Love Actually in (Sorta) Real Time: Four Weeks to Christmas

Despite my lateness with this post, technically, it's still 4 weeks to Christmas, and Prime Minister David is worried. What's he worried about?



Is he worried about shopping on the High Street, seeing as there are only (technically) 28 shopping days left until Christmas, and all the good buys at W. H. Smith, Mark and Spencer's, and Oddbins will be sold out by the time he gets his primarily ministerial arse in gear? No! Is he worrying about the delightful Natalie and how he's become instantly attracted to her? Well, probably, but not mainly. Is he worrying that he has no scenes in this movie opposite Keira Knightley? Well, no, because that's what I would be worrying about.

What David is concerned with is the upcoming visit to the UK by the American President (special uncredited guest star to be named later). While his Cabinet ministers strongly suggest that he make a strong stand to prove their independence from the American Eagle, David's hesitant: he's new at his job and needs that powerful ally from across the pond. "I'm not going to act like a petulant child," he explains, much to the disappointment of his Cabinet.



No doubt at this moment they would have leapt across the table and started beating him with those lovely crystal goblets (courtesy of Tutbury Crystal, I'm guessing), but he's saved by the bell belle—the entrance of Natalie, to be precise, bringing tea and a smile:



...and definitely turning the PM's mind from thoughts of affairs of state to...well, other affairs, I s'pose:



Later, Natalie brings tea (and delicious, yummy, chocolate biscuits) to David in his office. Gosh. Keira Knightley is wonderful, but she had better start bringing people yummy, scrumptious desserts in this movie to start competing with Natalie! Mmmm, choc biscuits.



Like any right-thinking person, David's very, very pleased to see chocolate biscuits arriving. Or maybe he's just happy to see Natalie. Since this movie is not entitled Chocolate Biscuits Actually, I'm guessing it's the latter.



After a brief interlude where Jack and Judy (the two movie body doubles) have some small talk about the Prime Minister (while performing nude in scenes I can't show off on this blog), we catch up again with Colin and Tony in Colin's sandwich delivery van. My goodness, no wonder I like this movie so much—there's multiple scenes of people bringing other people food! Colin's hit upon a solution to his strike-outs with women: he's bought himself a plane ticket to America, and he's leaving in three weeks, a schedule useful for those of you tracking this movie in (sorta) real time. Colin's heading, as he says, to "a fantastic place called...Wisconsin!"



Looks like Colin has forgotten all about his frost "future wife" Mia, and good riddance to cold fish! Speaking of which, let's check in at Fairtrade, and see what's going on: Harry, with Mia's help, is planning the office Christmas party. (The fact that it's not been canceled for budgetary reasons tells you immediately that as timeless as story as it in, Love Actually does not take place in 2008.)



There's a couple half-baked theories I have about Richard Curtis's direction of Love Actually and this is one of them: watch the actors' eyes and line of sight to check the relationships between them. Just like you could draw a perfect line, even without using your trusty straight-edge and a marker, between Mark's camera and the object of his affection, watch Mia's eyes in this scene—she follows Harry's every step. Mia's got a bit of a crush too, it seems, on her boss.

Even though Love Actually is a movie that cheerfully greets the suggestion of office romances with an enthusiastic "thumbs up," there's something a little bit calculating and...well, wrong about Mia's attention to Harry. Exactly what, we won't find out, but for the moment, Harry's focused on the party and its guests, asking Mia "You haven't got some horrible six-foot, tight-t-shirt wearing boyfriend you'll be bringing, have you?"



"No," smiles Mia, gazing at Harry forcefully. "I'll just be hanging round the mistletoe...hoping to be kissed."



Ah-ooga! Ah-ooga! Danger, Alan Rickman, danger!

The first part of Love Actually introduced the characters and their situations; this second week continues their stories, opens up the stage and expands the complications of love. Not every storyline is continued in this week's scenes (Keira! Where are you this week? Get back from your honeymoon!), but Curtis does a solid job of pacing and spacing the various storylines. We'll see them start to spin together in next week's installment, but for the moment, friends Karen and Daniel discuss the loss of Daniel's wife...



...and—more pressing at the moment—Daniel's young stepson Sam's withdrawal from communication and interaction. He's locked himself in his room, seldom emerging, "And when he sometimes does come out," Daniel explains, "it's obvious he's been crying."



Karen consoles Daniel's twin troubles with a kind word and an Emma-Thompsony pat on the shoulder: "Get a grip. People hate sissies. No one's ever going to shag you if you cry all the time."

Also,totally excellent choice of breakfast cereal, Daniel! I'm so coming over to your place for brekkies.



