A Cock and Bull Story

A Cock and Bull Story
A Cock and Bull Story

Film poster
Directed by Michael Winterbottom
Produced by Andrew Eaton
Screenplay by Frank Cottrell Boyce
(as Martin Hardy)
Based on The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman by
Laurence Sterne
Starring Steve Coogan
Rob Brydon
Music by Michael Nyman
Nino Rota
Cinematography Marcel Zyskind
Editing by Peter Christelis
Studio BBC Films
Baby Cow Productions
EM Media
East Midlands Media Initiative
Revolution Films
Scion Films
Distributed by Redbus Film Distribution
Release date(s) 20 January 2006 (2006-01-20)
Running time 94 minutes
Country United Kingdom
Language English
Box office $3,931,982

A Cock and Bull Story (marketed in Australia and the United States as Tristram Shandy: A Cock and Bull Story) is a 2006 British comedy film directed by Michael Winterbottom. It is a film-within-a-film, featuring Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon playing themselves as egotistical actors during the making of a screen adaptation of Laurence Sterne's 18th century metafictional novel Tristram Shandy. Gillian Anderson and Keeley Hawes also play themselves in addition to their Tristram Shandy roles. Since the book is about a man attempting but failing to write his autobiography, the film takes the form of being about failing to make the film.

Contents

Plot

A Cock and Bull Story depicts Steve Coogan playing himself as an arrogant actor with low self esteem and a complicated love life. Coogan is playing the eponymous role in an adaptation of The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman being filmed at a stately home. He constantly spars with actor Rob Brydon, who is playing Uncle Toby, and believes his role to be of equal importance to Coogan's, calling himself the "co-lead".

The film incorporates several sequences from Tristram Shandy. Not all of these are actually part of the film-within-the-film. The latter are limited to the story of Tristram's conception, birth and christening; Uncle Toby's experiences at the Battle of Namur; and Tristram's sudden and accidental circumcision at the age of three. In addition to these, Uncle Toby's wooing of Widow Wadnam (Gillian Anderson) takes place in a sequence dreamed by Steve Coogan; and, after the cast and crew have viewed the "completed" film, ending with Walter Shandy fainting at the sight of his wife giving birth, the question "How does the book end?" is followed by the concluding scene of the novel, in which Yorick says "It is a story about a Cock and a Bull - and the best of its kind that ever I heard!" (Yorick is not in the actual film-within-the-film; in this scene he is played by Stephen Fry, who appears elsewhere in the film as Patrick, a scholarly talking-head.)

Cast

Soundtrack

The film's soundtrack is notable for featuring numerous excerpts from Nino Rota's score for the Federico Fellini film , itself a self-reflexive work about the making of a film. Other non-diegetic musical references are made to Amarcord, The Draughtsman's Contract, Smiles of a Summer Night, Fanny and Alexander and Barry Lyndon. Michael Nyman, composer of The Draughtsman's Contract provides a new arrangement of the Handel Sarabande featured in the latter film, while the pre-existing tracks of The Draughtsman's Contract (the original soundtrack recordings—the score has been rerecorded numerous times) serve as a temp track to film of the Sterne material.

Locations

The film was recorded at a number of locations in England:[1]

Reception

The film has received very positive reviews. Review aggregate Rotten Tomatoes reports that 91% of critics have given the film a positive review based on 122 reviews.[2]

Home release

A Cock and Bull Story was released on both Region 1 and Region 2 DVD in July 2006.

The Trip

The fictionalized versions of Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon seen in the film reappear as the central characters in Michael Winterbottom's 2010 BBC series The Trip.[3]

References

External links


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Look at other dictionaries:

  • cock and bull story — UK US noun [countable] [singular cock and bull story plural cock and bull stories] informal a story that is silly and difficult to believe Thesaurus: types of story or play …   Useful english dictionary

  • cock-and-bull story — {n. phr.} An exaggerated or unbelievable story. * / Stop feeding me such cock and bull stories, the detective said to the suspect./ …   Dictionary of American idioms

  • cock-and-bull story — {n. phr.} An exaggerated or unbelievable story. * / Stop feeding me such cock and bull stories, the detective said to the suspect./ …   Dictionary of American idioms

  • Cock and bull story — Cock Cock (k[o^]k), n. [AS. coc; of unknown origin, perh. in imitation of the cry of the cock. Cf. {Chicken}.] 1. The male of birds, particularly of gallinaceous or domestic fowls. [1913 Webster] 2. A vane in the shape of a cock; a weathercock.… …   The Collaborative International Dictionary of English

  • cock-and-bull story — cock and bull stories N COUNT If you describe something that someone tells you as a cock and bull story, you mean that you do not believe it is true. [INFORMAL] Was it him who made you come to us with this cock and bull story? …   English dictionary

  • cock and bull story — A cock and bull story is a lie someone tells that is completely unbelievable …   The small dictionary of idiomes

  • cock-and-bull story — [käk′ən bool′] n. [for earlier cockalane < Fr ( saillir du) coq en l âne, lit., (to jump from) the cock to the donkey] an absurd, improbable story …   English World dictionary

  • cock-and-bull story — cock and bull ,story noun count a story that is very silly and difficult to believe …   Usage of the words and phrases in modern English

  • cock and bull story — ► NOUN informal ▪ a ridiculous and implausible story …   English terms dictionary

  • cock-and-bull story — noun an interesting but highly implausible story; often told as an excuse • Syn: ↑fairytale, ↑fairy tale, ↑fairy story, ↑song and dance • Hypernyms: ↑fib, ↑story, ↑tale, ↑ …   Useful english dictionary

  • cock and bull story — UK / US noun [countable] Word forms cock and bull story : singular cock and bull story plural cock and bull stories informal a story that is silly and difficult to believe …   English dictionary

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