Well, you might not actually SEE any women in love in this movie, but you'll certainly hear women TALKING about love, and men talking about love, and women talking about men, and men talking about women, and men talking about men, and everyone talking about death, and talking, and talking, until you yourself will want to scream and do something that requires no talking at all, like paint your bedroom or water your plants.
Welcome to the world of D.H. Lawrence, where psycho-babble reigns supreme, and where no one can get down to living a productive life because everyone is too busy talking about how unproductive their lives are. Spending time with the characters in a D.H. Lawrence novel is like being locked in a closet with a group of your most self-absorbed acquaintances who you would run away from if you met them at a party. When I read "Women in Love," I so desperately wanted to strangle every single character in it, but since I couldn't, I was hoping they would at least strangle each other. Alas, only one of them dies, not by strangulation, and I won't spoil it for you by telling which one, in case you actually give a damn about this story or any of these people.
To give director Ken Russell his due, he makes this filmed version about as entertaining as it's possible to make this essentially unfilmable novel. He throws out much of the psychological mumbo-jumbo that Lawrence adored, and focuses instead on all of the naughty parts, so we get lots of histrionic lovemaking in beds and fields, two buck naked men wrestling by firelight, and one embarrassing scene featuring Alan Bates (yup, buck naked again) roaming around in a meadow making love to bushes and grass (I'm not kidding). Glenda Jackson won an Oscar for her performance as Gudrun, the more dominant of the two sisters at the story's focus, and she certainly tries her hardest to do something with this material; anyone would deserve an Oscar simply for having to bear Russell's decision to give her a scene where she has to dance wildly in front of a herd of mystified-looking cattle. Oliver Reed has one expression, an intense glower. The whole thing is over-written and over-directed, and it's deliriously campy. Indeed, this vies with "Mommie Dearest" as perhaps the most unintentionally hysterical movie I've ever seen.
Grade: D
Welcome to the world of D.H. Lawrence, where psycho-babble reigns supreme, and where no one can get down to living a productive life because everyone is too busy talking about how unproductive their lives are. Spending time with the characters in a D.H. Lawrence novel is like being locked in a closet with a group of your most self-absorbed acquaintances who you would run away from if you met them at a party. When I read "Women in Love," I so desperately wanted to strangle every single character in it, but since I couldn't, I was hoping they would at least strangle each other. Alas, only one of them dies, not by strangulation, and I won't spoil it for you by telling which one, in case you actually give a damn about this story or any of these people.
To give director Ken Russell his due, he makes this filmed version about as entertaining as it's possible to make this essentially unfilmable novel. He throws out much of the psychological mumbo-jumbo that Lawrence adored, and focuses instead on all of the naughty parts, so we get lots of histrionic lovemaking in beds and fields, two buck naked men wrestling by firelight, and one embarrassing scene featuring Alan Bates (yup, buck naked again) roaming around in a meadow making love to bushes and grass (I'm not kidding). Glenda Jackson won an Oscar for her performance as Gudrun, the more dominant of the two sisters at the story's focus, and she certainly tries her hardest to do something with this material; anyone would deserve an Oscar simply for having to bear Russell's decision to give her a scene where she has to dance wildly in front of a herd of mystified-looking cattle. Oliver Reed has one expression, an intense glower. The whole thing is over-written and over-directed, and it's deliriously campy. Indeed, this vies with "Mommie Dearest" as perhaps the most unintentionally hysterical movie I've ever seen.
Grade: D