My Favorite Movies

I don't care how much flak I get for this one, I will stand by it until the day I die. This movie exploits the hell out of my obsession with British culture. It's the romantic comedy equivalent to Harry Potter or Doctor Who. Anybody who is anybody in English entertainment is in this movie, and if you can't see by the picture I'll give you a cast list.

Bill Nighy - He's Rufus Scrimgeour in Harry Potter, Davy Jones in those Pirate Movies, and Slartibartfast in Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

Hugh Grant - He's Hugh Grant

Liam Neeson - Aslan, Badass Extraordinaire, and some stupid Jedi

Martin Freeman - The "Jim" of the original Office

Emma Thompson - Nanny McPhee, Trelawney, and the author from Stranger Than Fiction

Colin Firth - The stuttering King, Darcy in Bridget Jones Diary and in Pride and Prejudice (TV)

Kiera Knightley - A heroin den

Alan Rickman - He's Snape! And the bad guy from Die Hard

Billy Bob Thorton - He plays a George W. Bush-like president in this movie, and broadens its message from not only Love, but British resilience as well.Tony Blair and W's relationship at the time this came out was that of a lap dog to America and this side story is developed well for its short time on screen.

Rowan Atkinson - Mr. Bean

Andrew Lincoln - You'll know him as Rick Grimes from the Walking Dead

Throwing a crap ton of good/famous actors into a movie doesn't necessarily make it good. Americans have copied Love's formula and tried it with Valentine's Day and now the dreaded  New Year's Eve. Love Actually is the first that I've seen take the setting of a coming holiday, Christmas in this case, and use it to weave several different stories into a working plot.

Liam Neeson plays the grieving widower whose first scene is giving a funny but moving eulogy for his wife, and then helping his kid woo his first crush. In 2009, Liam's wife actually died so his scenes of weeping uncontrollably mid-conversation are hard to watch given this knowledge. This little scene between father and son is just simply two dudes watching Titanic, something you don't see every day. Seeing Liam snap necks in Taken just doesn't feel right when you know he's a teddy bear.

There's also Colin Firth, the struggling writer, who goes to a cottage in France to finish his novel. While he is there, he falls in love with his Portuguese maid and neither of them can communicate with each other. It's clear there is chemistry, but when Firth leaves and goes home to England with just a single kiss we think that is the last of it. No, in movie fashion, a montage shows him learning Portuguese as fast as he can and eventually flying to Portugal to ask her hand in marriage. When he gets there he uses his botched wording to stumble over the lines only to find that she has done the same. How. Freaking. Appropriate. This is why girls hold guys to insane standards, but I don't care, because when I watch this movie I'm living through the characters and for a short while I think I can live up to that. 

I can't choose my favorite pairings of couples in the movie, because they all come from different places, but I can say my least favorites are Laura Linney and Alan Rickman's stories. Linney is an American working abroad who just wants to get laid, but every time she almost makes it she gets a call from the mental ward her brother is staying at, and she ultimately spends Christmas with his crazy self. Bro's before hos just doesn't work in this case. Rickman once again has to play a villain and is tempted to cheat on his wife with a flirty office temp, but is confronted by his wife, Emma Thompson, before it becomes something more. In a different movie, these story lines would work. Even as movies themselves, but what Love Actually is trying to achieve is light-hearted fun. It's certainly a date movie, so skitzos and adulterers have no place in it.

There are dozens of other things I'd like to say about this movie, but it can all be summed up by The Pointer Sisters.

Terrific. Thanks so much.