European Films

Romantic comedies are difficult to do well. It needs some fluff, a lot of good humour and a story that at least pretends to be about something. British screenwriter Richard Curtis knows how to write great romantic comedies: he wrote Four Weddings and a Funeral and Nothing Hill and adapted Helen Fielding’s Bridget Jones’s Diary. The secret, I think, that make his romantic comedies better than most is that he does not shy away from the drama. It cannot all be fluffy. Hence the funeral besides the weddings. Love actually is Curtis’ new romantic comedy that he not only wrote but also directed, and he has lost nothing of his special touch.

 

With a sprawling list of characters and many different stories that intersect at various points, Curtis offers us a look at love in all sorts of ways: sweet infatuation, unanswered love, the head-over-heels variety, love that is only lust in disguise, love between siblings, love in marriage and love at 10, Downing Street. I was amazed by the fact that the film switched so effortlessly from one story to another without becoming confusing or boring. All the characters seemed interesting enough to be followed and the editing was done in a way that you never once felt you were looking at different stories, but that they all somehow were part of a bigger whole.

 

Whilst it is always difficult to say who are the protagonists in an ensemble comedy, the number of stars Curtis has at his disposal for Love Actually makes this even more of a problem. What about having Hugh Grant, Alan Rickman, Laura Linney, Bill Nighy, Emma Thompson, Keira Knightley and Colin Firth all in one film? And the number of cameos is just endless: I spotted Rowan Atkinson, Claudia Shiffer, January Jones and Billy Bob Thornton as the president of the USA to name but a few (if the latter sounds silly, be warned that his British colleague is played by Hugh Grant).

 

The great thing about all of them is that no-one seems to take the lime-light from the others. All are equal, as they should be in an ensemble. Whilst the film does not skewer looking at the down-sides of love (rejected love, a funeral of a spouse and mother, a husband betraying his wife with his secretary) it also shows love blossoming. Two porn film stand-ins are not shy about their bodies, but are shy in making conversation whilst simulating copulation for the director of photography; geeky Brit finds a house full of American sisters digging his accent and wanting him bad.

 

The many strands are dealt with adequately, though the ending is somewhat muddled. It felt a bit stilted and understated, and I suppose some material has been cut in order to shorten the running time. Love Actually still runs 135 minutes as it is, which is exceptionally long for a romantic comedy, even a good one.

 

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