Kate Beckinsale a film based on the Danish legend which inspired Shakespeare's "Hamlet", and starred in the murder mystery "Uncovered". In 1995, while studying in Paris, she filmed the French language "". Shortly after leaving Oxford University in 1995, Beckinsale starred in "Cold Comfort Farm" as Flora Poste, a newly orphaned 1930s socialite sent to live with distant family members in rural England. The John Schlesinger-directed film was an adaptation of Stella Gibbons's novel and also featured Joanna Lumley, Eileen Atkins, Ian McKellen, Rufus Sewell and Stephen Fry. Beckinsale was initially considered too young, but was cast after she wrote a pleading
Kate Beckinsale of "The Hollywood Reporter" remarked, "There aren't great depths to the role, but Beckinsale excels with the long speeches and in defining her character as a very self-aware egoist." Also in the year, she starred in the horror film "The Disappointments Room", opposite Mel Raido, both playing a couple in a new house that contains a hidden room with a haunted past. The film was heavily panned by critics and flopped at the box office; it only made US$1.4 million in its opening weekend, and a total of US$2.4 million in North America. Christian Holub of "Entertainment Weekly" concluded that