English Literature & Creative Writing

George Orwell's novel of a totalitarian future society in which a man whose daily work is rewriting history tries to rebel by falling in love.

Based on the novel Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick, Harrison Ford stars in this fascinating, dark vision of the near future as a policeman who tracks engineered humans--a Blade Runner. In the year 2019, the police department forces Rick Deckard (Ford) out of retirement to hunt four genetically engineered humans who have come to earth. Designed to do difficult, hazardous work, the manufactured humans are stronger, faster and smarter than nonengineered humans. They feel no pain or remorse; they are almost indistinguishable from other humans ... and they are killing people. Now Deckard must stop them before they kill again. Academy Award nominations for Best Art Direction-Set Decoration and Best Effects, Visual Effects.

In a futuristic welfare state, Alex (Malcolm McDowell), a vicious young hoodlum, sleeps all day and spends his nights roaming the city with his droogs (friends), assaulting innocent people in the streets and in their homes. Finally captured by the police, Alex undergoes rehabilitation in the form of aversion therapy as brutal and horrifying as any of his offenses. Based on the novel by Anthony Burgess.

In this silent classic, John Barrymore scored one of his greatest screen successes as the dual personality created by Robert Louis Stevenson in the 1886 Gothic novel.

Bela Lugosi re-creates the stage role that made him famous as the Transylvanian vampire count in Bram Stoker's horror classic.

Based on Mary Shelley's 1818 novel. A scientist uses corpses to create a monster, who later incurs the wrath of the local villagers when he impulsively kills a little girl. Subsequently seeking out his creator, the creature flees with him to a nearby windmill.

Glenn Close plays mother to Mel Gibson's prince in director Franco Zeffirelli's adaptation of Shakespeare's tragedy. Claudius: Alan Bates. Ophelia: Helena Bonham Carter. Polonius: Ian Holm. Ghost: Paul Scofield. Horatio: Stephen Dillane. Laertes: Nathaniel Parker. Guildenstern: Sean Murray. Rosencrantz: Michael Maloney.

Absorbing fact-based portrait of a college grad (Emile Hirsch) who chucks it all to become a back-to-nature wanderer in the early 1990s. Catherine Keener, Hal Holbrook. Directed by Sean Penn, who adapted the script from the Jon Krakauer bestseller. Featured: a score that includes songs by Eddie Vedder of Pearl Jam.

Based on the 2017 book of the same name by David Grann. In the 1920s, innocent members of the Osage Indigenous American tribe suffer from a series of unusual, inexplicable murders. Though relegated to the margins of society, the case captures the attention of the FBI, which launches a large-scale investigation under the guidance of J. Edgar Hoover.

Ishmael signs on to the Pequod, a whaling ship captained by the brooding, one-legged Ahab, whose life has become obsessed by his pursuit of the crafty, enigmatic great white Moby Dick that maimed him in this adaptation of the Herman Melville novel.

Adaptation of Ernest Hemingway's classic tale stars Best Actor nominee Spencer Tracy as a Cuban fisherman who must overcome numerous obstacles in his attempt to haul in a giant fish. Hemingway's wife, Mary, played the shocked tourist at the end of the film.

Best Picture winner is about a fictional romance between a struggling young playwright named Shakespeare and a noblewoman who longs to act, and who inspires him to write "Romeo and Juliet." Gwyneth Paltrow won an Oscar for her role as the muse.

Best Picture winner about an FBI trainee (Best Actress Jodie Foster), who has a knack for analyzing serial killers, and enlists the aid of an imprisoned, cannibalistic sociopath (Best Actor Anthony Hopkins) in tracking a sadistic murderer. An Oscar went to director Jonathan Demme and also Ted Tally won for Best Adapted Screenplay for his script based on the Thomas Harris novel.

Based on Harper Lee's famous novel. Gregory Peck won a Best Actor Oscar as a widowed, morally upright lawyer defending a black man accused of raping a white woman in 1930s Alabama. Meanwhile, his two young children become involved in a mystery involving the town pariah.

Based on the DC Comics/Vertigo graphic novel written by Alan Moore and illustrated by David Lloyd. From the Wachowskis and Joel Silver, the masterminds behind The Matrix trilogy, comes another intriguing, action-packed fantasy-thriller. The premise: Great Britain has become a fascist state. Now, a shadowy freedom fighter known only as "V" (Hugo Weaving- The Matrix trilogy) begins a violent guerrilla campaign to destroy those who have embraced totalitarianism. In his quest to liberate England from its oppressive ideological chains, "V" recruits a young woman (Natalie Portman - Star Wars: Episodes I-III) he's rescued from the secret police to join him on an epic adventure to execute a seemingly impossible task.

bell hooks is one of America's most accessible public intellectuals. In this two-part video, extensively illustrated with many of the images under analysis, she makes a compelling argument for the transformative power of cultural criticism. In Part One, bell hooks discusses the theoretical foundations and positions that inform her work (such as the motives behind representations, as well as their power in social and cultural life). bell hooks also explains why she insists on using the phrase "white supremacist capitalist patriarchy" to describe the interlocking systems of domination that define our reality. In Part Two, she demonstrates the value of cultural studies in concrete analysis through such subjects as the OJ Simpson case, Madonna, Spike Lee, and Gangsta rap. The aim of cultural analysis, she argues, should be the production of enlightened witnesses - audiences who engaged with the representations of cultural life knowledgeably and vigilantly.

After a stint as an editor early in her career, American writer Toni Morrison understood the publishing industry better than the ordinary writer—but she refused to be defined by the establishment. She wrote her books from a vital, underrepresented point of view. Morrison was one of the few who wrote for an African American audience, and she understood the way language could operate as an oppressive or uplifting force—she refused to let her words be marginalized. After years of fighting to be heard, Morrison was awarded a Nobel Prize for her writing, and her novels are now taught in schools around the world. Through a trove of archival material, evocative works of contemporary art, and interviews with Oprah Winfrey, Angela Davis, and Morrison herself, we revisit her famed books and learn about the inspiration for her writing. Throughout, Morrison is effortlessly graceful, insightful, and candid, making this intimate, comprehensive portrait of her life and works an exploration of what it means to be a writer whose stories are so deeply intertwined with often-unrealized national truths.