Classic Literature on Film - 6-DVD Box Set ( Anna Karenina / Wuthering Heights / A Voyage Round My Father / The Heiress / Jane Eyre / Lorna Doone )

Classic Literature on Film - 6-DVD Box Set (DVD) (*)

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Original Title: Anna Karenina / Wuthering Heights / A Voyage Round My Father / The Heiress / Jane Eyre / Lorna Doone
Language Selections:
English ( Dolby Digital Stereo )

Product Origin/Format:
Australia ( PAL/Region 0 )

Running Time:
674 min

Aspect Ratio:
Fullscreen

Special Features:
Box Set
Interactive Menu
Multi-DVD Set
Scene Access
Black & White

Movie filmed in 1943 - 1990 and produced in:
United Kingdom ( Great Britain, Ireland )
United States ( USA, Canada )

Directed By:
Julien Duvivier
Peter Sasdy
Alvin Rakoff
William Wyler
Robert Stevenson
Andrew Grieve

Written By:
Jean Anouilh
Guy Morgan
Emily Brontë
Hugh Leonard
John Mortimer
Ruth Goetz
Augustus Goetz
Charlotte Brontë
Aldous Huxley
R.D. Blackmore
Matthew Jacobs

Actors:
Vivien Leigh ..... Anna Karenina
Ralph Richardson ..... Karenin
Kieron Moore ..... Count Vronsky
Hugh Dempster ..... Stefan Oblonsky
Mary Kerridge ..... Dolly Oblonsky
Marie Lohr ..... Princess Shcherbatsky
Frank Tickle ..... Prince Shcherbatsky
Sally Ann Howes ..... Kitty Shcherbatsky
Niall MacGinnis ..... Levin
Michael Gough ..... Nicholai
Martita Hunt ..... Princess Betty Tversky
Heather Thatcher ..... Countess Lydia Ivanovna
Helen Haye ..... Countess Vronsky
Mary Martlew ..... Princess Nathalia
Ruby Miller ..... Countess Meskov
Ian McShane ..... Heathcliff (4 episodes, 1967)
Angela Scoular ..... Catherine Earnshaw / ... (4 episodes, 1967)
John Garrie ..... Joseph (4 episodes, 1967)
Anne Stallybrass ..... Ellen (4 episodes, 1967)
Anthony Edwards ..... Robert (4 episodes, 1967)
James Haswell ..... Manservant (4 episodes, 1967)
Jeremy Longhurst ..... Lockwood's voice / ... (3 episodes, 1967)
William Marlowe ..... Hindley (3 episodes, 1967)
Angela Douglas ..... Isabella Linton (3 episodes, 1967)
Drewe Henley ..... Edgar Linton (3 episodes, 1967)
Keith Buckley ..... Hareton (2 episodes, 1967)
Paul Bartlett ..... Hareton as a child (2 episodes, 1967)
Janet Bruce ..... Zillah (2 episodes, 1967)
Michael Wennink ..... Linton (2 episodes, 1967)
David Markham ..... Mr. Linton (2 episodes, 1967)
Laurence Olivier ..... Clifford Mortimer
Alan Bates ..... John Mortimer
Jane Asher ..... Elizabeth
Elizabeth Sellars ..... Mother
Michael Aldridge ..... Headmaster
Alan Cox ..... Son as a Boy
Norman Bird ..... Ham
Albert Welling ..... Japhet
James A. Downer ..... Reigate
Susan Littler ..... Miss Cox
Gay Wilde ..... Miss Baker
Anthony Sharp ..... Film Director
Ann Davies ..... A.T.S. Girl
Judy Riley ..... A.T.S. Girl
Jonathan Newth ..... Boustead
Olivia de Havilland ..... Catherine Sloper
Montgomery Clift ..... Morris Townsend
Ralph Richardson ..... Dr. Austin Sloper
Miriam Hopkins ..... Lavinia Penniman
Vanessa Brown ..... Maria
Betty Linley ..... Mrs. Montgomery
Ray Collins ..... Jefferson Almond
Mona Freeman ..... Marian Almond
Selena Royle ..... Elizabeth Almond
Paul Lees ..... Arthur Townsend
Harry Antrim ..... Mr. Abeel
Russ Conway ..... Quintus
David Thursby ..... Geier
Orson Welles ..... Edward Rochester
Joan Fontaine ..... Jane Eyre
Margaret O'Brien ..... Adele Varens
Peggy Ann Garner ..... Jane Eyre as a Child
John Sutton ..... Dr. Rivers
Sara Allgood ..... Bessie
Henry Daniell ..... Henry Brocklehurst
Agnes Moorehead ..... Mrs. Reed
Aubrey Mather ..... Colonel Dent
Edith Barrett ..... Mrs. Fairfax
Barbara Everest ..... Lady Ingraham
Hillary Brooke ..... Blanche Ingraham
Michael MacKenzie ..... John Ridd's Father
Andrew Ferguson ..... Young John
Sean Bean ..... Carver Doone
Claire Madden ..... Young Lorna
Clive Owen ..... John Ridd
Paul Young ..... Neighbour
Jane Gurnett ..... Annie Ridd
Billie Whitelaw ..... Sarah Ridd
Polly Walker ..... Lorna Doone
Miles Anderson ..... Tom Faggus
Kenneth Haigh ..... Judge Jeffreys
Euan Grant MacLachlan ..... Ensie Doone
Robert Stephens ..... Sir Ensor Doone
Martin Heller ..... Priest
Rachel Kempson ..... Lady Dugal

