The French Lieutenant's Woman (film) The French Lieutenant's Woman (film) The French Lieutenant's Woman is a 1981 British romantic drama film directed by Karel Reisz, produced by Leon Clore, and adapted by playwright Harold Pinter. It is based on the eponymous 1969 novel by John Fowles. The music score is by Carl Davis and the cinematography by Freddie Francis. The film stars Meryl Streep and Jeremy Irons. Other featured actors include Hilton McRae, Peter Vaughan, Colin Jeavons, Liz Smith, Patience Collier, Richard Griffiths, David Warner, Alun Armstrong, Penelope Wilton, and Leo McKern. The film received five Academy Award nominations. Streep was nominated for the Academy
The French Lieutenant's Woman postmodern thematic binaries produced within the novel's content. Because of its prominence since publication, the novel has received a variety of different academic re-examinations in light of numerous critical and thematic approaches. Some of the most popular concerns for the novel are its discussion of gender, especially questioning "Is the novel a feminist novel?", its engagement with metafictional and metahistorical concepts and its treatment of science and religion. The novel creates a number of binaries between men and women. Michelle Phillips Buchberger argues that "The French Lieutenant's Woman," along with Fowles two earlier novels "The Collector" (1963) and "The Magus"