Desert Hearts (Two-Disc Vintage Collection)
by Donna Deitch
List Price:
Our Price: $12.10
You Save: $2.85 (19%)
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Buy Used: from $10.30 (click here)
Category: DVD
See more DVD details
Buy this DVD movie at online store in your country
Canada
Canada
DVD details
Actor: Andra Akers, Audra Lindley, Dean Butler, Helen Shaver, Patricia CharbonneauDirector: Donna Deitch
Brand: Wolfe
Cinematographer: Robert Elswit
Producer: Donna Deitch
Editor: Robert Estrin
Producer: Cami Taylor
Producer: Carol Jefferies
Writer: Jane Rule
Writer: Natalie Cooper
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Unknown), Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo; English (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo
Format: Closed-captioned, Collector's Edition, Color, Dolby, DVD, NTSC, Widescreen
Running Time: 96 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2007-06-05
Audience Rating: R (Restricted)
Studio: Wolfe Video
Product features:
- At 35 years of age, literature professor Vivian Bell heads out to Reno for a quickie divorce. But when she gets to Nevada, where she has to wait until her papers come through, a whole new world opens up to Vivian when avowed lesbian Cay Rivers openly begins to seduce her. Vivian at first resists Cay's overtures, but as time goes on, she is forced to admit her attraction. But as Vivian's
DVD Reviews of Desert Hearts (Two-Disc Vintage Collection)
DVD Review: brilliantly groundbreaking in various ways
Summary: 4 Stars
Lesbians and queer women everywhere can, and should, rejoice at the re-release of Desert Hearts (1985) in a 2-disc vintage collection set. A cult classic, Desert Hearts is one of the first full-length feature films premised on a lesbian love story. Vivian Bell (Helen Shaver), an established English professor, travels to Reno for a quick divorce from her husband where she meets Cay Rivvers (Patricia Charbonneau), a casino change-girl with a flair for white satin cowboy ensembles. Their attraction to each other is more than just platonic, and it is this growing sexual tension between the austere and staid English professor and the carefree and passionate casino worker that drives the film.
The focus on the sexual tension between Vivian and Cay is the film's most significant difference from its source, Jane Rule's novel The Desert of the Heart (1964). The centerpiece of the novel is not Vivian's relationship with Cay, but her consciousness as she grapples with her life in its transitional state. Formally, this struggle is represented by the use of free indirect discourse and internal monologue, both of which function to reveal Vivian's confusion and fear about the new direction of life and of her feelings for Cay. The director of Desert Hearts forgoes direct representation of Vivian's internal struggle and, instead, lets the camera do the talking: the film is filled with silences, which are intended to be profound and palpable, but which are inherently unreadable.
It is this unreadability--this uncertainty--that makes the love scene terribly unnerving. The scene begins with Cay forcing her way into Vivian's hotel room in order to discuss their relationship. When Vivian returns from making herself a drink she finds Cay naked in bed, the white sheets drawn to her navel, her breasts exposed. Vivian asks Cay repeatedly to "put on [her] clothes and leave," but Cay ignores her request and, instead, predicates her actions on her interpretation of Vivian's thoughts. She believes she knows exactly what Vivian wants, even if Vivian claims to want the opposite.
In her commentary, director Donna Deitch claims that she wanted to create the "requisite amount of emotional connection" necessary for the climatic love scene. But this connection is artificial; Vivian here reacts more like Patty Hearst than a consenting adult. In the end, the two spend hours in bed together, and the message is "No means Yes--with a little coaxing." This is where the film's deviation from the novel's primary theme of self-discovery to one of seduction is of consequence because seduction itself is a fraught category. Seduction is not a "bad" thing--like Cay, we all have, or have wanted to, seduce an English professor or two. But it is the exhilaration of seduction that also renders it dangerous: assumed emotions, forced thoughts and crossed boundaries. This film is brilliantly groundbreaking in various ways, but one has to wonder if it also has paved the way for current cinematic representations of the "monstrous" lesbian.
