Characters: Poets
by lpetrequin | created - 22 Sep 2022 | updated - 7 months ago | PublicDescription: Through verse they bare souls, weave tapestries of words, and enlighten minds. Their stories, real or imagined, reveal the passions that drive great poets. Featuring legends like Sylvia Plath, Lord Byron, Oscar Wilde, and Pablo Neruda, along with classics like Dead Poets Society, these films provide a window into the hearts and minds of artists who distilled life into poetic beauty. Love, loss, rivalry, and the agonies of creativity emerge from these candid cinematic portraits.
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1. Sylvia (2003)
R | 100 min | Biography, Drama, Romance
Story of the relationship between poets Edward James "Ted" Hughes and Sylvia Plath.
Director: Christine Jeffs | Stars: Gwyneth Paltrow, Daniel Craig, Lucy Davenport, David Birkin
Votes: 11,264 | Gross: $1.30M
2. Bright Star (2009)
PG | 119 min | Biography, Drama, Romance
The three-year romance between 19th-century poet John Keats and Fanny Brawne near the end of his life.
Director: Jane Campion | Stars: Abbie Cornish, Ben Whishaw, Paul Schneider, Kerry Fox
Votes: 28,707 | Gross: $4.44M
3. Little Ashes (2008)
R | 112 min | Biography, Drama, History
About the young life and loves of artist Salvador Dalí, filmmaker Luis Buñuel and writer Federico García Lorca.
Director: Paul Morrison | Stars: Robert Pattinson, Javier Beltrán, Matthew McNulty, Marina Gatell
Votes: 9,626 | Gross: $0.48M
4. Shakespeare in Love (1998)
R | 123 min | Comedy, Drama, History
The world's greatest ever playwright, William Shakespeare, is young, out of ideas and short of cash, but meets his ideal woman and is inspired to write one of his most famous plays.
Director: John Madden | Stars: Gwyneth Paltrow, Joseph Fiennes, Geoffrey Rush, Tom Wilkinson
Votes: 234,384 | Gross: $100.32M
5. Young Goethe in Love (2010)
Not Rated | 102 min | Biography, Romance
After aspiring poet Johann Wolfgang von Goethe fails his law exams, he's sent to a sleepy provincial court to reform. Instead, he falls for Lotte, a young woman who is promised to another man.
Director: Philipp Stölzl | Stars: Alexander Fehling, Miriam Stein, Moritz Bleibtreu, Volker Bruch
Votes: 3,075 | Gross: $0.16M
6. Molière (2007)
PG-13 | 120 min | Biography, Comedy
To satisfy his creditors, a witty actor reinvents himself as a satirical playwright, with uproarious, yet bittersweet, results.
Director: Laurent Tirard | Stars: Romain Duris, Fabrice Luchini, Laura Morante, Edouard Baer
Votes: 6,573 | Gross: $0.64M
7. Molière (1978)
260 min | Biography, Drama, History
Who was Moliere? He is known everywhere as one of the world's greatest playwrights. But who was he? Born Jean-Baptiste Poquelin in 1622, the son of a prosperous tapestry maker. His mother ... See full summary »
Director: Ariane Mnouchkine | Stars: Philippe Caubère, Marie-Françoise Audollent, Frédéric Ladonne, Odile Cointepas
Votes: 890
8. Children of the Century (1999)
135 min | Biography, Drama, Romance
A story of doomed passion between two genius writers of the 19th century - novelist George Sand and poet Alfred de Musset.
Director: Diane Kurys | Stars: Juliette Binoche, Benoît Magimel, Stefano Dionisi, Robin Renucci
Votes: 2,022 | Gross: $0.05M
9. Leopardi (2014)
143 min | Biography, Drama, History
Based upon the short but fruitful life of illness-racked Italian poet and philosopher Giacomo Leopardi.
Director: Mario Martone | Stars: Elio Germano, Michele Riondino, Massimo Popolizio, Anna Mouglalis
Votes: 3,050
10. A Quiet Passion (2016)
PG-13 | 125 min | Biography, Drama
The story of American poet Emily Dickinson from her early days as a young schoolgirl to her later years as a reclusive, unrecognized artist.