Daniel takes Sam out on the South Bank of the Thames for a walk and a talk. It's a lovely vista that sets up the scene: St. Paul's Cathedral and the still-under-construction Swiss Re building in the background. It's one of my favorite places in London and one of the most beautiful views of this city:




Speaking of pretty background sights, check out the redhead in jeans and the long coat in the scene above. She crosses behind Daniel and Sam's bench and disappears off screen past them:



...and emerges again to pass by them once more when the scene shifts angle to focus on Daniel and Sam. Hey! Continuity person! I think she's the one who stole Hugh Grant's tie!



Daniel's understandably worried about Sam's problem and talks to him kindly and honestly to try and help him out. Is it drugs? Is it bullies? Is it that weird red-headed lady who keeps following him everywhere? No, says Sam: "The truth is, actually...I'm in love."



Daniel's clearly relieved and also a bit amused. "Aren't you a little bit young to be in love?" he asks.



"No." says Sam, firmly.



The following exchange is short and pointed and one of my favorite in the movie. And it sums up the whole film pretty well on its own (not to mention that Kelly Clarkson song from the soundtrack):



Sam and Daniel aren't the only persons in the film who know the total agony of being in love, of course. Cut to Sarah, working late in the Fairtrade offices. (Note the photograph on her desk. We'll meet him later.)



Karl finishes his work day and shuts down the office lights...



...as Sarah watches his every move. There's that absolute adoring direction of vision again:



"Night, Sarah," Karl says.



"Night, Karl!" she replies, mock-cheerfully, ultra-casual.



The second Karl leaves, Sarah's ever-present mobile phone rings, and with an exasperated grimace, she answers with the same sort of mock-cheerful voice: "Yup, absolutely...I'm free as a bird. Fire away."



Who Sarah's speaking to will have to wait (golly, ain't this all so exciting!\ Can you stand the anticipation?), because with one swift film edit, we're out of London and away to the Continent: a farmhouse in France, to be precise.



I have no photographs of me in France so I'll just content you with this film still of Jamie sighing as he sits down in his French farmhouse vacation home. Cheating Girlfriend is conspicuous by her absence, or, as Jamie sighs aloud, in the words of that great poet Gilbert O'Sullivan: "Alone again. Naturally."



As the week starts to wind down, let's skip merrily back to Number 10 Downing Street for another visit to everyone's favorite romantic Prime Minister, Harriet Jones David...



...who's trying to get to know Natalie a little better.



In addition to the line-of-eyesight theory I have (which is probably nothing more than Acting 101: Look at the person you're in love with), I've also got another theory about Richard Curtis's filmmaking: his films are very thin at one end, bigger in the middle, and then...wait a minute, that's the wrong theory.

I've noticed when I've been trying to take screen shots that it's occasionally difficult to capture a scene's two characters in the same shot at the same time. Curtis generally places a camera on one and cuts to the camera on the other. For example, in this whole scenes, there's only a fraction of a second when David and Natalie are in the frame together at the same time:



You see this same technique in the previous scene with Sarah and Karl: quick cuts back and forth to middle shots of each of them, but no single scene with the two of them together. Not yet, at least. Again, it's kind of basic filmmaking, but I like the subtlety and gentle physical suggestion that this technique sends to the audience—mostly subconsciously, as I've seen Love Actually dozens of times and hadn't noticed it until I was trying to capture stills. Characters who are not yet emotionally connected, who are...for lack of a better phrase, dancing the dance of love...don't appear in the same frame together for many of their one-on-one scenes. Sam and Daniel, however, already a family and already greatly connected by the bonds of love despite the loss of Jo, are easily framed in the same screen.

It's a rough and easily disproved theory, of course: David and Natalie appear in the same frame in their first meeting (although it quickly switches to single-shots), and Jack and Judy can't be anything but filmed together...frequently without their clothes on. But it gives me something to look for in subsequent scenes, and it highlights the physical as well as emotional distance two characters must close before they can truly be a romantic couple.

Or, I could be being dazzled by Keira Knightley and British Frosted Flakes.

In the meantime, David's flirting a bit with Natalie: finding out that she lives in Wandsworth ("the dodgy end"). In a bit of Wodehousean coincidence that really isn't, David's sister also lives in Wandsworth. He poses a charmingly awkward question about her living arrangements in order to find out if she has a boyfriend. She doesn't: she's just broken up with her boyfriend because he said she was getting fat. "He said no one's going to fancy a girl with thighs the size of big tree trunks. Not a nice guy actually, in the end." David points out that, as Prime Minister, he's got the SAS at his beck and call, and he could just have her ex assassinated at a phone call. Must be nice!



After Natalie leaves, David turns to his left and asks "Did you have this kind of problem?..."



"...Of course you did, you saucy minx."