Description of Desert Hearts (Two-Disc Vintage Collection)
DESERT HEARTS - DVD MovieWhen college professor Vivian Bell (Helen Shaver) arrives in Reno in 1959 to get a quickie divorce, the last thing on her mind is romance. A prim intellectual, crippled by a sterile marriage ("We're a professional couple") and hiding behind her education, she moves into a ranch belonging to Frances Parker (Audra Lindley) and tries to keep to herself. But Parker's beautiful, sassy tomboy of a stepdaughter proves to be quite a distraction, and a love affair slowly blossoms. Cay (Patricia Charbonneau) refuses to be bound by convention or by expectations of how a nice girl should behave, and her devil-may-care attitude both attracts and terrifies the nervous professor.
Shaver is terrific as Vivian, and the slow thawing of her character is beautifully paced--you can feel the tension break when she finally lets down her guard. Another strong performance comes from Audra Lindley as Frances. She's a tough old bird with a drinking problem, but Lindley keeps the character from descending into stereotype, and she gives full rein to the tragic side of this lonely woman, especially as she struggles with her reaction to the developing relationship between Cay and Vivian.
There are scenes in Desert Hearts that would be painfully clichéd if they appeared in a heterosexual romance, and even here they only just escape that fate--relying a little too much on significant glances and lines that just don't sound like real conversation. Nevertheless, first-time director Deitch breathes new life into a standard straight-arrow-meets-free-spirit plot, and steadfastly refuses to turn this love story into an "issues movie." Add to that a strong feel for the period and a soundtrack filled with the likes of Patsy Cline and Gene Vincent, and the result is a warm, well-acted film that packs a real emotional punch. --Simon Leake
Bestsellers in DVD
![The Story of Jeremiah [VHS] Image](/images/noimg.gif)
The Story of Jeremiah [VHS]Vision Video; VHS Tape; VHS Video
Wresting With God [VHS]by Vision Video
Vision Video; Published: 1990-10-01; VHS Tape; VHS Video
Price in other shops:
Study Bible Video with Workbook [VHS]Spring Arbor Distributors; VHS Tape; VHS Video
Best price: $7.95
Price in other shops:
Tempo:Childrens TV Favourites Video [VHS]HarperCollins Audio; VHS Tape; VHS Video
Best price: $9.17
Price in other shops:
Tempo.Herbs:Parseley'Sb/ Party Video [VHS]HarperCollins Audio; VHS Tape; VHS Video
![Strike the Original Match [VHS] Image](/images/Strike-the-Original-Match-VHS-0001374079-X.jpg)
Strike the Original Match [VHS]New Liberty Films; VHS Tape; VHS Video
Price in other shops:
![Medjugorje The Miracles and the Message [VHS] Image](/images/Medjugorje-The-Miracles-and-the-Message-VHS-0001373293-X.jpg)
Medjugorje The Miracles and the Message [VHS]JPN Film Production; Release date: 1995-12-15; VHS Tape; VHS Video
Best price: $29.99
Mayo Clinic Echocardiography Review Course for Boards and Recertification DVD 2008by Mayo
DVD
Price in other shops:
Pediatric Diagnostic Imaging DVD: Single Userby Oakstone
DVD
Price in other shops:
Cost Accounting [VHS]by Charles T. Horngren, George Foster, Srikant M. Datar, Howard Teall
Pearson Canada, Toronto; VHS Tape; VHS Video
Similar DVDs, VHS Video, Audio CDs
The SecretsMonterey Home Video; Release date: 2009-04-07; DVD
Best price: $14.78
Price in other shops:
Better Than ChocolateLions Gate; Release date: 1999-12-28; DVD
Best price: $7.34
Price in other shops:
It's in the WaterWolfe; Release date: 2000-05-09; DVD
Best price: $15.39
Price in other shops:
Late BloomersRelease date: 2003-10-01; DVD
Best price: $10.45
Price in other shops:
Claire of the MoonRelease date: 2008-05-06; Amazon Instant Video; Movie
Best price: $2.99
Elena UndoneWolfe; Release date: 2011-02-01; DVD
Best price: $15.25
Price in other shops:
Imagine Me & YouFOX; Release date: 2006-06-27; DVD
Best price: $7.24
Price in other shops:
Elena UndoneDVD
Best price: $24.55
Loving AnnabelleWolfe; Release date: 2006-12-12; DVD
Best price: $8.25
Price in other shops:
BloomingtonWolfe; Release date: 2011-05-03; DVD
Best price: $15.14
Price in other shops: