Sophie’s Choice is director Alan J. Pakula’s famous movie based on the 1979 best-seller novel by William Styron, that won the National Book Award in 1980.
It’s the tragical story of three young people living in New York in 1947, two years after the Second World War. Stingo (Peter MacNicol), a wannabe novelist, moves to New York's Brooklyn in order to build a career. In an old mansion he meets Sophie (Meryl Streep) and Nathan (Kevin Kline). Sophie is a survivor of Nazi concentration camps, involved in a complex relationship with Nathan, an American Jew obsessed with the Holocaust. The three get befriended, though Stingo soon falls foul with Nathan, while he falls hopelessly in love with Sophie.
In the third flash-back of the movie it becomes clear what exactly Sophie's choice was: when Sophie arrived at Auschwitz, she was ordered to select one of her children who would be sent to the ovens - the remaining kid would be spared. This sequence is especially heartbreaking, as the screaming little girl is carried away to die.
In 1982, Néstor Almendros won the NYFCC Award for Best Cinematography. In the same year Meryl Streep won the LAFCA and the NYFCC award for Best Actress for her performance in this movie. One year later she won an Oscar, a BSFC Award and a Golden Globe, all for Best Actress. In 1984 director Alan J. Pakula won the Robert award for Best Foreign Film.
Personnel:
(for a full list, see www.imdb.com)
Meryl Streep Sophie Zawistowska
Kevin Kline Nathan
Peter MacNicol Stingo
Rita Karin Yetta
Stephen D. Newman Larry
Greta Turken Leslie Lapidus
Josh Mostel Morris Fink
Marcell Rosenblatt Astrid Weinstein
Moishe Rosenfeld Moishe Rosenblum
Robin Bartlett Lillian Grossman