

Married couple, Ethan and Zeena, are in need an extra hand around the house due to Zeena's debilitated body and constant illness. The young woman who joins them is a beautiful, spirited person. She and Ethan fall in love much to the dismay of Zeena.
Cinematography
Snow-covered Massachusetts becomes a prison of white.
Acting
Joan Allen's Zeena: illness as weapon and wound.
Writing
Wharton's novella stripped to its bleakest bones.

Director
John Madden
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Wharton wrote this during her own affair while hiding in her Massachusetts estate—she literally built the sled run she describes.
The film's framing device—Ethan aged and broken—was controversial; Wharton left his fate ambiguous in the novella.
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