Actually, A Great Film

One more "Christmas movie" before I move back to regular fare. I decided to watch Love Actually, which while not really about Christmas, is set in the weeks running up to it. It also happens to be a film that made my original top 100 list, though it had been many years since I'd first seen it.

My opinion of it was undiminished as I watched it again. If anything, I liked the movie even more this time around. It's a multi-story tale chock full of fantastic actors, any of whom could carry a film of their own. (And in many cases, they have.) Bill Nighy, Colin Firth, Emma Thompson, Martin Freeman, Hugh Grant, Laura Linney, and Alan Rickman are all great. Liam Neeson is particularly strong in a role that calls for him to act most opposite a young child actor (Thomas Sangster), and the two have a great rapport. Add to the mix Keira Knightley, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Andrew Lincoln (now well-known for The Walking Dead), and bit part by Billy Bob Thornton. Top with cameos by Elisha Cuthbert, January Jones (before Mad Men made her a face people would recognize), Claudia Schiffer, Shannon Elizabeth, and Denise Richards, and you've got one of the most exhaustive casts assembled in the last decade. (And a great "Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon" link.)

If I had to say anything against the film, it might be that the large number of running plots (I believe there are 10 in all) make juggling everything quite difficult. At a couple of points in the movie, one or two of the stories vanish for long enough to make you think "oh yeah, this!" when they're revisited. Still, that's a minor issue.

And particularly so since I'd be hard-pressed to cut any of the stories from the film. The thing that really makes Love Actually land is that it explores such a wide array of takes on the topic of love. There are couples finding each other (one in particularly odd circumstances), and another couple drifting apart. There's a man trying to deal with his love loving someone else. There's a young boy coping with love for the first time. There's a widower dealing with his loss. There's a date that goes bad. There's a guy just out for sex. There's love between brothers and sisters, and between long-time friends. And every one of these stories nails the emotion perfectly.

In short, it really is a movie that fulfills that old cliché: "you'll laugh, you'll cry." Love Actually remains on my top 100, and gets my recommendation for any time of year, not just Christmas. It's a total grade A.