Love is not like that ... and certainly not "like that" ...

Rating: 6/10 (17 April 2012)

Remember what Diana Ross said: "Can't hurry love, you just have to wait  Love don't come easy, it's a game of give and take"
Well, according to "Love Actually", love can come easily and quickly, count five weeks till December 25th... and you'll get it.
I remember the first viewing was with my best friend precisely at the end of December 2010, we wanted to watch a gangster film but, after filling our stomachs with some cans of beers, we decided to loosen up a bit and give a chance to the most improbably enjoyable film: a Brit Rom Com  and after more cans of beers, we were ecstatic. For me, it was the most feel-good and warmest romantic comedy my heart ever experienced, I almost wanted to hug my buddy and open my heart to him. The feeling lasted.
I saw it again, two weeks ago. I was left perplexed. I didn't even want to finish it. The magic disappeared. And I was almost ashamed of my initial reaction. Guess what was the only parameter that changed between the two viewings (besides being sober)? This time I was married.
And this time I saw the film with my newlywed wife, and what my heart 'experienced' the first time, was 'endured' the second.
In one year, I believe I learned one thing or two about love, and more than anything, about commitment. I know "Love Actually" is meant to be a kaleidoscope of all the love-induced situations that ever graced the silver screen for pure dramatization's sake, but this leads to underdeveloped stories canalized by a succession of painful clichés. "I love you" might be one of the simplest and most touching words ever said in a lifetime, it's also the most intimate and I'm not sure everyone would make a declaration of love in a crowded place.
And I can go on and on with all the situations that rang false in my book. Mourning a wife's death is a devastating experience that can't be swept off just because Junior is in love with the most popular girl in school, no matter how creepily smart he sounds. Being betrayed by his wife and brother is the kind of humiliations that would severely knock out any grown-up man, and I'm not sure all it took for Colin Firth's character was a non-English speaking Portuguese housekeeper. I'm not sure it takes a girl taking off her clothes in slow motion to create a love at first sight, when lust would be the most appropriate reaction.
Love is not just like that, and love is not "just like that" (snapping fingers).
And "Love Actually" consists on a successions of wannabe witty romances that would have made Woody Allen roll over his grave, if he was dead.
Oh yeah, and the whole thing is packaged in a dazzling celebration of post-9/11 post-modernistic political correctness which is a real insult to reality. A young man is in love with his best friend's wife, and we should just "oooow" about this because Keira Knightley is just so irresistible. The betrayed friend happens to be black like many other secondary characters that embodies the so cinematically convenient idea of differences that 'make no difference'. I never care about racial minorities' depictions in films, but since the film was obviously desperate to prove its open-mindedness, then why not featuring Indians, Pakistani, Arabs or Muslim characters for that matter? Oh yes, of course, they don't celebrate Christmas.
The racial thing is just the tip of the iceberg, that -in fact- betrays an extreme shallowness in the script.
One of the Prime Minster's assistant is black, and can easily be regarded as beautiful or ugly, following the tastes. At one point, she referred to the PM's secretary as fat, when she was just voluptuous and quite frankly had more sex appeal than her. But we're supposed to see Natalie as the ugly duckling while she's really attractive. Natalie is ugly by cinematic standards, just like her foul-mouthed language proves that she comes from the 'worst part of London'. Enough to make her unlikely romance with the PM (Hugh Grant, ladies) happen  Well, this was one of the most blatant cases of useless manipulation since the romance between a head of state and a secretary was already good material.
I can't believe I missed these details the first time. But at least, it makes sense considering the way the stories are handled, some end happily, some very happily, and 'foursome' lucky dorks, the Christmas miracle happened.
"Love Actually" betrays more what it tries to be, than what it actually is. Not any movie can have the wit of "Four Weddings and a Funeral" and the warmth of "Annie Hall" so the film can only exploit the magic of Christmas and a penetrating music to beg us to feel good for archetypes, you know those formulaic "You'll laugh! You'll cry!" slogans.
And they're all here, the workaholic architect, the lonely writer, the office's slut, the wife (Emma Thomson) who endures the infidelity of her husband (Alan Rickman) with dignity, the climactic race to the airport for a simple declaration of love, all the multiple story lines tying up at the end in the most artificial ways (did the stories all need to be connected?). The movie tries to satisfy everyone, with interracial love, kids' crush, international love, class loves, infidelity followed by divorce, infidelity followed by reconciliation.
Yet, the film is so politically correct that it didn't even have the guts to ruin the 'Family' feeling by having a gay couple in the storyline, so we have a Rock star who prefers to spend Christmas with his manager, two body doubles pretending to have sex is one thing, but is a gay couple for Christmas asking too much?