The Scarlet Letter/Jane Eyre (DVD, 2004)

Actors from the 1930s portray characters from these two literary classics. A faithful adaptation of Nathaniel Hawthorne's 1851 novel, THE SCARLET LETTER describes a woman forced to wear a scarlet letter A on her bosom after an illicit affair. Hester Prynne (Colleen Moore, in her last film) discovers her husband Roger (Henry B. Walthall) is declared dead after being missing for years. She falls into the arms of Reverend Dimmesdale (Hardie Albright) and delivers a child out of wedlock. She is harshly treated and ostracized by the prudish community. The Reverend wants to take responsibility as the father, but pious Hester refuses to let him shame his name. THE SCARLET LETTER is a penetrating examination of the devastation of Puritanism on the human soul in 17th-century Massachusetts. The second film, Charlotte Bronte's much beloved story JANE EYRE, recounts the experiences of a fiercely independent orphan (Virginia Bruce) who becomes a conscientious governess. After she quits her job as a school teacher at the orphanage where she was raised, she moves to the foreboding Thornfield Hall, home of the brooding Edward Rochester (Colin Clive). While taking care of Rochester's niece, she is alarmed by mysterious happenings in a locked wing of the mansion. Her love affair with Rochester reassures her and she doesn't question the strange occurrences until a mad woman who claims to be Rochester's wife suddenly appears in the mansion.