Sophie's Choice

Sophie's Choice is set in 1947, when Stingo, a young southern writer, arrives in New York to work on his first novel. He takes a room in a Brooklyn boarding house and becomes friends with the couple living nearby: Sophie, a Polish immigrant and Catholic concentration camp survivor, and Nathan, a Jewish intellectual whose charm and brilliance alternate with violent mood swings. Stingo is drawn into their lives and gradually falls in love with Sophie, while her account of what she endured during the war comes to the surface. Based on William Styron's novel, the film centers on the bond between the three and on the hold Sophie's past keeps over her.

Alan J. Pakula directed and wrote the screenplay, and produced with Keith Barish. It was his seventh feature, following Starting Over, and came as his previous films had established him as a maker of political thrillers. Meryl Streep plays Sophie, with Kevin Kline as Nathan in his first major film role, and Peter MacNicol as Stingo, heading a credited cast of thirty-nine.

Made for twelve million dollars, the film took about thirty million at the worldwide box office, a modest return that nonetheless confirms its international reach. On IMDb it holds 7.5 out of ten across more than fifty thousand votes, and on TMDB 7.3 from a smaller sample. A critics' rating of 7 out of 10 from forty-two reviews places it alongside those audience scores.