Favorite Plotline in the film [i]Love Actually[/i]

lol OK maybe that part is worse than I rememebered

guy from the office and her off Gavin & Stacey, isn't it?

― ailsa, Monday, December 20, 2010 1:34 PM (12 minutes ago) Bookmark

yep

I truly love the Milwaukee scene, it is hilarious

weird watching that now and seeing... betty draper

What? Where?

shes one of the american chicks

nighy because it is the least irritating part of this wretched film

the firth storyline is so deeply hilarious to me. was he really writing some kind of mystery novel out in longhand on a desk (!) perched at the end of a dock (!!) or am i just misremembering?

best is the one where the dude goes to america and bangs january jones and other hot ass chicks

the laura linney one is drawing a total blank here

she can't get it on with bloke because she's looking after her ill brother.

ill people are the worst

shes in love with this male model who apparently gets paid to hang around some darkened office gets his clothes off (thankfully) but gets cockblocked by here mentally ill brothers constant phone calls

The male model was the guy from lost who everyone hated and also the weird drag king Persian King in 3000!

iirc Firth was writing his mystery novel on a typewriter near a dock, like on the patio or something

Ha, so he was, I had forgotten about that.

xpost

David and Natalie (Hugh Grant as PM)

is Natalie the round-faced brunette? if so, that, bcz she was cute

still shits me that people jizz all over Nighy in this when it was Curtis' pale rip-off of Nighy in Clement & LaFrenais' Still Crazy

Egg is the lead in the Walking Dead adaptation??!!??!? does he do an American accent?

yeah, Egg does an American accent. Nice Southern accent...not too shabby imo

yep

yeah its not bad actually

worst is the one with the stalker guy flashing signs at a chick saying I HAVE ALWAYS *flips card* LOVED YOU *flips card* JUST FYI

― Princess TamTam, Monday, December 20, 2010 12:44 PM (12 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

yeah this one is terrible, weird racial politics, generally gross behavior, would have cut it from the movie

best is either hugh grant or colin firth--both those chicks are p cute and the portugal bit at the end is a+

― max, Monday, December 20, 2010 12:57 PM (5 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

serious question: what are the weird racial politics of that plot? all i remember is that one of the guys was black and it didn't seem to be remarked upon or made an important plot point in any way.

i dont remember either

well hes the only black guy in the whole movie, and the whole implication of that plot line is that the "true" romance is btw the two white ppl

I think the end of the movie indicates that the sign thing, though creepy, was actually cathartic for him and so allowed him to be a normal human being and be friends with Keira's character.

― the journey you take with bob ross (askance johnson), Monday, December 20, 2010 1:25 PM (5 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

^^ what he said, which is why i don't really see your point there

theres never any indication that she reciprocates his feelings, is there? i mean i havent seen this movie since bush's first term, but

well hes the only black guy in the whole movie, and the whole implication of that plot line is that the "true" romance is btw the two white ppl

― max, Monday, December 20, 2010 11:46 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark

yeah that's about it

in a perfect world that wouldn't 'actually' be weird racial politics, but the context is r-curtz made a film called 'notting hill', set in an area synonymous with afro-caribbean-british culture, and again didn't really cast any black people

but the context is r-curtz made a film called 'notting hill', set in an area synonymous with afro-caribbean-british culture, and again didn't really cast any black people

yah U&K

i mean i dont think its "actually racist" just "racially weird"

I think the end of the movie indicates that the sign thing, though creepy, was actually cathartic for him and so allowed him to be a normal human being and be friends with Keira's character.

― the journey you take with bob ross (askance johnson), Monday, December 20, 2010 1:25 PM (5 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

^^ what he said, which is why i don't really see your point there

― some dude, Monday, December 20, 2010 6:48 PM (16 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

theres never any indication that she reciprocates his feelings, is there? i mean i havent seen this movie since bush's first term, but

― the boobfinder general (Princess TamTam), Monday, December 20, 2010 6:50 PM (14 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

No but I don't think he ever would have told her had she not found the video. IIRC she found the wedding video he took and realized it was all shots of her and that he was in love with her. He freaked out and ran out of the apt and things were all weird and tense. Showing up on her doorstep was sorta him being like, "OK, I don't expect anything from you but since you know anyway and it's all awkward here's the deal now let's get on with being friends."

