84 Charing Cross Road
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Actor: Anne Bancroft, Anthony Hopkins, Judi DenchBrand: Sony
DVD: Region Code 99
Audio: English (Unknown); Chinese (Subtitled); English (Subtitled); French (Subtitled); Korean (Subtitled); Portuguese (Subtitled); Spanish (Subtitled); English (Original Language)
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD, NTSC, Subtitled
Picture Format: 1.33:1
Running Time: 100 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2002-05-21
Audience Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Studio: Sony Pictures Home Entertainment
DVD Reviews of 84 Charing Cross Road
DVD Review: The greatest movie ever made about the love of books
Summary: 5 Stars
If you've ever struggled to find a copy of Aubrey's BRIEF LIVES, or Burton's THE ANATOMY OF MELANCHOLY (during one of the periods when it was out of print), or Sprat's THE HISTORY OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY, or an edition of Samuel Johnson's sermons, or Coleridge's AIDS TO REFLECTION, this is the movie for you. Based on Helene Hanff's book by the same title, this movie details the nearly twenty-year friendship between New Yorker Helene Hanff and the denizens of Marks & Co., a purveyor of second hand books in London, and especially between Hanff and the store manager Frank P. Doel. It is a highly unusual movie in that it takes place both in New York and London and the main characters never meet. But the wit and liveliness, playfulness and the deep respect expressed in the long series of letters exchanged between Hanff and Frank and his colleagues are beyond what any description can depict. They are a series of letters written in marvelous prose by lovers of the great prose of the English language.
The movie begins in 1949 with Helene Hanff, a poor writer in New York with highly literary tastes in largely pre-Romantic English prose (though she makes exceptions for Newman), writing Marks and Co. concerning the availability of several titles. What ensues is a delightful exchange of books, food items (when England was still suffering from rationing), and ideas. Not a great deal happens in the film. There are no great crises. There are no action sequences. There are a couple of deaths and weddings, but essentially the film is filled with only the most everyday of occurrences. But one will be hard pressed to find a film that better communicates the love of great literature or the value of friendship, even if that friendship is conducted entirely via the post. The film is especially good at depicting the passage of time from the late forties to the sixties, reflecting not merely the changes in fashions but in the changes in the individuals themselves.
In a film like this, all depends on the cast. Mel Brooks had purchased the film rights to the book for his wife, Anne Bancroft, for whom the role of Helene Hanff was perfect. For key role of Frank Doel, the not-quite-yet-famous Anthony Hopkins, four years before super stardom as a result of THE SILENCE OF THE LAMB, brought the perfect blend of elegant reserve and quiet intelligence. Many of the best parts of the movie were those in which either Bancroft as Helene or Hopkins as Frank spoke aloud the contents of letters, many of them discussing editions of books. The absolute best parts of the movie were those in which Helene engaged in full stem rants about particularly offensive editions of books, the finest of those being her over the top rampage against the Modern Library edition of the Complete Poetry and Selected Prose of John Donne and the Complete Poetry of William Blake. I particularly delighted in this one because I myself once debated with someone about why they sought fit to put Donne and Blake inside the same covers. They are both religious poets, but why would you put the upper class Anglican Donne alongside the mystic dissenter, working class Blake?
I don't know if you would like this movie even if you have no interest in books. But as a dedicated collector with both Hanff's financial restrictions and some of her shared passions, I found this delightful from beginning to end. If ever a movie were made for bibliophiles, this be the movie.
Description of 84 Charing Cross Road
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