1928 novel still relevant in a patriarchal society
Ex-actress gives ‘Lady Chatterley’ a feminist perspective
The subject is sex, like it most always will be when discussing “Lady Chatterley’s Lover,” whether it’s D.H. Lawrence’s scandalous 1928 novel, or any number of film adaptations from the 1950s to current day. It is a sense of the forbidden that has drawn producers and directors to adapting the book over the years, and now Laure de Clermont-Tonnerre has fallen under its spell.
The former French actress who made her feature-length directorial debut with “The Mustang,” a brilliant take on toxic masculinity and emotional rehabilitation set within the American prison system, brings a feminist perspective to Lawrence’s themes of individuality versus confinement within class structures.
About that class divide: De Clermont-Tonnerre said she is heavily influenced by France’s poetic realist directors, such as Julien Duvivier, Jean Renoir and Marcel Carne, who made films highlighting workingclass struggles in the late 1930s. (Duvivier’s 1936 “La Belle Équipe,” about five unemployed workers who win the lottery and open a cafe, is her favorite film.)
Lady Chatterley, who, as de Clermont-Tonnerre puts it, “unleashes herself from the corset” with her paralyzed husband’s gamekeeper, is played by Emma Corrin, who won a Golden Globe as Lady Diana Spencer in “The Crown” and can be seen on Prime Video opposite Harry Styles in “My Policeman.”
De Clermont-Tonnerre spoke with The Chronicle in
October before presenting the film at the Mill Valley Film Festival, ahead of its limited theatrical release in the Bay Area and Netflix debut on Friday, Dec. 2.
This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.
Q: What do you think modern audiences can get out of a 100-year-old novel that's really no longer controversial? A:
What is still controversial is how a woman can be free with her own body. When you see what’s happening now, it’s like the patriarchy is deciding for the woman’s body
again.
Yes, Lawrence at the time was glorifying sensuality, bodies, sex as an ode to life, as a celebration of life. It was shameful and dirty, and a lot of it was kind of scandalous at the time, but I have to say that still in our society, because it’s so much shaped by patriarchy, a woman cannot be completely at ease or open about her sexual desires the same as men.
Q: The book has been adapted several times. Was there something you thought was lacking in those previous film adapta
Laure continues on B12