Director: Terence Davies | Stars: Emma Bell, Sara Vertongen, Rose Williams, Benjamin Wainwright
Votes: 6,312 | Gross: $1.86M
11. Dickinson (2019–2021)
TV-14 | 30 min | Biography, Comedy, Drama
Set in the 19th century, it explores the constraints of society, gender and family from the perspective of rebellious young poet, Emily Dickinson.
Stars: Hailee Steinfeld, Adrian Enscoe, Anna Baryshnikov, Jane Krakowski
Votes: 19,761
12. Wilde (1997)
R | 118 min | Biography, Drama, Romance
The turmoil in poet/playwright Oscar Wilde's life after he discovers his homosexuality.
Director: Brian Gilbert | Stars: Stephen Fry, Jude Law, Vanessa Redgrave, Jennifer Ehle
Votes: 18,128 | Gross: $2.16M
13. Total Eclipse (1995)
R | 111 min | Biography, Drama, Romance
Young, wild poet Arthur Rimbaud and his mentor Paul Verlaine engage in a fierce, forbidden romance while feeling the effects of a hellish artistic lifestyle.
Director: Agnieszka Holland | Stars: Leonardo DiCaprio, David Thewlis, Romane Bohringer, Dominique Blanc
Votes: 16,782 | Gross: $0.34M
14. Byron (2003 TV Movie)
147 min | Biography, Drama, Romance
Following the success of his poem "Childe Harold's Pilgrimage", Byron becomes the toast of London.
Director: Julian Farino | Stars: Stephen Campbell Moore, Oliver Milburn, Michael Elwyn, Jonny Lee Miller
Votes: 1,157
15. Dead Poets Society (1989)
PG | 128 min | Comedy, Drama
Maverick teacher John Keating returns in 1959 to the prestigious New England boys' boarding school where he was once a star student, using poetry to embolden his pupils to new heights of self-expression.
Director: Peter Weir | Stars: Robin Williams, Robert Sean Leonard, Ethan Hawke, Josh Charles
Votes: 546,405 | Gross: $95.86M
16. Haunted Summer (1988)
R | 106 min | Biography, Drama, Romance
In 1816, authors Lord Byron, Mary Shelley and Percy Shelley get together for some philosophical discussions, but the situation soon deteriorates into mind games, drugs and sex.
Director: Ivan Passer | Stars: Philip Anglim, Laura Dern, Alice Krige, Eric Stoltz
Votes: 586 | Gross: $0.01M
17. Shadowlands (1993)
PG | 131 min | Biography, Drama, Romance
C.S. Lewis, a world-renowned Christian theologian, writer and professor, leads a passionless life until he meets spirited poet Joy Gresham from the U.S.
Director: Richard Attenborough | Stars: Anthony Hopkins, Debra Winger, Julian Fellowes, Roddy Maude-Roxby
Votes: 20,451 | Gross: $25.84M
18. Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle (1994)
R | 125 min | Biography, Drama
Dorothy Parker remembers the heyday of the Algonquin Round Table, a circle of friends whose barbed wit, like hers, was fueled by alcohol and flirted with despair.
Director: Alan Rudolph | Stars: Jennifer Jason Leigh, Campbell Scott, Matthew Broderick, Peter Gallagher
Votes: 4,890 | Gross: $2.14M
19. Tom & Viv (1994)
PG-13 | 115 min | Biography, Drama, Romance
In 1915, Tom and Viv elope, but her gynecological and emotional problems disrupt their honeymoon. Her father is angry because Tom's poetry doesn't bring in enough to live, but her mother is happy Viv has found a tender and discreet husband.
Director: Brian Gilbert | Stars: Willem Dafoe, Miranda Richardson, Rosemary Harris, Tim Dutton
Votes: 1,870 | Gross: $0.54M
20. Beaumarchais the Scoundrel (1996)
116 min | Adventure, Comedy, History
The life story of the titular Beaumarchais, playwright and adventurer, who gets himself into numerous different scrapes and romantic encounters in 18th Century France.
