Synopsis

Recently orphaned Flora Poste leaves London for the Starkadder family farm in Sussex. Expecting rustic hardship, she instead encounters a household ruled by gloom, eccentricity, and long-standing grievances. Determined to impose order, practicality, and a little modern style, Flora begins reshaping the lives of her reluctant relatives while finding that Cold Comfort Farm provides unexpected material for her ambitions as a writer.

Factoids & Trivia

• The film adapts Stella Gibbons' 1932 comic novel, with a screenplay by novelist Malcolm Bradbury.

• It was produced for the BBC in association with Thames Television and first broadcast in the United Kingdom on January 1, 1995.

• The production was filmed in and around Brightling in East Sussex, with additional locations including the Kent and East Sussex Railway and the Royal Military Canal.

• The opening titles use multiplane animation made from layered artwork. A rostrum camera moves across the separate foreground, middle-ground, and background levels to create a parallax effect.

• The BBC version was shot on 16mm. It was later enlarged to 35mm for North American theatrical distribution, giving the television production a limited cinema release outside Britain.

• The film was the final production shot in Britain by its director, whose career had included both British and international feature films.