Famous Movies

Famous Movies

• "The Long Hot Summer" (1958). Filmed in part at Ramsey Plantation. Director Martin Ritt combines two William Faulkner stories into a smoldering drama starring Paul Newman as Ben Quick, a wandering handyman who arrives in Frenchman's Bend, Mississippi, where menacing rumors about his past circulate. The self-made town despot, Will Varner (Orson Welles), warms to the drifter and takes him under his wing, giving him a job at his store and setting him up with his daughter Clara (Joanne Woodward).

• "Easy Rider" (1969). Filmed in part in Morganza. Starring Dennis Hopper and Peter Fonda this is a movie that became the ultimate 1960s counterculture film. Motorcycle-riding mavericks Hopper and Fonda look for "the real America" and plot a cocaine score. Academy Award nominee.

• "A Gathering of Old Men" (1983). Feature film version of Ernest J. Gaines' novel. Features Holly Hunter.

• "The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman" (197 ). Novel by native Ernest J. Gaines. Was filmed in part at Ashland Belle Helene Plantation in Ascension Parish, LA.

• "A Lesson before Dying" (1999) Novel by native Ernest J. Gaines.

• "The Badge" (2001) Filmed over seven days at several locations in the parish . Starring Billy Bob Thornton and Patricia Arquette.