Frances is a 1982 American biographical tragedy film directed by Graeme Clifford and written by Eric Bergren, Christopher De Vore, and Nicholas Kazan.

It also features Kim Stanley, Sam Shepard, Bart Burns, Christopher Pennock, Jonathan Banks, and Jeffrey DeMunn in supporting roles.

Writer Jeffrey Kauffmann published an extensive online essay, "Shedding Light on Shadowland", that debunks much of Arnold's book, including the account of the lobotomy.

Born in Seattle, Washington, Frances Elena Farmer is a rebel from a young age, winning $100 in 1931 from the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards for a high school essay called God Dies.

After leaving Hollywood for New York City and appearing in the Group Theatre play Golden Boy, Frances learns, much to her chagrin, that the Group Theatre exploited her fame only to draw in more customers, replacing her with a wealthy actress for her family's needed financial backing for the play's London tour, and Odets ends their affair upon his wife's upcoming return from Europe.

While institutionalized at Western State Hospital, Frances is abused by the powers that be: she is subjected to electroconvulsive shock therapy, is cruelly beaten, periodically raped by the male orderlies and visiting soldiers from a nearby military base and involuntarily lobotomized before her release in 1950.

The film ends just after a party honoring her at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel with Farmer walking down a street with Harry York, talking about her parents' deaths, how she sold their house and that she's a "faceless sinner" with a slower paced lifestyle ahead of her in the future.

The end credits state that she moved to Indianapolis shortly afterwards, hosting a local daytime TV program (Frances Farmer Presents) from 1958 to 1964 before dying alone, just as she had lived, on August 1, 1970, at age 56.

The film was developed by the team who had made The Elephant Man, writers Eric Bergren and Christopher De Vore, and producer Jonathan Sanger and Mel Brooks.

[8] Lange found the nude scene of Farmer's arrest with policemen breaking into the Knickerbocker Hotel frustrating and demanding; there was a problem with the bathroom door which stuck each time the actors playing cops on the other side tried to get it open.

Along with some popular songs from the period, a notable piece of music was from Mozart's Piano Sonata No.11, K331, and the second movement of Beethoven's Seventh Symphony also featured.