“Cold Mountain” (Miramax Films)
Jude Law, Nicole Kidman and Renee Zellwegger bring Charles Frazier’s Pulitzer Prize winning novel, COLD MOUNTAIN, to life on the screen. Directed by Anthony Minghella, the movie has all of the strengths of the novel and all of its weaknesses. It is epic in scope but never reaches the emotional pinnacles it should.
The film starts with Inman (Law) reading a letter from Ada (Kidman). He is serving in the Confederate Army and she is waiting for him at home in North Carolina. She urges him to do whatever is necessary to return to her, and he does. He deserts the Army and starts the long trek home.
Along the way he meets a variety of people. This offers some of Hollywood’s best and brightest a chance to be seen in the film. These cameos spotlight Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Gena Malone, Natalie Portman, Giovanni Ribisi and Eileen Atkins. The interludes also cut into the flow of the film and make it seem choppy and erratic.
At home Ada is doing her best to hold her farm together. She finds help in the person of Ruby (Zellwegger), a rough mountain girl who can do the work of any five men and has common sense to boot. Zellwegger is perfect in this role and steals the film away from Law and Kidman.
Law is fine as Inman and Kidman is satisfactory as Ada but the two never click on screen. All the passion that should be there isn’t, and what is shown is surely not enough to sustain a man on an endurance trek through the cold and snow.
The relationship between Ruby and Ada is more believable than the one between Inman and Ada. This is because Zellwegger and Kidman play off each other with ease and assurance. They compliment each other in looks and acting style.
The movie is rated R for violence and nudity.
Frazier’s book had many, many fans and those people should love this movie. But for those who thought the book was too episodic and too depressing, the movie should have the same effect. Inman spends most of the movie slogging through the muck and mud and with very little payoff in the end. A tacked on happy ending feels forced and contrived.
I scored “Cold Mountain” an alp-ish 6 out of 10.
