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List Price: $29.99 | | Label: Acorn Media
Salesrank: 26642
Released: September 27, 2005 |
| Our Price: $16.65 |
| Used Price: $18.99 |
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MPAA Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Media: DVD |
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Editorial Review:
Based on Nancy Mitford’s beloved novels The Pursuit of Love and Love in a Cold Climate—part thinly-veiled memoir, part biting satire, and part fascinating window on a vanished way of life—this witty drama from the BBC follows the romantic adventures of three young aristocrats in the decade between the wars.
Starring British acting legends Alan Bates (Gosford Park), Celia Imrie (Bridget Jones’s Diary), Sheila Gish (Mansfield Park), and Anthony Andrews (Brideshead Revisited), with young stars Rosamund Pike (Die Another Day), Elisabeth Dermot-Walsh (Bertie and Elizabeth), and Megan Dodds (Malice Aforethought). Providing an authentic backdrop are several English castles and country houses, including Batsford Park, home of the Mitford family from 1916 to 1919.
Description of Love in a Cold Climate:
Love in a Cold Climate, Deborah Moggach's efficient 155-minute adaptation of Nancy Mitford's two best-known novels, hits an entirely appropriate balance between the comic and the sentimentally tragic. Viewpoint figure Fanny (Rosamund Pike) observes from her happy marriage the complicatedly messy lives of her two closest friends, Polly (Megan Dodds) and Linda (Elisabeth Dermot-Walsh). Polly escapes from a mother jealous of her beauty into a marriage that gets her disinherited and leaves her ultimately alone when her husband falls for the pretty male cousin who has supplanted her; Linda falls in turn for an Anglo-German banker, a posh young Communist who ships her off to the Spanish Civil War, and a brilliant doomed French aristocrat. Mingled with this sweet-sour material is the memorable comic relief: Linda's monstrous father and world-weary mother, the eccentric and affectionate Lord Merlin (John Wood) and Fanny's long-absent mother, the Bolter (Frances Barber). This has everything we expect from a BBC serial--excellent casting, a strong sense of period, and fast-paced direction. --Roz Kaveney
Love in a Cold Climate Reviews:
Naive young Love 
2009-09-04 - It was interesting to watch a movie about young girls and their infatuation with the opposite sex. What they consider being in love is all about. Parents of both sides of wealth and the prejudices that go with it. Old money verses new. The mother who bolts from one man to another, the French playboy, the affairs amoung the different relatives and more. The flamboyant and wise old uncle.
The story is about three girls who dream about being in love and living happiliy ever after. But ...two of them just don't get it. The level headed girl is Fanny she seems to take a back seat and watches the mess her cousin Linda and good friend Polly make of their life. Fanny does marry and lives happily ever after.
Linda falls in love with the son of a banker who is very, very boring. She is also warned not to marry him but does. The marriage turns out to be a diaster. Linda does have a child but is told by her doctor never to have another it could kill her. She leave's her husband and child for a supporter of the communist party. She marries him and later on finds out he is in love with another woman. She leaves him to go back to England. While she is at the train station in Paris she realizes she hasn't enough money to buy a ticket to go home.It is here she meets the French Playboy who talks her into staying the night at this hotel. He tells her he will give her the money she needs to get back home in the morning. You got it! She begins a affair with him and all goes well until the Germans invade France and she must leave the country. He is sent to war and she goes home back to her parents pregnant. Linda dies giving birth just as the doctor said. The French playboy dies at the hands of the Nazi's.
Polly the richest of them all marries her dead aunt 's husband who was also carring on an affair with her mother. She gets pregant looses and the child. Her husband turns out to be gay. She leaves him for another man who really does loves her.
Alan Bates is exceptional in his portrayal as Linda's father. I will say this all the actors did a fantastic job! I highly recommend this movie. I truely enjoyed it! There is so much more but I will leave that for you to see. The whole production was superb!
A "Keeper"
2008-05-15 - This is another movie that I rented on Netflix and immediately after viewing it I knew I had to have my own copy. I enjoy this period in history and times that will never return. I started out feeling sorry for the very lovely Rosamund Pike who always gets treated as a second-class citizen but after all comes out a winner in the end. In fact, she is the major reason that I bought the DVD. All of the actors did a great job and there are many seasoned ones that helped make this film so good. If you have viewed enough films from England or by English authors, you will be delighted to see them once again. I can't recall her name right now but if you've ever seen "Anna Karenena", the lovely actress that played the trouble-making princess appears in this film as a mother of a problem child, not as pretty anymore but still plays a fantastic role. If you have any kind of a soul, you'll love this film!
An engaging adaptation though too brief. 
2008-04-27 - I wish I had the opportunity of watching the 1980 British TV version of Love in a Cold Climate [7 hours long]. This 2001 version attempts to condense Nancy Mitford's Love in a Cold Climate and The Pursuit of Love into a 150 minutes production. It doesn't do justice to the books, but it certainly entertains, and the acting is simply marvelous.
The story is told from the point of view of Fanny [Rosamund Pike]who lives on her eccentric Uncle Matthew Radlett's [Alan Bates] estate with her cousin Linda [Elisabeth Dermot-Walsh] and her family. Fanny narrates their exploits as young women coming out into society and their rather unconventional upbringing, with Fanny herself having an infamous eloper for a mother, nicknamed The Bolter. The two young ladies approach love very differently, as does another one of their peer group, the aristocratic beauty, Polly Montdore[ Megan Dodds]. Whilst Fanny ultimately marries for love and settles into domestic bliss, Linda and Fanny go through much mishap in their love lives.
It is the three actors who portray the young women who are at the forefront of the story, and the men in their lives form a backdrop without really being of much substance. The story is part-autobiographical, for it is based on Nancy Mitford's own unconventional life and makes for compelling viewing. The production is of high-quality with the sets and costumes being very authentic to the period portrayed, circa 1929-1940.
This is an enjoyable series with good character development, and will appeal to Anglophiles and fans of period dramas.
BELOW AVERAGE FILM NOT AS ENTERTAINING AS BOOK 
2007-10-08 - I picked up the book about two years ago and really enjoyed the world that Nancy Mitford created so when I saw that the BBC made a film I was excited because they are usually well written and acted. I was disappointed with this one however. I feel the writing failed to capture the light hearted essence of the novel and took itself way too seriously. And from there, it's dreariness pulled the cast down with it. It's a romance at the end of the day and there was nothing romantic about the cinematography or costumes or settings and it's set in the Cotswolds! I find that area to be full of atmosphere none of which is captured on film. Celia Imrie (an excellent actress usually) made some terrible choices playing Aunt Sadie as continuously on the brink of a crying jag. The three lead actresses do well with their parts but overall are miscast. Rosamund Pike is just too beautiful to play Fanny (even with mousy brown hair) and would have been much better suited to the golden-haired, strong-willed Polly. That would have been something to see. I wouldn't waste my money - spend the time re-reading the book instead.
Love in a Cold Climate
2007-07-15 - I absolutely LOVE this movie. It is such a wonderful depiction of the life of the British upperclass in this period. I would have preferred two movies, one per book, only to have additional information on the people and period.
