The French Lieutenant's Woman (1981)

Story Within A Story Concept Works Beautifully In This Film

This 1981 film version of a famous novel by John Fowles from a few years earlier stars Meryl Streep and Jeremy Irons at the height of their youthful attractiveness if not their fame. Streep plays the dual roles of Sarah and Anna. Sarah is the title character, a young Victorian woman whose life has seemingly been ruined by her relationship with a Frenchman who abandoned her. Anna is the modern American actress who portrays her and who is involved in an affair with her costar, Mike, despite them both being in other committed relationships. Jeremy Irons plays this actor, Mike, as well as Sarah's love interest in the film Charles. Charles is a paleontologist and wealthy man of leisure who while recently engaged to a silly rich girl develops an obsession for the mysterious, forlorn but lovely Sarah.

The movie was obviously filmed on location in England and is quite beautiful to look at with lush outdoor scenes and ornate Victorian interiors and costumes. The story within a story approach was not used in the novel but the book would be particularly difficult to faithfully film because it has three alternate endings. The problem with the alternate endings is partly and cleverly solved by using the modern days actors' relationship to portray one of the alternatives while Sarah and Charles' story ends in another possible conclusion offered by the novel. The movie should appeal to those who love the Victorian era, romances or Thomas Hardy as the story is quite reminiscent of some of his novels. June 3, 2008

TWO FOR ONE

This movie has been around for a long time now but I just happened to see it the other night. It was on one of those late night movie channels and well worth staying up for. You really got two good stories in one. ( you will have to watch the movie to understand what I mean ) Meryl, was her usual great self so if you enjoy her work and have not yet seen this movie, you should. June 3, 2008

A classic

I saw this in the original release -- then I got to go to England, to Lyme Regis, to walk on the Cobb in a misty rain -- and it was magic. And so is this film. If you've read John Fowles' novel, you know what a challenge it was to make the film version. But, thanks to Harold Pinter, and everyone involved with the making of this film, most especially Streep and Irons, it remains a masterpiece! April 17, 2008

oldy but goody

This is an old movie but still love it all the same.
Well cast, great UK scenary etc, worth a look at. March 30, 2008

Emotionally powerful

The French Lieutenant's Woman tells two stories, the story of two lovers in the Victorian age (the biologist Charles played by Jeremy Irons and the outcast Sarah played by Meryl Streep) whose story are being filmed. The two married actors playing the roles of Charles and Sarah, Mike (Irons) and Anna (Streep) are also having an affair during the shooting of the film, thereby giving subtle commentary/enlightenment on the story of the Victorian lovers.

It is emotionally very powerful, as you are strongly pulled into Charles' fascination with Sarah and her behaviour. As a biologist, he is very interested and subscribes to the theories of Charles Darwin, which is of course a laughing matter for the Victorian society, who scoffs at what they believe to be a theory of their descendance from apes. He is a loner, preferring to spend his time alone in the veld, searching for fossils. His saving grace in the eyes of society is that he is rich and therefore he is acceptable, even when he asks the daughter of Mr Freeman, the wealthiest merchant in England, for her hand.

Sarah is an outcast because she had an affair with a wounded French Lieutenant, whom she nursed back to health and fell in love with. When he finally leaves for France, she follows him to the hotel he stays in before his departure. The lieutenant was married and not in love with her, causing her shame. She is forced to become an old woman's companion, but is shunned by society. Her favourite pastime is to walk alone on the quay overlooking the sea, or in the woods. It is here where Charles sees her and becomes obsessed with her. They start meeting. Sarah is dismissed by her mistress on account of her behaviour and has to leave town and Charles follows her. After declaring their love for each other, Charles goes back to break his engagement with his fiancee. This is of course totally unacceptable in the moral ethics of the time and his name is dragged through the mud. When he returns to the hotel, Sarah has left (inexplicably) and he starts a long search to find her.

In the actors affair, Mike also wants more from the married Anna and relentlessly pursues her, even when she goes back to London to be with her husband. It becomes clear that the novel on which the film is based gave two possible endings, a happy and an unhappy ending. The film attempts to capture both, but in the different time zones.

Streep is powerful in both the Sarah and Anna roles and dominates the film - just to see her at the height of her extraordinary power is already a good enough reason to see this film. Unfortunately the psychological motivation for her strange behaviour, especially as Sarah, is not convincingly explained, which is why the movie loses one star in my view. Irons is good as Mike, the actor, but seems a little unsure in his portrayal of the troubled Charles, sometimes overly aggressive (especially as the master in the household when he purports to have some understanding for his footman's indulgence in romance but on the other hand treats him with total disrespect) and other times overly passive (especially in some of the initial interaction with Sarah).

Like many good films, it leaves you with a feeling of "What exactly happened?" at the end, making it necessary to think through the events, the characters and what it meant. Significant is that Mike is calling out for Sarah (not Anna) at the end, therefore implying his search for his own vanishing and elusive dream, attempting to turn fiction (the story of the film) into the reality of the present. See it, it is worth it.
November 4, 2007

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