#44 | Love Actually 2: Love, Definitely?

Love Actually 2 | Beyond The Box Set | Best Movie Podcasts | Richard Curtis | Sequel

 

Listen to our Love Actually episode on:

Love Actually is the cinematic equivalent of 2015 viral sensation “The Dress“. Where some see Richard Curtis’ enduringly popular 2004 Brit-Rom-Com as a heartwarming extended montage of festive romance, others see a cynical shower of cheap, unearned sentiment that treats its female characters as like shit while reinforcing all manner of creepy and manipulative male behaviour under the dubious premise that ‘love’ conquers all.

There’s generally very little middle ground between these two viewpoints, and the side of the fence you fall on probably depends on how uncritically romantic or incurably cynical your general worldview is. This week’s episode of Beyond The Box Set is essentially an extended debate between these two views. One of our hosts considers Love Actually to be his all-time favourite Christmas movie. The other gets angry-bile just thinking about it.

Join the debate as we walk through all nine of the occasionally intersecting plot lines that make up the film, exploring which are the most and least romantic/problematic, from the sensitively acted highs of Emma Thompson and Alan Rickman’s failing marriage to the (surely) undeniable low point that is Kris Marshall’s sexual adventures with a trio of appallingly-written midwestern barbie dolls.

Whether the prospect fills you with horror or glee, it’s fairly inevitable that you’re going to be pinned to the sofa with this movie at some point this holiday season, so we highly recommend familiarising yourself with our Love Actually drinking games beforehand. The ‘drink for bizarre fat shaming’ category alone should be enough to keep you tolerably merry for the duration…

Obviously the name of the game in this podcast is pitching fantasy sequels. For the purposes of this episode we’re choosing to disregard the recent Comic Relief reboot, which we’re pretty sure isn’t supposed to be canonical. So with wildly varying degrees of optimism, we revisit the cast of characters and imagine how their relationships might have looked in 2017. We’re not sure Richard Curtis would approve…

Our Love Actually episode is available for free download and streaming from all major Podcasting channels, including iTunes, Stitcher, aCast and Podbean – see the links at the top of this blog post. If you enjoy the show check out some of our earlier episodes and hit subscribe to receive a new episode every Friday morning. We’d also really appreciate a review, as it really helps us to find new listeners.

If you have any thoughts on this episode that you’re itching to share, or if you have any ideas for movies you’d like to hear us cover in the future, please get in touch via Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Tumblr, Google+ or by leaving a comment under this blog post. We promise we’ll get back to you, and we might even give you a shout-out on a future episode.