A Soldier's Daughter Never Cries

James Ivory directed this drama adapted from Kaylie Jones's 1990 autobiographical novel in which the character Bill Willis is based on her father, James Jones, author of From Here to Eternity and A Thin Red Line. Ruth Prawer Jhabvala's screenplay about expatriate Americans in Paris during the ...more

Following the critical disappointments of Jefferson in Paris (1995) and Surviving Picasso (1996), A Soldier's Daughter Never Cries (1998) represented a return to form for Merchant and Ivory. The film's material broke new ground for the team; while they had presented character studies of expatriates before, these portraits had never taken place in the 1960s and '70s. The emotional center of the film lies with the unconventional Willis family, introduced to the viewer by daughter Channe (Leelee ...more