Movie Log: Cold Comfort Farm

It was another three-movie weekend (if we count Clone Wars), and this was #3 -- The Wife and I saw it Sunday night.

Once again, I picked a movie because I've read the book -- Cold Comfort Farm is based on the classic Stella Gibbons novel. It's very funny and very literary -- the novel is a parody of a lot of early 20th century English novels (D.H. Lawrence in particular), and the movie captures that beautifully.

In fact, I don't remember the novel being as funny as the movie was, which probably means I wasn't paying enough attention when I read the book eight years or so ago. (Another thing I should re-read in my copious spare time.)

If you need another reason to see it, Cold Comfort Farm also features the lovely and talented Kate Beckinsale in a part which doesn't make you feel sorry for her (unlike most of her more recent movies, which make me want to track down her agent and forcibly retire him). There's also a bunch of other people doing excellent work, from Ian McKellan as a fire & brimstone preacher to Stephen Fry as the very wet pseudo-Lawrence would-be writer.

If you read classic English novels, you need to read Cold Comfort Farm. And once you have, you should see the movie -- you could probably skip reading the book, I suppose, but that sounds like heresy to me.