I have to warn you after watching ‘heart-stabbing’ Netflix film My Oxford Year

Netflix has just released a new film that has fan up in arms about its ending, questioning its classification as a rom-com – and I’m afraid to say, is also just a bit crap.

Fans have swarmed social media to reveal they are ‘speechless’, ‘devastated’ and generally crying their eyes out over the movie, while others have taken it to task for being ‘so boring’ and leaving them ‘feeling nothing’ for any other characters.

And I wholeheartedly agree.

Not only does My Oxford Year take a very long time to introduce any stakes, but before we get there it’s a painful watch for British fans not particularly interested in the film’s tourist porn shots of the titular city and university.

And while they do at least cast English actors in English parts (Corey Mylchreest, Dougray Scott, Catherine McCormack), some of the schmaltz could not more obviously point to American involvement – we just don’t mix well with unnecessarily twinkling and dramatic music underscoring even the most mundane of teaching scenes.

The ‘rom-com’, loosely based on the book by American author Julia Whelan, who attended Oxford herself, concerns ambitious working-class New Yorker Anna (Sofia Carson), who is attending the University of Oxford to study Victorian poetry as a postgraduate.

While there she falls for charming local Jamie (Queen Charlotte’s Mylchreest), who also happens to be teaching her classes, and the pair begin a very tedious, chemistry-free flirtationship before a secret he’s been hiding threatens their burgeoning romance.

(Also warning you that, despite Bridgerton raising our expectations in this department, there are no steamy sex scenes to be found here, and even their tiringly clichéd kiss in the rain gave me nothing.)

*Spoilers ahead for My Oxford Year*

So what is My Oxford Year’s ending?

This is where My Oxford Year takes a sharp left into cancerbait territory, revealing that Jamie is doomed to succumb to an unspecified form of the disease, just like his late brother, despite looking and acting like the healthiest, liveliest rake in the room – plus, y’know, Mylchreest.

Obviously, they are reminding us that not everyone fatally ill looks or acts that way (and nor should they have to), but it’s a clumsily made point when the film decides to give Mylchreest his first topless scene while receiving chemotherapy. And then they belatedly whack out the greyish face make-up for one scene later on.

My Year at Oxford’s ending reveals that Jamie does indeed die after catching a critical case of pneumonia, sharing the news surprisingly subtly as Anna lies in bed with Jamie, narrating the stops of the grand European tour they intended to go on.

While the montage initially shows the couple happily together exploring Amsterdam, Venice, Paris and the Temple of Poseidon at Sounion in Greece, the camera then swings around to reveal Anna on her own taking the trip instead – and fine, yes, okay, I got a little burning behind the eyes at this, but it is not a high bar to pass for a film to manipulate me intro crying.

It proved even more emotionally effective for others though.

‘Did I finish the movie or did the movie finish me?’ asked fan Agnes on X over My Oxford Year’s traumatic conclusion.

‘Thought I was signing up for a chill romantic movie with a few clichés. Instead, My Oxford Year wrecked me emotionally, stabbed me in the heart and walked away like nothing happened. That ending?? RUDE. Yeah. I’m not okay. Not even a little bit,’ ranted user @_httpSea_, echoing a lot of the shocked reaction to the film.

‘My Oxford Year is the biggest Trojan horse ever seen. I thought I was watching a silly romcom and I just got depressed with the ending of it,’ tweeted @JENNIEDEMIE.

‘Why did nobody warn me that it ended like that and why am I bawling over a movie I thought would be a cute and silly rom com,’ complained Lily-Rose, while Mel shared: ‘Netflix really thought the book My Oxford Year wasn’t sad enough, so they proceed to change the ending to send us in therapy.’

The other problem with My Oxford Year

Critics have not been kind to My Oxford Year, with it sitting at a dismal 29% on review aggregator site Rotten Tomatoes at the time of publication.

Collider criticised it for having the ‘plot and character development out of a Wattpad novel written by a 15-year-old One Direction fan’, while The New York Times called it ‘a limp attempt at being this generation’s About Time’.

‘An uninspired yet competently assembled trifle,’ mused The Guardian’s two-star review, with critic Benjamin Lee saying the cancer twist will be ‘met with a sigh of disappointment’ for being so hackneyed.

Other viewers agreed, with one saying it was ‘pretty pointless’ and another that it was ‘worse than mediocre’.

Noga E described it as ‘a painful failure’ in comparison to the book while Nina B complained: ‘There’s no spark, no soul – just two hours of hollow stares and fake chemistry.’

‘It’s as if A Walk to Remember and Me Before You had a very, very odd cousin that no one wants to hang out with,’ added Teresita G.

I knew what I was in for when the film mentioned how much it rains in the UK after barely a minute, and Carson began her narration as Anna by quoting poet Henry David Thoreau.

Literature references are always the sign of an overly earnest film as you’d never catch a normal human going around quoting poetry, including out loud and at somebody (which also happens later in the film) to make a comparison, even if you were studying it at university (and I did).

That sort of thing is far too intense and emotional, control yourself… which I guess may prove the film’s point about British people being repressed and not wanting to talk about their feelings, which is what drives a wedge between Jamie and his father, played by Scott.

So I’ll give it that, I guess.

My Oxford Year is streaming now on Netflix.

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