"Love actually is all around..."
"Love Actually" is just the right mix of romantic comedy and drama to leave you with that warm, fuzzy feeling as you leave the theatre. It's an ideal Christmas movie for moms and dads who want to see something else while the kids venture into more PG films.
Writer/director Richard Curtis enlists a plethora of some of the finest British actors (and a few noteworthy Americans) to tell several different love stories. While it seems that there may be a few too many characters at first, the overall flow of the film allows the viewer to keep track quite easily. The cast is led by the ever-so-charming Hugh Grant as the British Prime Minister. While some critics have called this casting unbelievable, Grant actually pulls it off by portraying a more human, but yet stronger PM that we would all love to have leading us. His dance to the Pointer Sisters' "Jump for My Love" borders a bit on ridiculous, but it is nevertheless fun to watch. In the film, the PM is caught between leading his...
The Perfect Stocking Stuffer
This is the perfect Christmas gift to get any member of the group of free-loading moochers you call your friends. It's the perfect excuse to have a movie night at THEIR house, and make them ante up some wine, cheese, grapes and lots of chocolate, then hunker down for an evening of cornball romantic comedy with a difference.
Chances are, with Colin Firth, Hugh Grant, Liam Neeson and Alan Rickman on show, you won't even notice that the storyline is hardly Pulitzer Prize material, but you do stand the chance of busting a seam when Hugh does his Footloose/Saturday Night Fever/Risky Business impression at Lot 10 Downing Street, and Bill Nighy makes like Robert Palmer for a video shoot of the worst ever chart topping Christmas song. There's also the incomparable Rowan Atkinson, making like Mr.Bean at appropriately inopportune moments.
In case you think it's all about the guys (it is - but one can't take sides) there's a brilliant performance by Emma Thompson, and...
(4+) Actually Quite Entertaining but Definitely Deserves "R"
My rating is based on my enjoyment of this film. It has both major strengths and serious weaknesses, and as other reviews indicate has fostered very strong reactions, both positive and negative. Its format is somewhat disconcerting if you are not prepared for the methodology of the director. It contains nudity, profanity, sexual situations, and several situations that are very suggestive and some moviegoers may consider to border on the obscene. However, the situations that some people may consider offensive actually serve a purpose in developing the overall theme of the film.
Love, in all its manifestations - wonder, joy, pain, happiness, passion, grief... is the theme of the film. A very talented ensemble cast is utilized to tell several somewhat interrelated stories concerning the emotional lives of the various characters. The cast includes Hugh Grant, Liam Neeson, Colin Firth, Emma Thompson, Laura Linney, Kiera Knightley and Alan Rickman. There are also telling cameos by Billy...
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