Synopsis:

Anna Karenina (1948)
A married woman's affair with a dashing young officer has tragic results.
Wuthering Heights (1967)
Angela Scoular and Ian McShane respectively starred as the foolishly headstrong aristocrat Cathy and her rough-hewn gypsy sweetheart Heathcliff.
A Voyage Round My Father (1984)
John Mortimer's autobiographical play Voyage 'Round My Father was given a class-A TV adaptation in 1984. Mortimer, best known for his Rumpole of the Bailey stories, has fashioned an unexpurgated but affectionate portrait of his highly eccentric lawyer father Clifford Mortimer, played by Sir Laurence Olivier. Alan Bates costars as the younger Mortimer, who must deal with his father's decreasing ability to take care of himself. This was Olivier's second major TV appearance of 1984: the first was King Lear. Filmed in Britain, Voyage 'Round My Father was syndicated to American TV outlets as part of the Mobil Showcase Network series.
The Heiress (1949)
A young naive woman falls for a handsome young man who her emotionally abusive father suspects is a fortune hunter.
Jane Eyre (1943)
After a harsh childhood, orphan Jane Eyre is hired by Edward Rochester, the brooding lord of a mysterious manor house to care for his young daughter.
Lorna Doone (1990)
John Ridd was just a boy when the villainous Carver Doone callously murdered his father. Now a young man, John has two driving passions: his thirst for revenge against the outlaw Doones, and his love for the beautiful Lorna, daughter of his sworn enemies.

The second edition of classic literature on film showcases more of the finest collections of period dramas to come to life on screen. ANNA KARENINA (1948): Tolstoy's definitive nineteenth century romantic tragedy comes to life onscreen with deft direction by Julien Duvivier and a haunting performance by Vivian Leigh in the title role. Beautiful Anna Karenina is comfortably married to a distinguished Czarist statesman (Ralph Richardson) until she meets a dashing young soldier and nobleman (Kieron Moore). When she runs off with the officer she is ostracized by society, denied a divorce by her husband and forbidden to see her son. The hopelessness of the situation, compounded by her lover's lack of understanding about her disgrace, prompts the tragic heroine to believe life is no longer worth living in one of the cinema's most spellbinding tragic tales. A VOYAGE AROUND MY FATHER: In the screen adaptation of the highly acclaimed West End play A Voyage Round My Father, Alan Bates stars as John Mortimer and Laurence Olivier as 'the father' in an affectionate, anecdotal tribute to fathers everywhere. When Clifford Mortimer develops blindness in middle age, his battles in the courtroom as an eccentric lawyer continue - despite his inability to care for himself. Picking up the pieces is his son John, whose relationship with his father suffers as he tries to come to terms with his conflicting feelings towards him. JANE EYRE (1943): After spending her childhood in an orphanage young Eyre (Joan Fontaine) becomes governess to the ward of an imposing older man named Edward Rochester (Orson Welles). Ultimately Jane's gentle influence forces Rochester to drop his forbidding veneer and he proposes to her. But the discovery that Rochester is already married and further that his volatile wife is locked in the attic prompts Jane to leave as a series of tragic events unfold in this riveting classic that also features Margaret O'Brien. WUTHERING HEIGHTS (1967): Wuthering Heights is a heartrending story of unrequited love and sibling rivalry. When the dark brooding orphan boy Heathcliff enters the Earnshaw household at Wuthering Heights, he is at first shunned by his new stepsiblings, Catherine and Hindley. Catherine's feelings toward Heathcliff soon change, however, and the two fall deeply in love, but Hindley's rivalry with Heathcliff only deepens with time. When Hindley eventually inherits the estate, he treats Heathcliffe as little more than a servant, and when Catherine later marries a neighbouring landowner, who can offer her social advancement, Heathcliff's humiliation is complete, and he charts a course of revenge that will have tragic consequences for everyone. THE HEIRESS: Olivia De Havilland is Catherine Sloper an aristocratic young woman living under the scrutiny of her malevolent father. When a handsome but penniless suitor proposes her father believes he could only be after her vast estate and threatens disinheritance. Can she be rich in both love and money? LORNA DOONE (1990): John Ridd was just a boy when the villainous Carver Doone callously murdered his father. Now a young man, John has two driving passions: his thirst for revenge against the outlaw Doones, and his love for the beautiful Lorna, daughter of his sworn enemies.