Director: Édouard Molinaro | Stars: Fabrice Luchini, Manuel Blanc, Sandrine Kiberlain, Michel Aumont
Votes: 1,468 | Gross: $0.63M
21. Marquise (1997)
120 min | Comedy, Drama, History
The rise and fall of a beauteous actress. She rises from an impoverished background to become a favorite of the Sun King, Louis XIV.
Director: Véra Belmont | Stars: Sophie Marceau, Bernard Giraudeau, Lambert Wilson, Patrick Timsit
Votes: 1,470 | Gross: $0.07M
22. Marcel Proust's Time Regained (1999)
169 min | Drama, Romance, War
A lush, elegant epic taking us on a time-swirling trip down the infinitely complex labyrinth that is Marcel Proust's memory lane.
Director: Raúl Ruiz | Stars: Catherine Deneuve, Emmanuelle Béart, Vincent Perez, John Malkovich
Votes: 2,831 | Gross: $0.46M
23. Possession (2002)
PG-13 | 102 min | Drama, Mystery, Romance
A pair of literary sleuths unearth the amorous secret of two Victorian poets only to find themselves falling under a passionate spell.
Director: Neil LaBute | Stars: Gwyneth Paltrow, Aaron Eckhart, Jeremy Northam, Jennifer Ehle
Votes: 13,719 | Gross: $10.10M
24. The Keeper: The Legend of Omar Khayyam (2005)
PG | 95 min | Adventure, Drama, Family
Kamran is a 12-year-old boy in the present day who discovers that his ancestor is 11th-century mathematician, astronomer, and poet of Persia Omar Khayyam. The story has been passed down in ... See full summary »
Director: Kayvan Mashayekh | Stars: Adam Echahly, Bruno Lastra, Moritz Bleibtreu, Rade Serbedzija
Votes: 805 | Gross: $0.22M
25. Jean de La Fontaine - Le défi (2007)
100 min | Biography, History
Biography of the French poet Jean de la Fontaine, who lived in the times of Louis XIV.
Director: Daniel Vigne | Stars: Lorànt Deutsch, Philippe Torreton, Sara Forestier, Jean-Claude Dreyfus
Votes: 150
26. Daphne (2007 TV Movie)
90 min | Biography, Drama, Romance
Daphne Du Maurier, author of "Rebecca" and "Jamaica Inn," becomes attracted to the wife of a publisher and to an actress.
Director: Clare Beavan | Stars: Geraldine Somerville, Elizabeth McGovern, Janet McTeer, Andrew Havill
Votes: 569
27. The Edge of Love (2008)
R | 110 min | Biography, Drama, Romance
Two feisty, free-spirited women are connected by the brilliant, charismatic poet who loves them both.
Director: John Maybury | Stars: Keira Knightley, Sienna Miller, Matthew Rhys, Simon Armstrong
Votes: 18,948 | Gross: $0.03M
28. A Poet in New York (2014 TV Movie)
72 min | Biography, Drama
A look at Welsh poet Dylan Thomas's fatal visit to New York City, and his stormy relationship with his wife Caitlin.
Director: Aisling Walsh | Stars: Tom Hollander, Phoebe Fox, Ewen Bremner, Celt Llewelyn Jones
Votes: 290
29. Beloved Sisters (2014)
Not Rated | 138 min | Drama, History, Romance
The 18th century literary genius Friedrich Schiller falls in love with the sisters Charlotte and Caroline von Lengefeld. After a passionate summer together in a menage a trois, jealousy and rivalry endanger their union.
Director: Dominik Graf | Stars: Hannah Herzsprung, Florian Stetter, Henriette Confurius, Claudia Messner
Votes: 1,599 | Gross: $0.05M
30. Dangerous Beauty (1998)
R | 111 min | Biography, Drama, Romance
A Venetian courtesan becomes a hero to her city, but later becomes the target of an inquisition by the Church for witchcraft.
