Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore (Full Frame)

VHS, PG, 112 minutes, WARNER

Widow. Unskilled. 35. One son. Alice Hyatt's credentials don't carry much clout in the world. But look out, world. In her remarkable Academy Award-winning portrayal, Ellen Burstyn stars as Alice, a recently-widowed housewife who packs herself and her son into a station wagon and heads off for a better life. It's a bumpy road Alice travels. No money. Nowhere jobs. And little luck. But she fights back with her only weapon, a spirited determination that underscores this "fine, moving, frequently hilarious tale of Alice's first lurching steps toward some kind of self-awareness and self-sufficiency." (Vincent Canby, The New York Times) With "Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore," director Martin Scorsese shows he's as much at home in the semi-rural Southwest as he is in the asphalt-jungle environs of "Taxi Driver," "After Hours" and "The Color of Money." He guides the "live a little, learn a lot" of Alice's odyssey with affection unmarred by sentiment. And he elicits dead-on performances from a gallery of supporting stars that includes Kris Kristofferson, Alfred Lutter, Jodie Foster, Harvey Keitel, Vic Tayback and Oscar-nominee Diane Ladd as Alice's foul-mouthed fellow waitress. The result is a blend of humor, character and ambiance so appealing it inspired the long-running TV favorite "Alice." Live a little. Learn a lot. Watch Alice serve up a slice of life as real, funny and thought-provoking as any you've ever seen. Or lived.