Anna Karenina (1948)
Stefan and Dolly Oblonsky have had a little spat and Stefan has asked his sister, Anna Karenina, to come down to Moscow to help mend the rift. Anna's companion on the train from St. Petersburg is Countess Vronsky who is met at the Moscow station by her son. Col. Vronsky looks very dashing in his uniform and it's love at first sight when he looks at Anna and their eyes meet. Back in St. Petersburg they keep running into each other at parties. Since she has a husband and small son, they must be very discreet if they are going to see each other alone.
Wuthering Heights (1967)
Of the many British TV adaptations of Emily Bronte's gothic romance Wuthering Heights, only a handful were able to cover the entire novel by virtue of the miniseries format. The first of these was telecast in four 50-minute segments from October 28 to November 18, 1967. Angela Scoular and Ian McShane were respectively starred as the foolishly headstrong aristocrat Cathy and her rough-hewn gypsy sweetheart Heathcliff.
Season 1
An End to Childhood S1, Ep1 28 Oct. 1967
The First Revenge S1, Ep2 4 Nov. 1967
The Abduction S1, Ep3 11 Nov. 1967
The Last Revenge S1, Ep4 18 Nov. 1967
A Voyage Round My Father (1984)
Before creating the beloved courtroom drama Rumpole of the Bailey, writer John Mortimer found inspiration in his own life for this portrait of a difficult but enduring love between father and son in mid-20th-century Britain. Screen legend Laurence Olivier stars as the eccentric patriarch--a blind barrister so stubborn and cantankerous that he refuses to acknowledge his sightlessness. Alan Bates (Gosford Park) portrays his devoted son, who follows his father's footsteps in the law while longing to become a writer, with Jane Asher (Brideshead Revisited) as his wife. Adapted for the screen by Mortimer himself and filmed largely on location at his family estate in bucolic Oxfordshire, this production garnered multiple awards, including an International Emmy for best drama. By turns hilarious and heartbreaking, it captures the special bond between father and son, which at times seems unbearable--but ultimately unbreakable.
The Heiress (1949)
In 1840's New York Catherine lives with her father, Dr. Sloper. Her mother died some years before, and Dr. Sloper still idolizers her, and never misses an opportunity to compare her daughter to her -- a comparison the daughter can never win. When Morris Townsend, a handsome but pennyless young man, comes along, and woos and wins his daughter's heart, Dr. Sloper is sure that he is after her considerable inheritance, and opposes their marriage. Dr. Sloper takes his daughter to Europe in hopes she will forget Morris, but she does not. After Catherine returns to New York, the young lovers plan to elope. Dr. Sloper threatens to disinherit his daughter. Will this dissuade Morris?
Jane Eyre (1943)
Small, plain and poor, Jane Eyre comes to Thornfield Hall as governess to the young ward of Edward Rochester. Denied love all her life, Jane can't help but be attracted to the intelligent, vibrant, energetic Mr. Rochester, a man twice her age. But just when Mr. Rochester seems to be returning the attention, he invites the beautiful and wealthy Blanche Ingram and her party to stay at his estate. Meanwhile, the secret of Thornfield Hall could ruin all their chances for happiness.
Lorna Doone (1990)
This British version of Lorna Doone is one of the more rewarding film adaptations of the venerable R. D. Blackmore novel. The plot remains as ever: Lorna (Polly Walker), a feisty 17th century Scots lass, falls in love with a much-despised landowner (Sean Bean). Lorna's father, a notorious brigand, foments a peasant rebellion against her lover. It turns out of course, that Lorna is actually a high-born heiress, kidnapped in infancy. Billie Whitelaw and Rachel Kempson costar in this made-for-television costume epic.

This product was added to our catalog on Saturday 24 May, 2014.