Director: Marshall Herskovitz | Stars: Catherine McCormack, Rufus Sewell, Oliver Platt, Fred Ward
Votes: 19,640 | Gross: $4.53M
31. Neruda (2016)
R | 107 min | Biography, Crime, Drama
An inspector hunts down Nobel Prize-winning Chilean poet Pablo Neruda, who becomes a fugitive in his home country in the late 1940s for joining the Communist Party.
Director: Pablo Larraín | Stars: Gael García Bernal, Luis Gnecco, Mercedes Morán, Emilio Gutiérrez Caba
Votes: 11,054 | Gross: $0.94M
32. Antonia. (2015)
Not Rated | 96 min | Biography, Drama
A journey through the last ten years in the brief life of Italian poet Antonia Pozzi. This is the portrait of an artist and of her art set in 1930s Milan.
Director: Ferdinando Cito Filomarino | Stars: Linda Caridi, Filippo Dini, Alessio Praticò, Perla Ambrosini
Votes: 294
33. The Aspern Papers (2018)
R | 90 min | Drama
A young writer tries to obtain romance letters a poet sent to his mistress.
Director: Julien Landais | Stars: Jonathan Rhys Meyers, Vanessa Redgrave, Joely Richardson, Lois Robbins
Votes: 812
34. Red Rose (2004)
107 min | Drama
Robert Burns, national poet of Scotland is reduced to poverty when his many social marital affairs catch up with him.
Director: Robbie Moffat | Stars: Michael E. Rodgers, Lucy Russell, Rebecca Palmer, James Watson
Votes: 120
35. Howl (2010)
R | 84 min | Biography, Drama, Romance
As Allen Ginsberg talks about his life and art, his most famous poem is illustrated in animation while the obscenity trial of the work is dramatized.
Directors: Rob Epstein, Jeffrey Friedman | Stars: James Franco, Todd Rotondi, Jon Prescott, Aaron Tveit
Votes: 13,408 | Gross: $0.62M
36. Nora (2000)
R | 106 min | Biography, Drama
Dublin, 1904, James Joyce chats up Nora Barnacle, a hotel maid recently come from Galway. She enchants him with her frank, uninhibited manner, and before long, he's convinced her to come with him to Trieste.
Director: Pat Murphy | Stars: Ewan McGregor, Susan Lynch, Andrew Scott, Vinnie McCabe
Votes: 1,846 | Gross: $0.01M
37. The Young Schiller (2005 TV Movie)
90 min | Biography, Drama
Young poet Friedrich Schiller flees from the elite academy of Prince Carl Eugen to become an acclaimed theater writer in Mannheim. But the influence of Carl Eugen reaches farther than Schiller thought.
Director: Martin Weinhart | Stars: Matthias Schweighöfer, Teresa Weißbach, Robert Dölle, Jürgen Tarrach
Votes: 403
38. The Postman (1994)
PG | 108 min | Biography, Comedy, Drama
A simple Italian postman learns to love poetry while delivering mail to a famous poet, and then uses this to woo local beauty Beatrice.
Directors: Michael Radford, Massimo Troisi | Stars: Massimo Troisi, Philippe Noiret, Maria Grazia Cucinotta, Renato Scarpa
Votes: 39,007 | Gross: $21.85M
39. Lost Illusions (2021)
149 min | Drama, Romance
Lucien de Rubempré, a young, lower-class poet, leaves his family's printing house for Paris. Soon, he learns the dark side of the arts business as he tries to stay true to his dreams.
Director: Xavier Giannoli | Stars: Benjamin Voisin, Cécile de France, Vincent Lacoste, Xavier Dolan
Votes: 6,361
40. The Raven (I) (2012)
R | 110 min | Crime, Mystery, Thriller
When a madman begins committing horrific murders inspired by Edgar Allan Poe's works, a young Baltimore detective joins forces with Poe to stop him from making his stories a reality.
Director: James McTeigue | Stars: John Cusack, Alice Eve, Luke Evans, Brendan Gleeson
Votes: 88,298 | Gross: $16.01M
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