The year was 2003, and a quiet little movie named The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King took home the Academy Awards biggest prize that year, winning Best Picture. Some will argue that this reflected on the culmination of a pretty darn good trilogy and that will ensure that the Peter Jackson franchise was worthy of its share of accolades that maybe Best Picture of the Year wasn’t one of them. I can’t give my personal opinion on that one because I have yet to see the film as of the time of this writing (February 2019). I liked the first two enough and don’t really have a reason for not seeing the third yet other than length and the thought that I should probably watch The Fellowship of the Ring and The Two Towers again beforehand. There was a slightly quieter movie that year that seemed to be the Academy sweetheart heading into Oscar night, a film that reestablished Clint Eastwood as a major force to reckon with as, perhaps, THE best director in Hollywood for the foreseeable future (2004’s Million Dollar Baby being his crowning achievement). Mystic River was nominated for six Academy Awards (including Best Picture and Best Director for Eastwood) and earned both Sean Penn and Tim Robbins their long-awaited trophies. 2003 was also the year for the excellent Seabiscuit, Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World, Monster, and Lost in Translation. But there was one movie that was better than all of these. It too was a major name at Oscar night, earning seven nominations and landing Renée Zellweger her first win after receiving nominations for 2001’s Chicago and 2000’s Bridget Jones’s Diaries at the previous two events. That movie was Anthony Minghella’s (The Talented Mr. Ripley) sweeping Civil War piece Cold Mountain.
I was absolutely moved by this movie when I saw it in the theater. Since that December evening in 2003, Cold Mountain has remained in my All-Time Top 25. While an excellent movie, had it come out today, it might not have made as much of an impact. I equate this experience to 1994’s Legends of the Fall in terms of just being in awe of what I was watching on film. It’s almost like I didn’t know yet that movies could be made like that…these poignant love stories based around the hell that is war, the atrocities that happen during these lawless times, and what some will do to get back to the ones they love.
Cold Mountain tells us the story of a woman and a man during the Civil War. Ada Monroe (Nicole Kidman – The Hours, Moulin Rouge!), the daughter of a preacher (Donald Sutherland – Ordinary People, Space Cowboys), has moved with her father to the fresh air of the titled North Carolina mountain from Charleston, SC, because of his poor health in late 1861. Ada is book smart but not street smart in a place where most people are street smart but not book smart. But she’s the son of a preacher’s daughter, and the main goal for the beautiful Ada seems to be to find a suitor. Inman (Jude Law – Artificial Intelligence: AI, The Talented Mr. Ripley) is a lumberer. The unspoken attraction is communicated the moment they lock eyes. Inman is a Christian man himself and respects the proper protocol of wooing Reverend Monroe’s daughter. All is thrown into upheaval when it is revealed that Inman and his fellow confederates will “get their war.” There were many different reasons for the south succeeding from the Union. It is stated by Inman at one point that he is fighting mostly to protect the sacredness and beauty of Cold Mountain, and that seems to be substantiated in the context of States Rights, which was a key factor for the Carolina’s, at least according to this study.
Most of the movie is set four years in the future. Their lightning courtship happened so quickly that they haven’t even really held each other before he is called to duty. They manage one kiss before he leaves, promising themselves to each other. And while they don’t share a lot of time on the screen together, you buy into their relationship simply through how the two look towards each other and speak softly and respectfully to one another. All had thought this had been a fast war, and it has proven to be anything but, seeing that it’s now four years later. And it is wartime, so life isn’t exactly great for either person. Inman longs for the war to be over so he can go back to Ada. She only wants him to come home. Unfortunately, tragedy strikes when Reverend Monroe’s health betrays him, and he dies. Without money or resources to take care of the family home, Ada relies on the help of her friends Sally (Kathy Baker – CBS’s Picket Fences, Edward Scissorhands) and the rugged mountain girl who takes no crap Ruby Thewes (Zellweger) who, after moving in with Ada, takes her under wing and shows her how to get her hands dirty.
Meanwhile, Inman is fighting a war that he at first felt so strongly for, but now sees masses of humanity on both sides of lines being slaughtered. His friends are dying, and the thought of not getting back home to Ada is haunting him. When he is shot in the neck with a non-life-threatening wound while trying to save a fellow soldier, he ends up in the infirmary. A nurse reads one of the letters that Ada has sent to him. It is backdated, but it affects Inman nonetheless. Hearing her words and her last plea for him to return home to her causes him to desert the war and make the hike back home. And this is where the story gets super interesting and where I’ll stop posting specific incidents.
While Ada and others are being harassed by Teague (Ray Winstone – The Proposition, The Departed), Bosie (Charlie Hunnam – F/X’s Sons of Anarchy, Papillon and their small handful of men who are set to “protect” the women, children, and those too old to work on Cold Mountain while using their self-appointed authority to rid punish those harboring deserters, Inman is busy seeing some of the worst atrocities committed by people for self-gain, because they are in need to show their power, or they are as desperate during war times as everyone else. I won’t mention anything specifics, but there are some great cameos by Philip Seymour Hoffman, Melora Walters, Jena Malone, Giovanni Ribisi, Jackie Gleason, and Natalie Portman. It’s not quite the ensemble of Mystic River, but it’s a pretty darn close second. And each of these people serves some purpose in progressing or delaying the reunion of Inman and Ada. And that doesn’t include the Union forces hot on his trail or the Confederate sympathizers who look at a small payday of returning deserters to officials who can hold them accountable.
The cinematography in this movie is beautiful. I’ve never seen the Civil War look so stunning visually. The score is the perfect mix between chaos and tranquility, between hate and love, between personal agendas and agendas that are strictly for the advancement of another. The acting is top-notch (not quite Mystic River but, again, close). Zellweger wears her anger and disgust at what she sees on one sleeve and the glimmer of hope that she and her friends will come out clean on the other. It’s a role that you may never see her in again. Equally as good were Law (who earned his second Academy Award nomination), who played as kind-hearted a soldier as you’ll ever meet, and Kidman, a woman desperately clinging to the hope that the man she has fallen in love remains alive after all of these years away. And the cameos mentioned in the paragraph above each had their specific purpose and performed flawlessly. Portman was by far my favorite character. She told such an intense story of the effects of war on her in her ten minutes of screen time, spread across to adjacent scenes.
Cold Mountain is a movie I’ll continue to watch every five or so years. I understand that when you break down its story, it’s a straightforward one and one that’s been told time and time again…lovers separated by circumstance, determined to do whatever it takes to get back to one another. This story is not for the faint of heart, and while we think we know how it’s going to end, the end is very much in doubt until the final minutes.
This is a film not to be missed.
Plot 8.5/10
Character Development 9/10
Character Chemistry 9.5/10
Acting 9.5/10
Screenplay 9.5/10
Directing 9/10
Cinematography 10/10
Sound 10/10
Hook and Reel 10/10
Universal Relevance 10/10
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