Movie review: Lady Chatterley

How to have fun with your clothes (mostly) on.

by John P. Meyer

Leave it to a French filmmaker (writer/director Pascale Ferran) to produce a version of the Lady Chatterley tale that concentrates more on the odd couple love affair than it does on the socio-economic divisions brought about by the burgeoning industrial age. (It rises far above less-ambitious soft-porn versions of the story, as well.) It undoubtedly helps that Ferran took as her source material the second of two early drafts of D.H. Lawrence's iconic novel: John Thomas and Lady Jane.

The John Thomas draft (must not... make... "barn door open" joke... AAARGH!) does, in fact, spend more (and more tender) verbiage on the Constance/Parkin relationship than does the finished novel; furthermore, the character of Parkin comes across less as a boorish animalistic servicer of affection-starved female nobility and more as a sensitive new-age gamekeeper guy: at one point he decorates Constance's naked reclining form with flowers, for heaven's sake.

Not that either of the acting leads spend much of their screen time naked: in fact, this is one of those films that serves as a glowing example of how well-portrayed intimacy can end up being far more arousing than gynecologically-explicit coupling between emotionless parts-interchangeable glamour models. When Constance Chatterley (played by the naturally lovely and expressive Marina Hands) and Parkin (rough-featured, broad-as-a beam Jean-Louis Coullo'ch) first decide to "do it," he lays her down on the rough plank flooring of a forest shed and sees to the removal or pushing aside of only those clothing items denying direct access to those primary "doing it" regions.

Indeed, there's little delicacy involved in the initial trysts between the two seemingly mismatched characters (he an "uncouth fellow" of the laboring class; she a lily-white indoor aristocrat) - the point is that they are both so deprived of physical contact (he because of his isolation in the forest; she due to her husband's aloofness and paraplegic condition) that their mutual hunger will stand no foreplay. Constance is more than satisfied to have his big hands roaming over her clothed body briefly, and when he soon thereafter effects the requisite conjoining the camera lingers on her face, eyes open, lips parted, gaze drifting off to nether realms previously unimagined. (Talk about intimacy.)

For his part, the matter-of-fact Parkin is confronted with something totally beyond his ken: he can't believe what he's being given - freely and willingly (perhaps with even a degree of eagerness) - by a beautiful woman who by all rights should be as unreachable to him as a creature from another planet.

This is not to give the impression that the two lovers immediately take to the planking; in fact, there's much time spent in the buildup to this momentous event. Constance, who's been diagnosed with "reduced vitality," seeks fresh air and recuperative perambulation in the forested acreage of her husband's estate. One day she encounters Parkin in the act of washing up behind the gamekeeper's cottage. He's naked from the waist up, which might not sound like much in the way of stimulation to modern lady oglers (or maybe it does...?), but the sight of his sinewy back literally knocks the wind out of her; she's forced to sit down for a while in the woods rimming his property before she can bring herself to approach the house and convey to Parkin the message her husband has sent her to deliver.

Much attention is given by the cinematographer to a loving exploration of nature's realm: Spring's first flowers carpet the inter-forest glades; moss coats the ragged trunks of trees; flowing water makes its own delicate music in the rivulet of a stream. Sylvan symbolism practically whacks us in the head with a hammer. Constance and Parkin, in the process of becoming fast friends, traipse off into the woods to birdwatch - probably the only known instance of this pursuit actually leading to sweaty sex.

Their ongoing passionate affair - secured as it is in a remote locale, removed from the regard of the rest of the world - is the perfect arrangement for both of them. Parkin loathes the company of other men, yet dotes on the beauty and perspective supplied by the miraculously-approachable wife of his employer. Constance lacks for nothing in worldly things, save for that most basic requisite: a partnership of mind and body, a world tinted with shadings beyond those she can paint for herself.

By the conclusion of the screen story, Constance and Parkin have become true life partners, content to be with each other in any fashion that the constraints placed upon each of them by external forces will allow. The ending is bittersweet and quiet and seemingly abrupt, but at least it's an ending, and after 168 minutes you'll probably be glad for it - even though the getting there has been a delightful and thought-provoking voyage.

French subtitles are well-situated and easily read. There's almost no scoring employed in the film - director Ferran has apparently decided that we should immerse ourselves in the sounds of the wind sowing through the trees and the chirping of birds, or the crackle of burning embers in the fireplace against the wall of the cottage where our lovers recline in the night. It works by lending an unhurriedness to events, removing them from the timestream, affording them magic. It works.

In addition to the two main players, Hippolyte Giradot is notable as Sir Clifford, husband of Constance and head of the estate. He slots perfectly into the role of a self-important, self-deluded, physically damaged nobleman with more interest in his business affairs than his personal ones. The scene in which he's forced to ask for help as his tin lizzie wheelchair bogs down on a muddy hill supplies apt allegory for the way in which the privileged classes think they need nothing from "those beneath them," when in fact it's just that group who make it possible for them to survive.

MOST WISHFUL THINKING EVER: "One cannot be killed unless he believes he can be." - WWI veteran dinner guest, regarding death on the battlefield

SHARED INCREDULITY: "How can I ever thank you?" - Constance to Parkin, following an intimate encounter

"Thank me for what?" - Parkin's stunned reply

DEFINING ONE'S WORTHINESS: "I feel like I'm worth nothing to no one - except to you." - Parkin to Constance.