For what it was, not bad.

Rating: Null/10 (7 November 2004)

Whomever called this movie a cute date movie is pretty much right on the money. The acting is stellar, but how can it not be? The story lines, yes plural, in fact, very much so, are underdevelopped for the most part, and just hard to follow. This didn't stop Love Actually from being a pretty cute movie, and this coming from a die hard horror fan. It seemed cliché though, almost contrived to have all these different, interconnected love stories end up so well. Oddly enough, the only part that really struck a chord with me for no apparent reason was the storyline with Jamie the writer striking up a romance with Aurelia the cleaning lady. When they learned English/Portuguese for each other, it was really...well, cute, but just a tad cringeworthy. The weird gratuitous sex scenes weren't really offensive per se, just slightly unnecessary. The film would have definitely worked without that story line, from which I can't even remember the characters' names. The ten year old with girl problems going to his grieving stepfather for advice was *very* cliché, to the point of groaning whenever they came on screen, since I'm such a nice critic. Hugh Grant was good as the newly elected Prime Minister. Well, Hugh Grant is always good, but he was really good in this one, and the small part he had alongside Thornton was well done indeed. His romance with Nathalie, and especially that kiss at the end was perfect. All in all, there were some story lines and some actors that this film would have done fine without: The sex scene stand ins and I guess the burnt out pop singer/manager thing we could have done without. Alan Rickman was great though, and whoever played Billy Mack was very Keith Richards-ish. This has been another useless review of another weird romantic comedy. Cheers.