And it never would have occurred to me that there was anything racially weird about that plot line.

Yeah, I never thought about it at all.

yall dont have to agree with me not trying to be whiney here its just... something that bugged me

he has a kind of contradictory public image, curtis, in that he spends half his time doing charity work, mostly in africa i think, and for real, i think, not like bono. (more recently he did an absolutely terrible spot for some climate-change thing.) so there's that, and the right dislikes him for it. but the left dislikes him even more, for making films about the upper-middle classes. i wrote something when 'love actually' came out about what a strange film it is, politically, especially coming out six months after the iraq war. (though the politics aren't limited to that: it's all about the school.)

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

the entire film is worth it for Linney's brief dance when she pulls that guy.

"I know there's a bit of us that would like me to do a Hugh Grant in Love Actually and tell America where to get off. But the difference between a good film and real life is that in real life there's the next day, the next year, the next lifetime to contemplate the ruinous consequences of easy applause." Tony Blair, 2005.

not sure which one to vote for. maybe the Emma Thompson/Alan Rickman one, which was maybe the most emotionally involving one for me, or maybe the Hugh Grant one, since that had the 'fittest' 'bird' that i'd 'snog' or 'shag' in the movie.

My mom adores this. Don't Joni Mitchell's deep-voiced reinterpretations of her classics appear? Mom became a Joni fan.

The Emma Thompson/Joni scene is pretty great

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

I don't understand what happened here

but Rickman/thompson is good enough that I am not complaining

But the NAKED PPL? ugh.

quite cute how all the americans be loving martine mccutcheon.

fuck you buddy

lol

I just rewatched this for the first time in years. no weird racism that i could tell in Egg/Keira storyline, naked people just rubbish, Laura Linney and Emma Thompson own this entire thing. Liam Neeson and weird kid not as annoying as I remember

the entire film is worth it for Linney's brief dance when she pulls that guy.

Totally.

Oh yeah I watched this again over xmas & just thought about it now (because of that 'lovable loser' thread - thinking about competing value claims, and how Linney's plot is rly moving because she goes for altruism/duty/family above the romance sentiment that fuels abt half the film, and most other romantic comedies - it's a very old-fashioned tone to be hitting in what seems a blithe romp, do. the Rickman/Thompson plot)

BUT ANYWAY

I wasn't paying enough attention at the end, so I have a question. Egg, Keira and thing run into one of the other chars at the airport (egg is slightly behind Keira and thing): has Egg come to meet Keira/Thing at the airport? Or has he been away with them? ie is he stuck being a third wheel or have they set up a menage?

but the context is r-curtz made a film called 'notting hill', set in an area synonymous with afro-caribbean-british culture, and again didn't really cast any black people

Also synonymous now with the kind of old Etonian twats who now govern us, so I would forgive him if it not for the fact that's he's Richard Curtis and should never be allowed to write anything in any form ever again.

re Egg, I think him and Keira & Chiwetel are all mates with Colin Firth and come to meet him back from his honeymoon, no? Think he's just a third wheel, showing Keira doesn't hate him for being creepy stalking dude and they are all still mates.

Right. That makes sense. I was only half-watching at that point: felt like either it's a bit of a dismal resolution for Egg if he is 3rd-wheeling (no way is he getting over her that way, but then I suppose the wages of secret stalking is unhappiness) or that the film is a bit odder than it seems and was willing to imply a v unconventional set-up as a happy ending. Shame it's the former.

i like how the "homewrecker" stereotype character wears a literal devil costume to the company christmas party

there are good things about this movie.

i like the part where the guy tries to seduce his best friend's wife but the movie is totally supportive of him

i also like how tony blair fires or demotes a subordinate after she is sexually harassed by bill clinton but she forgives the charming dissembler anyway (via love)

i like how colin firth goes to "portugal" but really he travels through a time warp and ends up in the parts of the "the godfather" that take place in mussolini's italy

"can we imagine that many of the passengers on that fateful flight might have regretted, in the end, not driving home for christmas?"

look i know it was in november but

I've been thinking about this and any way you slice it, being in a plane about to hit the twin towers and deciding to call your arch enemy to really let them have it is a baller move.

