In Contention

Tag: Love Actually

  • Well said

    Love Actually

    Curtis essentially took the climactic moment from every romantic comedy and distilled it into one delectable stew and somehow came up with a product that works. In a way, by focusing solely on the crowd-pleasing moments it almost becomes experimental. Not every story hits but enough does to ensure that I felt warm and gooey from literally the first frame to the last.

    From our own Chad Hartigan’s on-going list of the 100 best films of the decade, re: “Love Actually.” I thought it would be a nice festive mention, to say nothing of the fact that I agree with every word.

    Incidentally (and belated), my list of the top 10 perennial must-watch Christmas movies, originally posted last year.

  • Treading water?

    I have a complicated relationship with Richard Curtis. (Well, with his work, at least.)

    On the one hand, I’m keen to defend the man: it’s become fashionable here to direct aggressive vitriol his way for daring to stick to an upbeat formula that, while hardly pushing the envelope artistically, has proved both popular and crowdpleasing. While more considered than most, this critique by Tim Adams in yesterday’s Observer is typical of the scepticism with which local critics regard him:

    This desire to be a one-man band, and not just a writer of scripts, appears to be born of an unlikely immodesty. There was a likable kind of humility about the scale of Four Weddings … but as the budgets have grown, so, apparently, has Curtis’s sense of what he is capable of. Somewhat like Blair, he seems to feel he is a pretty straight guy, but also a lone positive voice.

    He seems to want his films to evangelise the idea that the world is nowhere near as grim as most film-makers like to think … It is admirable, that faith, but when translated wholesale to movies it borders on sanctimoniousness.

    Like I said, I want to go against that elitist grain, but the truth is that Curtis’ maddeningly inconsistent oeuvre doesn’t entirely justify such loyalty. Yes, “Four Weddings and a Funeral” still stands as an exemplary, structurally inventive rom-com, even if it occasionally misjudges the audience’s affection for its characters. (Andie MacDowell over Kristin Scott Thomas? Really?)

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  • THE LISTS: My top 10 perennial must-watch Christmas movies

    Bill Murray in ScroogedTis the season, no?

    I found it rather perplexing that, with In Contention being on the scene for three Christmas seasons already, we’ve never set about putting together the obligatory “best Christmas films” list.  Well, I’m setting out to amend that oversight this holiday week with such a collective, but I don’t have the heart to call it a “best” list per se, so I’m giving it a different angle.

    Every year I have a few staples of the season that make their way into my DVD player or, in some instances — gasp! — my VCR, like new friends come home to visit before going back on the shelf for another 12 months stretch.

    Typically, I just can’t feel right about the holiday season without taking in the films on this list at least once.  They’ve slowly gelled into my “must-watch” Christmas movie list for various reasons: reminiscence, unavoidable television programming, uniqueness in the face of the typical seasonal film glut, etc.

    While there are a handful of classic, well-made staples that would be agreeable to the masses as far as quality is concerned, I think everyone’s list would be different when it comes to this kind of thing.  With that in my, my list of the top 10 perennial must-watch Christmas movies should give you some insight into who I am.

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  • Will BAFTA stick by their own?

    I have a bit of a love-hate relationship with the BAFTA Awards. On the one hand, they can be far more daring and playful in their choices than the American Academy — this is an organisation, after all, that has handed their Best Film award to such enduring works as “The Purple Rose of Cairo,” “GoodFellas” and “Lacombe, Lucien,” while nominating the Oscar-snubbed likes of “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind” and “The Usual Suspects.”

    Their technical awards are invariably more imaginatively awarded, too — take a look at their Best Film Editing category, for example, which in recent years has crowned “Eternal Sunshine,” “City of God” and “Mulholland Drive” as winners. And they can often be counted upon for gratifying upsets, as when Pedro Almodovar pushed past Sam Mendes for Best Director in 2000, or when “Trainspotting” blindsided “Sense and Sensibility” in the 1996 screenwriting race.

    For an awards show that fancies itself world-class, however, BAFTA can be infuriatingly parochial in their selections, stubbornly rewarding their own in the face of bigger, bolder competition. I doubt most of the voters could say with a straight face that “Four Weddings and a Funeral” was the very best film of 1994, nor “The Full Monty” of 1997, but they cleaned up nonetheless.

    For the last two years running, that kind of provincialism has ruled the voting, with this year’s awards looking particularly suspect. I think “Atonement” is a fine film, but handing it their top award seemed tokenistic at best, not least when the only other gong it took was for Best Art Direction.

    It’s a trend that Variety thinks could continue this year. In an article previewing the British contenders in the acting categories, they point out that Limeys have taken 16 acting BAFTAs in the last decade, compared to seven Oscars. Needless to say, they are frequently justified. It’s fair to say that this year, several British names will be cropping up in awards lists on either side of the Atlantic, and deservedly so — particularly in the Best Actress category, where thesps like Kristin Scott Thomas, Sally Hawkins and the ubiquitous Kate Winslet are all likely to figure.

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