3 out of 5

Directed by: John Schlesinger

‘Cold Comfort Farm,’ as the actual name of the farm on which Flora (Kate Beckinsale) decides to settle, is pretty on the nose. It’s a direct joke – there’s no pun; the name elicits exactly the vibe of the location – that feels exactly right for a 1930s book parody of a certain type of romantic, doomy novel, and especially one by an English author, if we can go with the stereotype of British humor of saying the silly lil’ thing with a barely detectable smirk. And not that the various adaptations of Stella Gibbons novel, including this 1995 made-for-TV (and eventually released in theaters) edition should have changed that title, but it gains a little less purchase in the cinematic medium, which can’t afford to be as broad, necessarily, when compacting a tale into 90 minutes or so. In less windy words, separated from the source material by a few decades, or if you weren’t familiar with it in the first place, you might think / expect there to be a little more to the name, but no: it’s pretty on the nose.

That kind of “is there more to this?” consideration is the hitch in the step of director John Schlesinger’s and writer Malcolm Bradbury’s adaptation, which takes at least a third of its run time to warm up and inform the viewer that the answer to that question is, again, no. Prior to that, we’re undoubtedly charmed by the illustrated title sequence, and the over-the-top archetypes populating the farm – Flora is a relative to cousin Judith Starkadder (Eileen Atkins), one of the matriarchs on the farm and who agrees to take in Flora post the death of the latter’s parents, and due to some unspecified slight done to Flora’s father – but beyond the whimsy of the score (Robert Lockhart) and the fact that Flora grins a lot, how comical this comedy is meant to be is unclear: will we be making good on the over-the-topness, or is this a dry, titter-at-the-title type of humor? Either could work; the wait while the film establishes itself is a restless one.

…Which comes back around towards the end, as Flora’s machinations, once she’s taken it upon herself to “fix” the denizens of the farm, start to feel pretty rushed and forced, like we’re speed running through some gags / concepts better set up in the book. But inbetween those final moments and the charming but slow setup, Cold Comfort Farm definitely clicks. There is, again, not more to this fixing decision, since it’s really just a play on the novels Gibbons’ book poked at, but the movie has to set up all of the pawns for Flora to move around, and there are quite a few. Beckinsale is game for the whole process, though, and her assuredness keeps us intrigued to see where it’s going, with Schlesinger presenting the whole thing with apropos soap opera angles and framing. Some of the setups are exceedingly clever (within the silly confines of the story), and the slow roll does have its purpose in letting you know there’s no hidden tragedy here: you can just keep going, confident the movie will stay silly and sweet the whole while.