“The Bridges of Madison County” (1995)
Robert James Waller's turgid tale of an affair between a National Geographic photographer and a lonely Iowa farmwife was an inexplicable fixture on the New York Times bestseller list for over three years. That's a remarkable accomplishment for any book, let alone one as shamelessly contrived as Waller's. Perhaps even more miraculous is that screenwriter Richard LaGravenese and director Clint Eastwood managed to turn the novel's painfully purple prose into a deeply felt, movingly written tearjerker that earns its bittersweet ending.