parents, frustrated teenagers, suicide, and murder. Multiple storylines deftly interweave: Allison MacKenzie (Diane Varsi), an ambitious young girl struggling with the neurotic fears of her mother (Lana Turner, in a career-reviving performance) and the neurotic fears of the boy she loves (Russ Tamblyn), while her best friend Selena Cross (Hope Lange) fights off the brutal advances of her drunken stepfather. The movie had to sanitize the novel's New England town in order to get some of the more unsavory plot turns past the censors; ironically, the glossy "normal" surface makes these events all the more shocking, paving the way for David Lynch's Blue Velvet and Twin Peaks. --Bret Fetzer
Peyton Place is the sensitive and poignant story of coming of age in a small New England village whose peaceful facade hides love and passion, scandal and hypocrisy.
Compulsion
by Richard Fleischer
from 20th Century Fox
In this riveting true story about the notorious 1924 Leopold-loeb murder case, Orson Wells stars as the brillant Clarence Darrow whose history-making defense against capitol punishment saved two wealthy Chicago teenagers from a death sentence.
I Never Promised You A Rose Garden
by Anthony Page
from Buena Vista Home Entertainment
"While ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO'S NEST offered a subversive and satirical look at a psychiatric institutions, ROSE GARDEN delivered a dramatic, emotionally compelling portrait of a young woman's experience of psychiatric treatment. This Oscar(R)-nominated screenplay was adapated from the best-selling novel by Hannah Green. It features a critically acclaimed performance by a young Kathleen Quinlan in an extremely challenging role. Shot with stark realism, the film pulls no punches in its depiction of a psychiatric ward, while maintaining individual and sensitive portrayals of the hospital's residents." -- Roger Corman~~~In her critically acclaimed performance, Kathleen Quinlan inhabits Deborah, a mentally ill teen who struggles between fantasy and reality, escaping to her own imaginary world. Deborah is sent to a psychiatric hospital for treatment by Dr. Fried (Ingmar Bergman favorite Bibi Andersson), who must attempt to rescue Deborah from the cruel beauty of her inner world.~
I Never Promised You a Rose Garden
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