In his opening paragraph to Lady Chatterley’s Lover, D.H. Lawrence writes — “We’ve got to live, no matter how many skies have fallen.” Although he goes on to clarify that “this was more or less Constance Chatterley’s position”, many of the historical romances on Netflix India show us that the sentiment neatly captures the plight of protagonists across centuries and countries.

In England, Constance Chatterley née Reid marries Sir Clifford who returns from the Great War, paralysed waist-down. The two retire to his country estate, Wragby Hall, where Constance finds herself with little to do other than play nurse to her husband who is curiously unruffled about his crippled life, entirely oblivious to what that might mean for his young wife. Constance finds comfort and affection in the arms of the gamekeeper Oliver Mellors, and admirably sticks by her decision even at the risk of humiliation and ostracisation.

In Russia, at the turn of the century, Matvey Polyakov in Silver Skates loses his job just before Christmas 1899. His father is diagnosed with tuberculosis while he falls in cahoots with a band of quick-footed thieves and then falls in love with an aristocrat’s daughter. All the action happens on skates, with the boys often literally skating on thin ice. With romance and survival hanging in the balance, Matvey will do what it takes to live, even when the sky is falling around his ears.

In 18th-century France, we see a noblewoman in Lady J, plotting revenge on a marquis who has dared to fall out of love with her. She prides herself for being able to resist a man’s attentions and the movie begins with her laughing at the well-known Lothario’s courtship. And yet she succumbs to his charms, only to find that, after some time has lapsed, his emotions have changed. Revenge it is while the skies fall around her, for hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.

Book to Screen

Released in 2022, 2020 and 2018, the three period pieces on Netflix India are also all based on books. While Lady Chatterley’s Lover is adapted from the famous eponymous novel by D.H. Lawrence, the Russian movie (dubbed in English) Silver Skates is only loosely based on the 1865 novel by American author Mary Mapes Dodge — Hans Brinker or The Silver Skates: A Story of Life in Holland, which is set in the Netherlands and deals with friendship and honour. The French movie Lady J is inspired by a story in Denis Diderot’s 1796 novel Jacques the Fatalist where the valet Jacques is asked to regale his master with accounts of his love affairs. Diderot makes no secret of the fact that many of the stories by Jacques were taken from the 1759 novel by English writer Lawrence Sterne — The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman. And both novels are strongly reminiscent of Cervantes’ Don Quixote.

So, if you’re on a historical romance binge, you might be tempted to flip through some of these pages as well (especially since the modern doctor prescribes reading over watching, two hours before bedtime!) If you’re wondering if any of the other novels chartered the Chatterley course and found itself banned for obscenity, you’ll be disappointed.

Class Act

If there’s one thing that these stories have in common, it is love and passion which transcends the divisions of class. Lady Chatterley falls in love with the gamekeeper who served at Wragby Hall even before the war. He’s the last person that Sir Clifford imagines that his wife is likely to have an affair with, even though he is greatly encouraging of her bearing another man’s child so that Wragby can have an heir. In Saint Petersburg, Matvey sees that Alisa is a young woman who wants to break free of the impositions placed on women and is far more interested in science than domestic duties. Alisa sees a young man driven to desperation by poverty. And although her father is a minister and his is a lamplighter, there’s no one else who can understand the other better.

In France, near Paris, Mademoiselle de Joncquières is born into adverse conditions and becomes the key in a noblewoman’s plot for revenge against her lover. The lover is a marquis who is driven by passion and is tricked into marrying the defiled Lady J. When he finds out, he wants to discard her but her helplessness elicits a kindness of spirit which he has hitherto never displayed. Not that we think it will last, but it certainly does turn the revenge plan upside down!

Action and Adventure

An element of adventure runs through these historical romances on Netflix. With Lady Chatterley, we nervously look over our shoulders as the lovers eagerly shed their clothes in the midst of the serene greens of the midlands. We feel the outrage of early-20th century sensibilities building as we bite our fingernails through audacious love scenes — what if they’re seen? What if one of the many servants employed at Wragby stumbles upon these two hormone-fuelled madcaps romping in the nude in broad daylight? And of course they almost do get caught in the act!

Silver Skates puts modern car chases and impossible running sequences to shame with their artful speed-skating. The Ice Gang, a band of thieves who have mastered the art of robbing the rich in Saint Petersburg, who practise their art in a manner reminiscent of Fagin’s boys from Oliver Twist, are also nimble skaters, apart from being artful dodgers – they flee from cops as gracefully and deftly as figure skaters in a circus ring.

Lady J, on the other hand, is gentle-paced, imitating the languor of the French upper classes. Romance and revenge play out in a leisurely manner over walks in the woods and endless flower arrangements.

As an aside…

What’s a good drama without a compelling supporting character to keep the protagonists interesting?

Lady Chatterley finds an unlikely accomplice in the strait-laced, gossip-loving Mrs Bolton. If Constance and Oliver are to be caught, we don’t think Mrs Bolton will lose a second in letting the rat out of the bag. But she’s still a young romantic, having lost her husband far too early to the coal mines. There’s more to her crisp demeanour than meets the eye and we want to know more.

Matvey is inducted into the gang of thieves by their leader, Alex. He’s clever, smooth and ruthless. But with his inscrutable face and lips set thin, Alex keeps an eye on his boys, never letting them down, coming to their rescue by putting himself in danger. His political ideologies are rooted in theory and reality, so why then has he taken to the streets?

The only really interesting character in Lady J is Madame de Joncquières, the quintessential fallen woman. She narrates her story falteringly – like all fallen women she is of high birth and through twists and turns rife with betrayal, finds herself destined to the brothel. While her beautiful daughter is made queen of the revenge chessboard, it is her story which would have made for a more interesting plot. We would like Madame de La Pommeraye to step down from her role as the protagonist, with her spurious notions of feminism which involve using other women to regain her misplaced pride.

And with that leave you to decide which period piece caught your fancy the most. In D.H. Lawrence’s words, “Ours is essentially a tragic age, so we refuse to take it tragically.” It is a sentiment which stretches across the eras.