When it hits this point in winter, I find myself sitting with my back to the windows buried in a book or lost in a movie. I don't ski, skate or snowboard so when the temperatures are hovering at zero, I ignore my snow-covered garden and escape into those that are blooming elsewhere. Recently Gardening Gone Wild reminisced about the gardens on film that have remained etched in her memory.
I commented on a few personal favorites, later realizing just how many movies I remember more for the scenery than the sentiment. A shot of a stone wall or the slant of the light coming through the trees usually stays with me long after the story fades. Here are ten garden-rich film favorites in alphabetical — rather than numerical — order.
My all time favorite — The Secret Garden — deserves its own post, which is why it's not mentioned here. Let me know what I've missed and need to add to my list to get me through February and March.
BED OF ROSES (1996): From my Christian Slater phase. Slater plays a shy florist who falls for a troubled young woman (Mary Stuart Masterson) and woos her with flowers. Slater's NYC florist shop is charming, but the garden he creates on the roof of his brownstone apartment is magical.
CROUCHING TIGER/HIDDEN DRAGON (2000): A visual feast that borders on overwhelming whether you are interested in art, architecture, costume, or landscape. Chinese courtyard gardens contrast with forests of bamboo, bleak landscapes with monastic mountain retreats. Be sure to get the original version in Chinese since the language is another layer of riches.
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This monastery retreat in the mountains of China appears near the end of "Crouching Tiger/Hidden Dragon."
EVER AFTER (1998): A re-telling of the classic Cinderella story, set in the Middle Ages, with a "modern" young woman (Drew Barrymore) at its center. She's modern because she can read, think and argue and the film amusingly has Leonardo da Vinci as the fairy godmother. Lots of anachronisms that I ignored in favor of the medieval castles and knot gardens where the story is sited, including a working veggie garden with a wattle fence.
GREEN CARD (1990): Two strangers (Andie MacDowell and Gerard Depardieu) agree to a marriage of convenience. She gets the apartment of her dreams and he gets the "green card" of the title. Everything is perfect until the INS comes calling and the two must actually live together. You will completely agree with MacDowell's motivation when you see her top floor brownstone apartment complete with a 19th century conservatory with tropical plants, ceiling watering spigots and a raised fish pond. It is a garden not just to die for — but to kill for.
MERCHANT IVORY FILMS: Name a movie from the pantheon of productions by the team of James Ivory, the late Ismail Merchant and Ruth Prawer Jhabvala that doesn't include memorable gardens and landscapes. I'm guessing they're already flashing before your eyes: the wheat field threaded with poppies in "A Room with a View;" the tree stuck with the pig's teeth and the dreamy bluebell wood in "Howard's End;" the Arcadian New England autumn of "The Bostonians;" and the heat and dust of "Heat and Dust." For the foodies among you, Merchant was also the author of a number of excellent Indian cookbooks.
MISS POTTER (2006): A charming bio-pic of famed children's author, Beatrix Potter (Renee Zellweger), complete with Peter Rabbit, English gardens and the glories of the Lake District. After you see the movie, read
Linda Lear's biography of Beatrix to discover how much more amazing the real Miss Potter was than the movie even begins to suggest.
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Chateau de Hautefort, in the Dordogne region of France, is one of the main locations for the film "Ever After."
MR. BASEBALL (1992): From my Tom Selleck phase, which may or may not be over. Selleck is an aging, arrogant ballplayer who's traded to a Japanese team. You can picture the culture shock. Ulimately Selleck reforms with the help of a good woman (the lovely Aya Takanashi), a hip businesswoman with a startlingly modern office and apartment. Her grandparents, however, have a ravishing traditional Japanese house and garden. I just stop the movie right there and drool over the details.
PAVILION OF WOMEN (2001): Based on the Pearl S. Buck book of the same name, the novel was an early pick by my former book group. The book is a complex look at marriage and the changing role of women in pre-WWII China. The movie is melodramatic and overwrought, but it does have William Dafoe, selections from the opera "Madame Butterfly," and a beautiful and elaborate Chinese garden where a fair amount of the story takes place.
THE FORSYTE SAGA (2003/04): I saw the original BW version in the late 60s and never forgot it. The 8-hour remake has a great cast, full color, town and country gardens, conservatories and Japanese strolling gardens. But it is the house and garden at the center of the story — Robin Hill — that one falls in love with and never forgets.
TWELFTH NIGHT (1996): Trevor Nunn sets Shakespeare's comedy in the Arts and Crafts era with an all-star cast and one of the National Trust's most spectacular properties. I kept losing track of the dialog while I stared at the famed Irish yews.
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Irish yews dot the landscape at Lanhydrock House in Cornwall, the site of Trevor Nunn's film of "Twelfth Night."
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