I’m watching Four Weddings and a Funeral for the first time

[Change17]

I know it’s a classic but somehow I’ve never watched it.
So I’m about an hour in and I just wanna get this straight ..

Carrie meets Charles. They sleep together. Charles finds out she’s in fact engaged and meets her fiancé. They sleep together again. And then she takes him with her to pick out a wedding dress .. that’s as far as I’m up to

What is happening here I thought these two were one of the most iconic and popular couples in romcom history I had no idea this is how the relationship started 😂😂

@MandalaYogaTapestry

Change17 Imagine You and Me is about a straight married woman falling head over heels in love with another woman. It's a totally different theme for a movie.

My point is, I’m not the type to immediately dismiss two people falling in love just because one might already be in a relationship. I’m sure there’s people who wouldn’t like the theme of IMAU.

They’re not an iconic couple. Nobody likes her. Everybody loves scarlet and duckface and the John hanna character. It’s much more about friendship than about the romance. That’s kind of the point.

yes a bit like Love Actually (which has many, many faults) FWAAF is about platonic love, or love in its different forms. Wonderful film.

I saw the film when I was 14 - it was the first 15 film I went to at the cinema and I was nervous they wouldn't let me in! I remember being quite shocked by carrie's 'number' but I've now surpassed it myself

Ok, I don’t think anyone’s said the number, OP, but there have been references to her as a ‘cocktease’, ‘skanky’, ‘a right slapper’, as boasting about her lovers, two references to her likely STDs etc.

@NellieTeehan

Ok, I don’t think anyone’s said the number, OP, but there have been references to her as a ‘cocktease’, ‘skanky’, ‘a right slapper’, as boasting about her lovers, two references to her likely STDs etc.

Ah I missed the STD comment Yeh thats definitely not on. Maybe I’m being naive but I took the “slapper”’comments more to refer to the way she strung Charles along. Invited him to go wedding dress shopping with her etc. Perhaps I was naive there as I agree if it was referring to the number of people she’d slept with then that’s completely not ok

The best thing about the film is the closing credits and accompanying song. It ties together a poor vanity project of RC where the men get all the funny lines. Carrie had to be completely different to any woman Charles had ever met otherwise he wouldn't have wanted her. Am appalled at the slapper-style comments and someone said she didn't 'deserve' Charles! Someone who let Duckface down but somehow conned her into a wedding then left her at the altar? Loved the ex-girlfriends and the 'I've lost a lot of weight since then' delivery. Genius!

^For me, it’s the funeral that is iconic.
Having never ever heard that poem before in my life, it took my breath away.^

That film did more for WH Auden than any English teacher. There was a very slim collection of WH Auden poetry published as a movie-tie in, with Hugh Grant looking mournful on the front. It was the fashionable book to have on every mid-90s student bookshelf.

@keiratwiceknightly, that is super casting! KST epitomises “aloof”. Really looking forward to the film. The Hitchcock original is one of my favourite films.

Tried watching this once, years ago. It was so bad, we put it off. Terrible storyline. Still don't know what all the fuss is/was about...

Omg more people who have heard of “Imagine Me and You”!! I LOVE that film

And as for FWAAF, love KST, love Charlotte Coleman ❤️ (it’s the B359!)
But where is all the love for James Fleet as Tom? Anyone else tread in a cowpat?

I do adore that scene a PP mentioned when Fiona sees Tom at breakfast and turns away with just a cup of tea 🤣

And the girl who learns sign language so she can talk to Charles’ brother and they dance and dance just gazing into each other’s eyes... magical

And yep Bernard and Lydia “Don’t be ridiculous Bernard. I’m not THAT desperate”

I dont know what he ever saw in her. She's a complete twat. She treats him like 2nd best the entire time and is about as interesting/fascinating as watching paint dry. She aint even that pretty! His best friend Fiona is way more stunning than she is.

Ah really want to watch it now. Scarlet was such a great character, really loved her. So sad that she died so young.
Keeping mum sounds good as well. Anyone know if these are available on prime or Netflix?
Watched the Karate Kid last night on prime for a bit of 80s nostalgia and it was really good! I hadn’t seen it for more than 20 years

@FromTheAllotment

Omg more people who have heard of “Imagine Me and You”!! I LOVE that film

And as for FWAAF, love KST, love Charlotte Coleman ❤️ (it’s the B359!)
But where is all the love for James Fleet as Tom? Anyone else tread in a cowpat?

