1. Billy Mack and Joe. Billy is a washed up singer who is trying to make a comeback via a schmaltzy remake of a popular love song into a Christmas song. Joe is his manager. Billy fat-shames Joe several times, and at the end, when Billy realizes he “loves” Joe in a romantic way, it feels totally fake.
2. Juliet, Peter, and Mark. Juliet marries Peter as their friend Mark does the videography. Mark is kinda rude to Juliet, but we don’t know why ~ I suspected that he was in love with Peter. Wrong. He is in love with Juliet and has to let her go (after he tells her in a silly way). That’s it. Just another case of unrequited love. Juliet isn’t going to leave Peter, and Mark has to deal with his broken heart like the rest of us. Realistic, but so what?
3. Jamie and Aurélia. Jamie discovers that his girlfriend is cheating on him with his brother. He takes off for his French cottage, as you do, and while there he falls for his cute Portuguese housekeeper who doesn’t speak English. OK! This love story was adorable, probably because it starred dashing Colin Firth, and the ending was super sweet. The whole movie could have just been about these two characters and would have been much better.
4. Harry, Karen, and Mia. Harry and Karen are typical frumpy 40-somethings, married with children, and Mia is Harry’s sexy secretary. For some inexplicable reason, Mia keeps coming on to Harry in grossly inappropriate ways (because don’t all hot 25 year old girls want their tired looking old bosses?), and he ends up buying her gold jewelry for Christmas. Karen finds the box and thinks it’s for her, but all she gets is a Joni Mitchell CD. The marriage disintegrates, and everyone is sad. WTF?
5. David and Natalie. First, a question: Is Hugh Grant utterly incapable of playing any other role besides the boyishly handsome awkward bumbler, or are those the only roles he’s ever offered? That persona has worked out well in a couple romcoms, but here he’s supposed to be the freaking Prime Minister! Needless to say, he’s completely unbelievable, and his acceptance of the fat-shaming of poor Natalie by his nasty staff makes him thoroughly unlikable (plus he joins in at the end by calling her heavy when he picks her up). Their “love” story is blech.
6. Daniel, Sam, Joanna, and Carol. Daniel is mourning his dead wife, Joanna, but not for long as he starts to fall for Carol, a mom at his stepson Sam’s school. At the same time, Daniel encourages Sam, who is like 12, to chase after Joanna, a classmate. Why did they give the girl the same name as the dead mom? Just yucky. And the “joke” that Daniel will be faithful to his Joanna until he meets Claudia Schiffer, who plays Carol, is not funny whatsoever. I have never found the “game” of comparing lovers to unattainable celebs to be in any way romantic ~ it’s the opposite in fact, not to mention unkind and insecurity-provoking.
7. Sarah, Karl, and Michael. Gah, this just keeps getting worse! Sarah has the hots for Karl, a coworker, and they finally get together but are interrupted by a call from the facility where Michael, Sarah’s brother, is institutionalized. Somehow, this love story can never happen because Michael comes first, so Sarah has to give up the idea of dating. But why? Because one sex session got derailed? She has a responsibility to her family, so therefore she must be alone forever? This is all just sad.
8. Colin, Tony, and American hot girls. Colin is not having any luck with British girls, so he decides to go to Wisconsin, where he is sure his accent will be an aphrodisiac. Tony says this is stupid, which it is, but Colin goes anyway and picks up a whole pile of total stunners. He brings two back to the UK, and one falls for Tony. Ughhh.
9. John and Judy. This is one long tedious “joke” about two actors who are standing in (usually unclothed) for p0rn performers in order to block their scenes, while at the same time they’re too shy to ask each other out. Guess what happens? Yep, they end up going on a date. Hurrah! Eye roll.
10. Rufus the doofus. This character appears in a few scenes as a foil for the main characters, and he seems to end up alone at the end. All things considered, this is the best outcome for anyone in this depressing loveless movie, unless you happen to have a Portuguese maid.
Wow - I thought I was cynical. This was my husband's favorite movie - for some reason it is now considered a xmas movie and not only did my husband watch it during the xmas season but through the wonders of Netflix and streaming he would watch at other times during the year. He cried at the end of it every time, I think it's a nice movie but not nice enough to watch it as many times as my husband did.
ReplyDeleteUntil Xmas 2023, I absolutely did not want to watch "Love, Actually", which is on every Xmas in Norway. Hugh Grant, yuck! But a friend I watch Xmas movies with on Netflix told me he wasn't that dominant in the movie, and it has Bill Nighy and Emma Thompson and Alan Rickman, yay! So I watched it with her in 2023. And again in 2024. And since it features several other British actors I like, it's become like paging through the family photo album in a family of rather bad but loving photographers.
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