Harold Pinter

A tailor living in Panama reluctantly becomes a spy for a British Agent. John le Carré's spy thriller is brought to the big screen. A British spy is banished to Panama after having an affair with an ambassador's mistress. Once there he makes connection with a local tailor with a criminal past and connections to all of the top political and gangster figures in Panama. The tailor also has a wife, who works for the canal administrator, and a huge debt. The spy's mission is to learn what the President intends to do with the Panama Canal, but he's really in business for himself, blackmailing the tailor into spinning a fantastic tale about the canal being sold to China and former mercenaries ready to topple the current government. —John Sacksteder <jsackste@bellsouth.net>

Fanny, born into a poor family, is sent away to live with wealthy uncle Sir Thomas, his wife and their four children, where she'll be brought up for a proper introduction to society. At 10, Fanny Price, a poor relation, goes to live at Mansfield Park, the estate of her aunt's husband, Sir Thomas. Clever, studious, and a writer with an ironic imagination and fine moral compass, she becomes especially close to Edmund, Thomas's younger son. Fanny is soon possessed of beauty as well as a keen mind and comes to the attention of a neighbor, Henry Crawford. Thomas promotes this match, but to his displeasure, Fanny has a mind of her own, asking Henry to prove himself worthy. As Edmund courts Henry's sister and as light shines on the link between Thomas's fortunes and New World slavery, Fanny must assess Henry's character and assert her heart as well as her wit. —<jhailey@hotmail.com>

Under a dystopian religious tyranny, most women cannot conceive children. Those young women who can live in a form of sexual slavery to provide children for influential families. In a future dystopian land (formerly the United States of America), the story tells of Kate, a "handmaid". Kate is a criminal, guilty of the crime of trying to escape and sentenced to become a Handmaid. Handmaids' sole function is to bear the children of influential men whose wives (like most women) have been rendered infertile due to pollution. After rigorous group training by "Aunt" Lydia ("Aunts" train and discipline handmaids) in the proper way to behave, Kate is assigned as Handmaid to the Commander. Kate is attracted to Nick, the Commander's chauffeur. At the same time, a resistance movement begins to challenge the regime. —Reid Gagle (updated by R.M. Sieger) In the not-too-distant future, the USA has become the Republic of Gilead. It is a tyrannically run state that brutally suppresses all opposition, whose policies are based primarily on the Old Testament and which downgrades women in particular to mere child bearers and deprives them of all rights. Former librarian Kate therefore tries to flee Gilead with her husband and their daughter. However, she is intercepted at the border and ends up as a "servant" of the state in the household of Commander Fred, one of the leading military officers in Gilead, and his wife Serena. They need Kate primarily for the purpose of procreation and henceforth call her "Offred". However, when she learns that Fred is incapable of procreating, Kate sees her position in jeopardy, as her predecessors have also been solely blamed for her failure to conceive. In her situation, Kate believes the best strategy is to maintain a good relationship with both the commander and his wife, especially as they both have ways of finding out where their daughter is. Through the commander's chauffeur, Nick, Kate hopes to escape, but must continue to be obedient. Her situation becomes untenable over time, and when she sees how her friends treat servants who do not fulfill their duties, she wants to act as quickly as possible. —Arte Following a coup, America is a country still at war with itself and ruled by a repressive Bible-inspired regime. Past pollution means only 1% of women can bear children, and anyone committing a crime and found to be a potential mother is put into an institution run by "Aunts" to be indoctrinated. One such young woman is Kate, who is turned over to Fred, a high ranking member of the security forces, to attempt to procreate. Kate then becomes known as "Offred" (for property "of Fred"). Serena, Fred's wife, is jealous and vicious. The state's grip seems to be tightening but Kate still has her own mind and she finds some other people who are prepared to resist. —Jeremy Perkins {J-26} (updated by R.M. Sieger)

Anna and Mike portray two characters in a film set in 19th century England who fall in love despite the fact that Mike's character is engaged. In nineteenth century England Charles, a paleontologist, is engaged to be married, but who falls in love with outcast Sarah, whose melancholy makes her leave him after a short, but passionate affair. Anna (Meryl Streep) and Mike (Jeremy Irons), who play the characters of Sarah and Charles, go, during the shooting of the movie, through a relationship that runs parallel to that of their characters. —Leon Wolters <wolters@strw.LeidenUniv.nl> John Fowles' original novel "The French Lieutenant's Woman" was distinguished by a literary technique that involved telling a story of Victorian sexual and social oppression within the bounds of a 1970s viewpoint. How does one convey this time-frame dichotomy on film? The decision made by Writer and Director Edith Ritchie and Screenwriter Harold Pinter was to frame Fowles' basic plot within a "modern" context of their own making. While we watch as Sarah, a nineteenth century Englishwoman ruined by an affair with a French Lieutenant, enters into another disastrous relationship with principled young Charles (Jeremy Irons), we are constantly made aware that what we're seeing is only a movie. This is done by surrounding the story with a modern narrative, focusing on a movie production company which is on-location filming "The French Lieutenant's Woman". Meryl Streep doubles in the role of Sara and the American actress who plays her, while Jeremy Irons essays the dual role of Charles and the handsome Briton playing Charles. Likewise, everyone else in the cast is seen as "themselves" and as their French Lieutenant's Woman characters. Not surprisingly, the "real" Streep and Irons enter into an affair which closely parallels their characters' relationship. —Bob Harren