I do adore that scene a PP mentioned when Fiona sees Tom at breakfast and turns away with just a cup of tea 🤣

And the girl who learns sign language so she can talk to Charles’ brother and they dance and dance just gazing into each other’s eyes... magical

And yep Bernard and Lydia “Don’t be ridiculous Bernard. I’m not THAT desperate”

Yay! Another for Imagine Me and You. I was 13 when it came out and dont recall but was it even released in cinemas or did it go straight to dvd?

I just love Celia imrie’s character. Such an accurate portrayal of how a lot of upper middle class women of that generation can be. When Rachel tells her about being in love with Luce “so the two of you are.... lesbi-friends?”

That bit at the first wedding “she’s no longer my girlfriend... she’s now my wife” - and then Hugh Grant hitting his head against the pillar thing - gets me every time.

I don’t think Charles or Carrie are supposed to be the nicest people - I think they’re supposed to be good looking and charming with a trail of fucked up relationships behind them both. Carrie’s obvious arseholishness to the loathsome rich Scot and her list versus Charles’s “serial monogamy” and tableful of cross exes. The actress is not great but the characters seem a fair match for each other. Charles is obviously a much better friend than boyfriend, sure we all know people like that.

Totally disagree with the idea that those people wouldn’t be friends. Gareth would love Scarlett because she is eccentric and would laugh at all his jokes!

Oh I also agree that Bernard and Lydia (or even Tom and the shepherdess cousin) are much better love stories!! I saw Bernard and Lydia playing the leads in Guys and Dolls a few years ago and they were SO good.

Marisa Tomei was first choice to play Carrie but she turned it down, then Jeanne Tripplehorn but she had a death in the family and had to pass.

I didn’t come across IMAY till it was on television. Recorded it by chance and then kept it saved till that freeview box or whatever we had back then gave up the ghost! I’ve checked Netflix & Prime a few times since but never seen it.

I love Marisa Tomei! She would have been SOO much better.
Ive always found Andie M incredibly wooden and boring

Marisa Tomei would have been perfect, I can easily imagine Charles falling in love with her.

I also agree that yes, the friendship group is a bit odd but at times in your life you do end up with friends that don't always make sense. I think the point was, they were outsiders, not the perfectly respectable "normal" people they were attending these weddings with. Charles and his friends were the piss takers on the sidelines who were there to make the numbers up. Plus, they stuck together as they were mainly all still single in a world of people getting married and doing "the right thing ."

I really don't like Richard Curtis films much (I hate Love Actually and could only stomach half an hour of Yesterday) but he's very good at writing about friendship groups and tends to get it right. That's what tugs at the heartstrings here, not the romance.

I said that Carrie was skanky - nothing to do with her number and everything to do with cheating and taking her lover to help choose her wedding dress. Imagine being the poor fiance.

BikeRunSki that is the best part of the film and I read some of Auden's poetry for the first time since school after watching it.

I would not watch it now, it seems dated, and Richard Curtis's work since then I think has been dross.

Marisa Tomei would have been MUCH better
I love her in My Cousin Vinny

I said that Carrie was skanky - nothing to do with her number and everything to do with cheating and taking her lover to help choose her wedding dress. Imagine being the poor fiance.

Well, you're making a sexual judgement on her, and quite apart from the fact that 'poor' Hamish is written to be a pompous, sexist creep who can't even make a wedding speech without referencing Margaret Thatcher, some people seem a lot more het up about the fact that Carrie has a one night stand while engaged than the fact that Charles actually jilts his fiancee at the altar, mid-ceremony, because someone he's slept with twice shows up at the wedding newly single.

I am making a moral judgement on her, certainly.
Doesn't matter if Hamish was a pompous arse - she chose to marry him and I do think that her behaviour was awful.
Ditching someone at the alter is an awful thing to do too. He should never have gotten that far. Is it worse to leave someone at the alter or marry them anyway, knowing you are in love with someone else?

No, I think he's pretty gross, too. But taking your most recent shag to try on wedding dresses is pretty ick. As is referencing him in your wedding speech to demonstrate how many people are enraptured by your magic fanny. And I can't help but feel that if a man were to enumerate his sex partners, and mentioned that two consecutive ones were a daughter and her mum, people would find that a bit weird, too. They're both vile.