The French Lieutenant’s Woman (1981) would earn Meryl Streep her third acting Oscar nomination. The film would reconstruct the book it was based upon by reimagining it as a movie within a movie. Streep and Jeremy Irons play dual roles. In the current day, they are both actors, having an affair while working on a movie together. The movie they are filming, The French Lieutenant’s Woman, has them playing Victorian-era characters who are also embarking on an affair.
The
movie uses the two contrasting time periods to question topics of social growth
or stagnation as it regards women’s abilities to have independence, the
consequences of infidelity, social oppression, and sexual repression/hypocrisy.
The two main actors give standout performances… Streep in particular as she
flawlessly inhabits both a current day American actress and a Victorian age
British character.
Visually this film is gorgeous and captivating. The cinematography, sets, and costumes utilized for both time periods are stunning. It would often be amusing to be watching a Victorian-era scene, and then suddenly splicing away to a new scene where characters are wearing tight blue jeans! If I were to have one complaint, it would be with the film’s pacing. Twice during my viewing, I found myself pondering the time remaining for things to wrap up, but then the story would pick up and I would become fully engrossed again.
I enjoyed The French Lieutenant's Woman very much. It’s a film that you think about afterward and continue to ponder the layers and layers of cat-and-mouse antics that both the movie and the movie’s characters, administered.
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