Let’s go get the shit kicked out of us by love.
It’s taken me months to get the shit kicked out of me by “Love, Actually”, the latest movie by Richard Curtis (creator of the lovely Bridget Jones), but I finally made it. It’s superstar cast of sexy english accents is enough to make this movie a success to any American female looking for a fairytale. But what’s best about this movie is that it’s not so much a fairytale at all as it is a dramatic cavalcade of all aspects of every possible love scenario imaginable. By avoiding gory detail, this movie manages to highlight the love trials of a dozen or so people who are loosely connected in some way or another. And by trials, I do mean the tortures as well as the cheer. Liam Neeson plays a recently widowed father of a boy who’s in love with the most popular girl in school. Emma Thompson embodies emotional strength as the wife of Alan Rickman whose recently taken a fancy to his secretary. Colin firth plays the jilted writer who finds love with his Portugese cleaning lady (despite the language barrier). Hugh Grant is, as always, adorable as the British Prime Minister who takes a rather sheepish liking to his tea girl (Martine McCutcheon). You can imagine my glee when I found that Martin Freeman was playing half naked as the sex-act double who fancies the lucky lady he’s pretending to hump. Without a doubt, however, Bill Nighy steals the show as a once popular rock star trying to make a comeback with an extremely tacky take on the song “Love is All Around” by Wet Wet Wet (”So if you believe in Christmas, come on and let it snow…”). 
Without Nighy, the movie may have ended in too much gush; his may be the most honest character in the movie. “When I was young, I was greedy and foolish, and now I’m left with no one. Wrinkled and alone.” But he still finds love… with his plump manager who’d been with him through his whole career.
I’m a girl, so I was smiling through the entire movie. It’s funny, it’s sad, it’s romantic candy for the soul (cuz we all know that love never happens like it does in the movies — and if you think differently, shame on you!).
The movie’s right about one thing: there’s not much worse than the total agony of being in love. But when it’s all said and done, you just have to laugh.
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