The Go-Between recounts the secret love affair between a beautiful heiress and a poor tenant farmer, told by the twelve-year-old boy who is hired to be their message bearer.

Beautiful mother of five Jo leaves the banality of her marriage to second husband Giles to wed her passionate screenwriter lover, Jake Armitage. As her suspicion of Jake's philandering grows, Jo's sanity spirals. Screenwriter Jake Armitage (Peter Finch) and his wife Jo (Anne Bancroft) live in London with six of Jo's eight children; the two eldest boys are at boarding school The children are spread over Jo's three marriages; only the youngest is Jake's biological child, but he treats them all as his own. Jo left her second husband Giles (Richard Johnson) after meeting Giles' friend Jake; the two were immediately attracted to each other. Their upper-middle-class life is very different from Giles and Jo's; who lived in a barn in the English countryside. But Jo is ruminating about her strained marriage to Jake, with issues on both sides. Jo suspects Jake of chronic infidelity, only confronting him with her suspicions whenever evidence presents itself. Jo's psychiatrist believes that she uses childbirth as a rationale for sex, which he believes she finds vulgar. The combination of these issues has placed Jo in a fragile metal state. Both state that they love each other, but neither seems to like the other much. As they prepare to move back to the English countryside, into a new house within sight of Jo's old barn, both Jo and Jake come to their own unspoken individual conclusions of whether their marriage can withstand these strains.

Upper-class Tony hires servant Hugo Barrett, who turns out to have a hidden agenda. The aristocratic Tony (James Fox) moves to London and hires the servant Hugo Barrett (Dirk Bogarde) for all services at home. Barrett seems to be a loyal and competent employee, but Tony's girlfriend Susan (Wendy Craig) does not like him, and asks Tony to send him away. When Barrett brings his sister Vera (Sarah Miles) to work and live in the house, Tony has a brief hidden affair with her. After travelling with Susan and spending a couple of days in a friend's house outside London, the couple unexpectedly returns and finds Barrett and Vera, who are actually lovers, in Tony's room. They are fired and Susan breaks with Tony. Later, Tony meets Barrett alone in a pub and hires him back, and Barrett imposes his real dark intentions in the house, turning the table and switching position with his master. —Claudio Carvalho, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil Professional servant Hugo Barrett (Dirk Bogarde) is hired by a wealthy young man, Tony (James Fox), as his man-servant. Initially, Barrett is the ideal man-servant, quiet, loyal, submissive, unquestioning, and very helpful. However, over time the shine wears off and he reveals more of his true self, and it's far from submissive. Also, with time the master-servant dynamic starts to shift. —grantss In desperate need of an impeccable valet, the vain and work-shy London aristocrat, Tony, employs working-class Hugo Barrett as his live-in manservant. Of course, at first glance, Barrett is a keeper; however, imperceptible nuances of misconduct and a subtly intense power-play between master and servant will soon lead to a corrosive undercurrent of pent-up emotions, rendering Hugo indispensable. Then, Vera, Barrett's seductive sister from Manchester, enters the picture, and the pernicious psychological abuse escalates. But, what does the insidious servant want? —Nick Riganas Including of their interrelationships, is largely a four person character study split along class lines of proverbial and literal masters and servants in British society. Well off Tony has just returned to London after doing development work in Africa, he planning on doing the same in South America. Setting up a just purchased house in Knightsbridge, Tony hires Barrett as his manservant, the sole servant in the household in Tony not wanting to deal with others who he considers onlookers into his life. There is an immediate and open dislike by Tony's fiancée Sandra of Barrett who she doesn't trust, which places a strain between her and Tony if only because her want for Tony to fire Barrett demonstrates to him that she doesn't trust his opinion, especially as he has become reliant on Barrett for many of his day-to-day needs. Barrett is able to convince Tony to hire his "sister" Vera to be the household maid. As time passes, the interrelationships between the four begin to morph where the class lines not only blur but are smashed. —Huggo