"You won't have Nixon to kick around anymore!"

lol

The Freeman plot is def not porn - they’re stand-ins for lighting/cinematography on what we have to assume is let’s say a post-basic instinct mid/high budget 90s erotic drama.
And yes the linking is so half arsed for that, also the KK/Lincoln/Chiwetel plot (airport friends of Firth and Lincoln runs the gallery where the Rickman office party happens). I think… only the middle-class middle-aged plots (Grant/McCutcheon; Rickman/Thompson/Makatsch; Neeson/boy) are effortfully bound.
Saying more nice things about this monstrosity I have repeatedly faced: McCutcheon really works and yes! Lúcia Moniz is properly charming.
Oh I’d never noticed till this watch that the Firth/Moniz plot is not set in Portugal - it’s Marseilles/South of France. Like there’s some particular freedom of movement/migrant labour thing going on that I can’t unpick.

https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2023/oct/16/richard-curtis-admits-regret-over-weight-jokes-and-lack-of-diversity-in-films

he recently apologised, while getting interviewed by his daughter, for doing fat jokes, body shaming women and not having black characters in a Notting Hill movie at Cheltenham literary festival. But all the dodgy shit, that's fine!

*other*

You know I am full Stockholm-syn on this dark monument that I will be forced to watch and interpret and decode and rewatch and reinterpret and recode and rebuild for the rest of my life but About Time is a straight piece of shit.

I think I was blinded by love for Colin Firth when I decided his creepy pursuit of a woman he'd never spoken to was cute.

Give Moniz agency! She’s in too!

the linking woof mentions i can forgive- richard curtis and all like him know only those fifty people from college or work upon whom they rely for getting gigs like richard curtis has

Yup yup I get where his attention goes based on background - successful politician, director of ad agency, man with a very particular set of skills - but I felt myself noticing that Freeman and Marshall were basically badly attached sketches this time out.

Oh, the Tall Guy is actually not a bad film by Curtis. It predates all this dreck by several years and features Jeff Goldblum doing a stage musical of the Elephant Man called "Elephant!" (I haven't seen this in over 30 years so it might be terrible actually)

So as I try to summarise it in my head L,A is basically the real people have interesting dramas and aren’t the other smaller people funny and charming. Art (Bill Nighy) exists in a disturbing liminal space which is neither one nor the other but provides a background texture that eventually collapses into a queer/porn space which the film turns away from.

I think Linney complicates that - she's not an important successful man, but the film cares about what happens to her.

Oh, the Tall Guy is actually not a bad film by Curtis. It predates all this dreck by several years and features Jeff Goldblum doing a stage musical of the Elephant Man called "Elephant!" (I haven't seen this in over 30 years so it might be terrible actually)

about time is maybe the creepiest film ever made. change my mind

look i know it was in november but

― close encounters of the third knid (darraghmac), Wednesday, December 27, 2023 2:10 PM (five hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

this was fantastic

Oh I’d never noticed till this watch that the Firth/Moniz plot is not set in Portugal - it’s Marseilles/South of France. Like there’s some particular freedom of movement/migrant labour thing going on that I can’t unpick.

France, along with Switzerland, has traditionally been the main target of immigration for ppl from the Portuguese mainland - especially during the dictatorship, when it offered working class people a better chance at escaping poverty and political dissenters a safe space. If it had been set in Portugal the idea of Moniz speaking zero English would've been too ludicrous for words - a second gen immigrant living in France I can accept, though she would speak fluent French and her Portuguese would probably be a lot less good than it is in the film.

Portuguese men also 100% do not kiss each other ever, I had to unlearn this toxic masculinity kissing my French relatives on the cheeks.