Sam spills the beans on the object of his affection: the most popular, beautiful, talented and coolest girl in school. "Well," muses Daniel. "Basically, you're fucked, aren't you?"



And finally...I know you were wondering what happened to him...let's check in with aging popster Billy Mack, who's now appearing on that popular British TV show, Ant & Dec's Saturday Night Takeaway...

[EDIT: Boisterous Bully booster Nicholas Yankovec points out in the comments that this show isn't Saturday Night Takeaway:

...with the inclusion of a child audience it's either SMTV or CD:UK, both Saturday morning children's shows presented by Ant and Dec, which always featured interveiws with pop acts and competitions for the kids giving away the performer's stuff.

And Nicholas oughta know...he's from Ipswitch. I'm guessing it's supposed to be SMTV: CD:UK didn't start until September 2003, only a couple months before Love Actually, so the timing is better for the show to be SMTV, which ran until December 2003. My persistent emails to Ant & Dec settle the matter remain unanswered, so Nicholas gets a Bull-Prize for his keen eye and his knowledge of the Ant-&-Dec-ology. Ta very much, Nicholas! Now, let's have that paragraph again, corrected:

And finally...I know you were wondering what happened to him...let's check in with aging popster Billy Mack, who's now appearing on that popular British TV show, SMTV, while Billy's manager Joe watches on a TV monitor off camera.



This is no fictional duo: Ant & Dec are played by themselves (Anthony McPartlin and Declan Donnelly). This duo of popular actors, musicians, and telly presenters are among the best-recognized television personalities in Britain, and virtually nearly unknown here in America. (Can't tell them apart? Ant always stands on the left. Always.) It's not essential that we recognize Messrs. Ant & Dec, though: like other scenes, Curtis gives us just enough info to set the scene: Billy's on a music show promoting his single "Christmas is All Around."



Despite the prologue's assertion that the song is shit, in each subsequent Billy appearance we see the pop single gaining greater public awareness and acceptance, even as the jokes about it continue. Like the Ant & Dec appearance, it's now fairly to a UK audience that Billy's in the running for that most prestigious of Christmastime music-world honors: the chance to have the #1 pop single during the week of Christmas. Since this isn't a music industry tradition in the USA, let's pop over to Wikipedia ("the encyclopedia written by everyone in the world, including yo' mama") to check out what it has to say about Christmas number-one singles in the UK:

Each year, record companies compete for the Christmas number one single spot on the British charts. Having the UK Christmas number one is very prestigious and leads to a lot of media coverage. Since people are buying gifts for the Christmas period, single sales are extremely high in the week before Christmas, and since the Christmas number one is the single with the highest sales, record companies can make sizable profit from trying to get their single to Number One. Many people place bets at a bookmaker's on who will be Christmas number one.

It then goes onto say that "AC/DC ROCKS AND QUIET RIOT SUCKS!!!!!!!!!!!!" which is the sort of incisive and in-depth commentary you only get on Wikipedia.

The Christmas Number One battle is still a major traditional in Britain, although in recent years the winner is frequently the victor of that season's X-Factor TV competition (the UK's version of American Idol). This year the contenders include Glasvegas's "Please Come Back Home" and Victoria Hart's "Santa Baby" cover. But I wouldn't put your money down yet on a winner (even though British bookies offer extensive odds on the Christmas Number One race, because if there's one thing the British 45/CD/MP3/wax cylinder -buying public loves, it's an underdog competing among the top dogs. F'r instance, Billy's up against top pop boy group Blue for the honor of Christmas Number One. What chance does a Christmas novelty song have against the smooth post-adolescent tones of a quartet of heartthrobs? What chance, indeed?

Part of the fun of Saturday Night Takeaway SMTV is the chance for ordinary viewers (like you!) to win fabulous prizes contributed by the great pop star guests on the show, given away by Ant and Dec (or, as Billy puts it—and I've joked in the past on my blog—"Ant or Dec"). Blue has contributed what looks like a pretty sizeable prize package of CDs, DVDs and a framed poster. Billy Mack's contribution is a personalized felt-tip pen.



As Joe watches in dismay, Billy demonstrates how the felt tip pen writes on anything. Even glass.



...and offers an inspirational message for the impressionable kids of the UK:

"Hiya kids...here's an important message from your Uncle Bill. Don't buy drugs.



"...Become a pop star, and they'll give you them for free!"



Aw, what the heck: watch the whole scene! (It's one of my favorite in a movie just chock-full of favorite scenes!



And, as the studio erupts, it's suddenly 3 Weeks to Christmas. Next week, we'll meet the final major player in our love stories, get a glimpse of fresh-from-her-honeymoon Keira Knightley, and a startling cameo appearance by the President of the United States, who's quite a jerkwad. We'll see you again next time then, won't we?