My Oxford Year

Yesterday, I had thoughts of perhaps going to see the film adaptation of Hamnet, which is getting very good reviews. I enjoyed but did not love the book, but I am considering rereading it. However, I woke up with a head cold and decided to take it easy instead. I skipped my weights and my walk, and did a simple yoga for sick recovery stretch instead. I wrote out a few Christmas Cards, then decided to watch the film adaptation of My Oxford Year, a romantic tragedy written by Julia Whelan, which I read (and enjoyed) last year.

Anna (named Ella in the book) is spending a year abroad at Oxford, studying poetry. She has a job lined up in New York (Finance – it was Politics in DC in the book), but she is taking some time first to fulfill this dream of hers. There is a specific professor that she really wants to work with, and it has taken her a lot of effort to get herself there and in that class. The first day of school, the Professor tells the class that she isn’t going to teach them after all, she has gotten a promotion and does not have time. Instead, one of her teaching assistants, Jamie, will be their instructor. Jamie, the annoying, handsome, and charming man who accidentally ruined Anna’s blouse on her first evening in Oxford. Sparks fly, but not the good kind. Of course, this is a romance, so they’re going to fall in love. And it’s a tragedy, so things are going to go wrong.

Whelan wrote her novel based on the screenplay that eventually became the movie, so it’s a little confusing to know who to blame for the film’s shortcomings. Some of the emotional heft of the novel is stripped from the movie, and it seems to brush the surface in a lot of places where the novel had complexity and depth. Did Whelan add the heft? Was it originally in the screenplay and then removed? I don’t know. I liked (didn’t love) the book, and the movie was fine for a day spent on the sofa with a head cold. But the book was better. If you find yourself wanting a romantic film to watch, give it a try, it’s on Netflix.