• The Good Earth (1937). Paul Muni, Luise Rainer. Pearl Buck's great novel of famine, plague and the fight for survival in China is one of the greatest films Hollywood ever made. Both Muni and Rainer give faultless portrayals in this still wonderful film. (Dir: Sidney Franklin.)

• Dragon Seed (1942). Katharine Hepburn, Walter Huston, Agnes Moorehead, Akim Tamiroff. Occasionally gripping adaptation of Pearl Buck's novel about the impact of the Japanese invasion on a small Chinese community. (Dirs: Jack Conway, Harold S. Bucquet.)

Buck's stories "China Flight," "The Big Wave," and "Satan Never Sleeps," were also adapted as films.