Brilliant, non-stop, dazzling network of relationships, very British, very fun

Rating: 9/10 (27 December 2011)

Love Actually (2003)
This huge network of feel good stories could have been sloppy and sappy. Oh, heck, it is sloppy and sappy, and that's why it's so lovable. And great, in its own way. A whole slew of top notch actors give really sincerely spot on performances--all of them rather brief in terms of screen time because there are so many stories here, but still satisfying.
What is there not to like about a movie where almost everyone succeeds in overcoming something, mostly loneliness? The point of love actually is actually just love, and falling in love, and making what love they already have meaningful. There are relationships that makes sense, like Laura Linney's heartbreaking nurturing of her mentally challenged brother to the detriment of her own love life. There is the painfully realistic and mature marriage between two sophisticated educated professionals, Emma Thompson and Alan Rickman, with their varying levels of sincerity. And there is the Prime Minister of Britain himself, played by Hugh Grant, who falls in love, and resists falling in love, with his secretary. Throw in a more drab if pretty-ish Keira Knightley, a wonderfully love-sick Andrew Lincoln, and the oddly adult relationship between Liam Neeson and his cute cute stepson and it gets more and more layered up and fun.
While certainly the film is well known here in the U.S., it is practically a national treasure, from what I gather, amongst rank and file Brits. This is a thoroughly British movie, to be sure, and more lovable for it. For one thing, they have removed all the pomp and security machinations around the Prime Minister, so he seems just like a regular lonely guy who goes to work and gets coffee. Then there is the key scene where this Hugh Grant P.M. stands up to the visiting American President, and it's a great rah-rah moment.
While not all the actors are British, most are, and some very much so, such as Bill Nighy who plays so dazzlingly well the aging rock star on the comeback. The terrific British comedian Rowan Atkinson has a couple of key roles that are brilliant. And so on. Of course the President is Billy Bob Thornton (Arkansas) and Linney is a good old New Yorker (bless her) and there is Claudia Schiffer who is international somehow, but born in Germany.
All of these people are interconnected in ways that really don't strain the plot. (A wonderfully excessive chart of all these, with French text, oddly, is clickable on the Love Actually wikipedia page.) The writing and directing are both the work of one man, Richard Curtis, who has directed only one other film but has written a slew of them (and who is only British by means of the Empire--he's from New Zealand). But if the direction is solid, the writing is sublime. Yes, it doesn't strive for Shakespeare level profundity, and it doesn't reach it, either, but it's really smart, snappy, believable, funny stuff. That will also get you in the gut if you let it.