Lady Chatterley's Lover

This 2015 adaptation tries to bring D. H. Lawrence's classic forbidden love story to life but kinda misses the mark. What should be a bold, emotional journey about passion across class lines ends up feeling a bit flat and distant.

One thing this version has over the 2022 Netflix adaptation is that it has some scenes, which is missing in the Netflix version. Those scenes actually help build the story and explain the characters' choices better. Without them, the emotional progression in the Netflix version feels rushed or confusing, so this older version wins points there.

That said, even here, the romance doesn't quite land. The chemistry between the leads feels like it's almost there but never really clicks. You keep waiting for that spark, but it never fully lights up. And visually, the color grading doesn't help either, it's dull and washed out, not giving off the warm or passionate vibe you'd expect from a story about secret love.

In the end, it feels like the film gets caught up in the heaviness of war and class, and forgets to bring the forbidden romance to life. It had potential, but the emotion just doesn't hit the way it should.

Constance Reid meets Sir Clifford Chatterley, a wealthy Mining Colliery owner, and the two quickly marry. After a short passionate renaissance Clifford who is serving in the Army is caught by a bomb blast and suffers massive injuries, which leave him wheelchair bound. Oliver Mellors, a fellow survivor from the front line turns up at the Chatterley's estate seeking the role of Gamekeeper. Mellors is employed due to the fact that he served in Clifford' regiment. Constance is seemingly quite a passionate woman, and when she first sees the sultry looking Mellors there's a definite attraction, and a love affair between the two soon begins. Clifford becomes desperate for an heir, hugely frustrated because he can't produce one he tries to initiate proceedings.

The scene of Clifford getting caught up in the bomb blast was fantastic, it looked very realistic. I would question how Constance hadn't heard of his accident though.

I applaud James Norton for his performance as Clifford, he's a truly versatile actor, he has the ability to make you love him and hate him, and in this he made me pity him, he is fantastic, and is the one giving the others the masterclass in acting.

It's a very well behaved version of such a well known story, it's well acted, it looks good. I just felt it was missing a bit of spark, maybe Lady C herself, possibly she should have been a bit more intense, a bit more passionate. I felt Holliday Grainger got better as it went on, there was an innocence to her character, just missing a little bit of allure, but on the whole it was pretty good. 6/10

While I liked the movie for it's romanticism, I must say that it was an overall sad movie in my opinion.

This movie is about a wealthy newlywed couple who, after the husband returns from war paralyzed from the waist down, begin to drift apart. The drifting in mostly on the part of the wife due to the husbands frustrations and longing for an heir he can not provide them with. This sets the wife's eye on the estate's newly hired gamekeeper. Slowly falling for one another leads the adulterous couple down a complicated road.

I say it was sad only because I had some feelings about the husband's life change and how hard that would've been to deal with. The movie wasn't bad. It has some nice costumes and some beautiful camera work but it doesn't make it very far past an average film for me.

The cast drew me in... and although I didn't suffer through it because of positive performances from Jodie Comer & James Norton. More was left desired from Richard Madden, but mostly Holliday Garainger. From my perspective she didn't match the level from the rest of the cast. Especially the dialogue and facial expressions that got me, cause I just didn't buy it (and yes, I know what sort of movie I was getting into but I usually feel okey by the somewhat awkwardness, but unfortunately not here.)

I knew very little of what Lady Chatterley's Lover was about before watching this adaptation of the 1928 novel of the same name, due to the fact that I don't really read classics, until I saw the trailer for it one day on BBC One. After I saw the trailer a few times, I knew that I wanted to watch it and then, after viewing it, possibly get around to reading the novel. Now that I have seen the TV Film, I know that I am definitely going to finish the novel at some point in the near future.

The on-screen chemistry between Lady Chatterley & Mellors, portrayed by Holliday Grainger and Richard Madden respectively, had me hooked from their very first meeting. I found myself willing them to be together and was almost brought to tears on numerous occasions in the last 40 or so minutes of the show.

Having already seen Madden as the self-proclaimed "King of the North" Robb Stark in the current HBO adaptation of George R. R. Martin's Game of Thrones I had an idea of how I felt regarding his acting and let me say, he does not disappoint. His portrayal of gamekeeper Oliver Mellors was, to me, simply astounding.

I am relatively new to the acting of both Grainger and Norton, having only fleetingly seen them as small roles in other TV shows. But boy did they impress me. While Norton was given the task of playing the wheelchair-bound Sir Clifford Chatterley which, in my eyes, could not have been the easiest of roles for an actor to play, Grainger was given the role of Lady Constance "Connie" Chatterley. Grainger plays Lady Chatterley so very well. She is a character that you'll just love to hate.

I understand how film critics may be a little disappointed with this adaptation, if they have previously read the novel, as I quite often compare a film adaptation with its book counterpart but, as someone who went into watching this adaptation completely blind from knowing any previous history of it, I thoroughly enjoyed it and would definitely watch it again.