Product Description

This compelling rendition of the literary masterpiece is a visual stunner and very likely the mostsensuous film ever made (N.Y. Daily News). Glenda Jackson garnered the first of her two Oscars®* for her superb performance in director Ken Russell and writer Larry Kramer's brilliant exploration of the complexities of sexuality and romantic love. Growing up in the sheltered society of 1920s England, Gudrun (Jackson) and Ursula (Jennie Linden) know little about the ways of love. So when they pursue thrilling, torrid affairs with a notorious playboy (Alan Bates) and abrooding philanderer (Oliver Reed), what they discover about their lovers, and themselves, may be more all-consumingand dangerously volatilethan they ever dared imagine.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #25425 in DVD
• Released on: 2003-03-04
• Rating: R (Restricted)
• Aspect ratio: 1.66:1
• Formats: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD, Letterboxed, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: English, Spanish, French
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 131 minutes

Amazon.com essential video
Before director Ken Russell's name became synonymous with cinematic extravagance and overkill, he actually directed what is one of the most passionate and involving adaptations of D.H. Lawrence in recent memory. Oliver Reed and Alan Bates star as friends who fall in love with a pair of sisters (Jennie Linden and Glenda Jackson, who won an Oscar for the role). But the relationships take markedly different directions, as Russell explores the nature of commitment and love. Bates and Linden learn to give themselves to each other; the more withdrawn Reed cannot, finally, connect with the demanding and challenging Jackson. Shot with great sensuality, it was surprisingly frank for its period (1970) and includes one of the most charged scenes in movie history: Bates and Reed as manly men, wrestling nude by firelight. --Marshall Fine

Customer Reviews

Excellent presentation of Lawrences warm blooded themes
Film versions of novels rarely get everything right but this comes pretty close. I especially like how effective the film is at conveying the importance of the body and physical sensation so vital in Lawrence's writing. I think a film can only attempt to show what the book more specifically says so to the mind the book will always be preferred but with a writer like Lawrence film makes perfect sense. In fact Lawrences flaw is perhaps that he at times uses too many words when an image would suffice. So I love that someone as visually audacious as Ken Russell made this film. I've seen it many times and always love different things about it. Russell is usually equated with excess but here everything exists in just the right amount, nothing is overdone, he finds just the right way to convey literary content without overly revering it and so framing it too neatly. Russell remains true to the book,and to his credit the way he injects the Lawrentian themes enlivens his characters, make them seem even more vital which is no small accomplishment and so the film never feels "literary" even though it is very literary in the best sense. To Lawrence love and any kind of relationship was always marked with struggle and restlessness because it could never be perfected. He was not interested in the bourgeoisie convention of marriage which domesticated love into something else but in its truest most uncompromised state. So in this film Ken Russell gives us that. Not every detail of the whole story but the essential feeling of love as experienced by four very different temperaments and all four main characters are very different types indeed, and all react differently to passion and interpret its meaning differently also. The most beautiful scenes are the wordless ones when the characters stop analyzing what their lives are about and allow themselves to simply inhabit their own passion and instincts. I think Russell is very true to Lawrence's concerns, perhaps shares them, but articulates them in his own visual way which really makes this a kind of collaboration with Lawrence as some of the scenes have no precedent in the book. The characters all remain complex and interesting and much remains unresolved because it is unresolvable. He also did a version of Women in Love's companion novel The Rainbow which is only about half as good.

A Must MUST see for all.
One of the most magnificent films and most sensuous ever made. I rented "Women in Love" years ago over and over again, until I gave up and finally bought a copy. I have grown attached to this film. Glenda Jackson deservedly won oscar for her portrayal as Gudrun. Cinematographer should have won too for his elegant photography.

When discussing this film with other film buffs, they keep mentioning the "most" brilliant scene, the nude scene with Alan Bates and Oliver Reed. I agree it's brilliant and exotic, but there are others that are beautiful, graceful and unforgettable: 1) Jennie Linden's nude scene with Alan Bates, circling gracefully around one another in a field while a beautiful score of music plays in the background. 2) Jackson's dance and graceful movement while reaching for a tree branch and slowly descending to the ground and back again, while Linden sings "Pretty Bubbles". 3) Linden's reconciliation with Bates starting with "See what a flower I found you?" 4) Jackson's gorgeous elongated eyes behind a veil putting on a costume in Switzerland while having an affair and Stravinsky plays in the background.

No matter how many times I see this film, I find new beautiful discoveries. I pledge people to give this one a chance and I promise it will be worth while and rewarding.

Possibly Russell's most enduring work....
This has to be one of the most memorable treatments of Lawrence's work.

The film explores all three relationship possibilites (male-female, male-male, and female-female) revealing the true underlying drives of each sex. The performances of *all* cast in this film are exemplary. Not only do Bates, Reed, and Jackson turn in unforgettable performances, but other characters (Jennie Linden as Ursula, Vladek Sheybal, Eleanor Bron, to name a few) are inspired to excel equally.

Really this is a film which will haunt and force you to view it many many times. Each time you view it you will find more depth and more of Lawrence's insight into the life force behind men and women.

This is not a film for the faint-hearted, or for casual viewing. It is a heavy hitter.