A
period when Ken Russell brought out films that challenged
cinema. Women in Love was a major critical and commercial
success. The Music Lovers continued his success and The
Devils established him as a great mainstream director. At
one point his last three films (The Music Lovers, The
Devils, The Boyfriend) were showing at the same time on
London's West End.
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Women in Love established Russell as a major
film director. The film is based on DH Lawrence's novel and caused as
much critical confusion as Lawrence did in his day. But it became a
major commercial success.
The wrestling scene brought homo-erotic images
into the mainstream cinema.
As in the later Rainbow, Russell skips most of
the political aspects of Lawrence's book.
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Drowned lovers contrasted with the living. |
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The rest of the virgin and the anxiety of the
mistress. |
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Eleanor Bron and Jennie
Linden provide good supporting roles. |
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The photography is by
Billy Williams. Says Joy Gould Boyum (from Double Exposure)
"the scenes between Rupert and Ursula tend to be brightly lit,
situated in daylight and frequently outdoors. The scenes between
Gerald and Gudrun, in contrast, tend to be set in interiors and most
often at night- with the prevailing darkness serving... to comment on
the texture of their relationship....". The use of mirrors
is typical of Ken Russell.
The editor is again Michael Bradsell.
Costumes are by Shirley
Russell. Georges Delerue did the
music, Russell says: "Certainly the power of the scene is greatly
enhanced by the music of Georges Delerue but its
not the exact music that he wrote for that particular
sequence... what I had to do was to cut out the fugue and
use the prelude, actually the prelude had tremendous, a
sort of growing intensity and power so it worked and the
fact that it cut off just as the moment when the two men
collapsed worked extremely well".
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people |
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best image |
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Glenda Jackson, red hair and
fringe, confronting the Highland cows, red hair and fringe. |
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Alan Bates naked in the field.
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best scene
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The wrestling scene.
The opening sequence with the
coal miners on the bus and the silent dialogue of Glenda
Jackson.
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themes |
sexuality (repression,
homosexuality) the
elements: water and earth.
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films |
Other films released in the same year include True Grit,
Midnight Cowboy and Easy Rider. |
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