I’m watching four weddings and a funeral

[Frynye]

I’m watching four weddings and a funeral for the first time since I was about 15 and I have questions. When did everyone stop wearing hats to weddings and why are so many people (Carrie mainly) wearing white to weddings

I always laughed at the bit where Hugh Grant reverses down the motorway when he misses his junction.

It would’ve been a perfect film had they cast someone else as Carrie. I love Andie MCDowell in a lot of things (fantastic recent performance as the mum in Maid) but she was shite in this and there was zero chemistry between her and HG.

No, I've said upthread I found a quote from RC saying they didn't marry but they did have a fling so it wasn't a joke photo either. Somewhere in the middle.

I thought it was obvious from the first watch that Gareth and Matthew were a couple. Surely there was no question and no coyness about it?

‘Huge thighs’ bloody terrible, really.

Four Weddings and a Funeral is one of my all time favourite films, despite hating one of the main characters… but I can’t see how anyone was meant to do anything BUT hate Carrie.

Re hats at weddings. I am 31 and go to a lot of weddings (combination of my age and having a v wide social circle due to DH being the most sociable of social butterflies!) and I can’t think of a recent one where I’ve not worn headgear of some kind. Rarely a full hat but I am partial to a ‘hatinator’ (never a fascinator, I hate how flimsy they always are!) or a chunky padded, sometimes embellished, headband or similar. I don’t really feel my outfit is complete without one! Normally quite formal/posh weddings admittedly for the bigger or more statement headgear.

I adored Gareth and Matthew. So obviously a couple to me but partly because they were SO like how my uncle and his later-husband were at the time. Clearly deeply in love and very happy but still somewhat held back from being super open about being together due to societal norms etc. I thought it was so well done.

I was never fan of Andie MacDowell and I agree there was no chemistry between her and HG but she was fantastic in The Maid as was her daughter!

I dont think it was coyness it wasthey were another couple no need to make a fuss about it, I don't know how pp missed it either, the op was only 15 at first watch so maybe went over her head,

I always thought that was quite interestingly handled, that the sophisticated American woman was far more sexually experienced than the bumbling English serial monogamist, and that’s how we’re made to see it — that it’s something she has no mixed feelings about at all, it’s just a series of funny, arch anecdotes, and he’s envious and impressed, not horrified

If you think about it, it fits with what we see of her character, too. She’s very at ease with leaving for the airport after her first ONS with Charles, and does that gag about assuming they’re getting married as they’ve slept together, and she sleeps with him when she’s engaged to gruesome Hamish.

I’m convinced David Simon ripped it off for a key scene in The Wire 20 years later!

You might be right! That is such a great scene @PacificState

That wasn't Hen. That was another of Charles' exes that were all sat at the same table atc2nd wedding reception. She was the ex whose Mum made a pass at Charles when they were dating.

Hen was thin, tall, dark haired and neurotic. Jilted by Charles at the altar and punched him fair enough. Married a soldier in the end credits.

I remember hats were still relatively common 10 years ago, but hardly ever on young women. I wouldn't have minded if not for the fact the styles selected were generally ridiculous. Nowadays even older ladies generally seem not to bother.

They filmed one and it was cut, so that might not have been his decision.

Does everyone notice Nicola Walker popping up?

I remember going to a wedding in the early 20s and someone wearing a white suit. Never gave it a second thought at the time.
I don’t even know where you would buy a hat now the department stores have mostly closed.

I agree. In many respects, Curtis was ahead of the curve in showing a gay couple as no big deal.

This is typical of Curtis, see Martine McCutcheons character in Love Actually who is written as “plump” whilst clearly being nothing of the sort. Curtis is a misogynistic prick.

I love hats! I remember going to a load of weddings around 2001-2 when I was in my late 20s and wore a hat to all of them (different friendship groups so I got away with same hat / outfit!). The last time I wore one was to a family wedding in about 2011. When I got married almost 20yrs ago I encouraged hat wearing (not compulsory, though)
I am very much not of the hat-wearing demographic, as a working class lass from the NW, but had so much fun!

That’s a good way of looking at it actually. The way she delivers the lines still makes me curl up though!

See, I quite like her brand of antiseptic blankness in things like Green Card, but it just sits oddly in a film like Four Weddings where other characters who are apparently impressed by her are far wittier and sharper. I mean, it’s not clear why Matthew describes her as ‘gorgeous’ or ‘adorable’ or something after sitting on her table at one of the weddings, because she doesn’t get many good lines compared to other characters, and doesn’t really come across as anything other than pretty and rather bland, and usually about to dash off somewhere, whether it’s to the US or into a marriage with someone else.

I think it’s just a flaw in the writing. She’s just not a well-written character. It’s not clear why a supposedly sophisticated American would even contemplate marriage to a much older, pompous, Scottish Tory politician. Am I imagining that she works for Vogue? And still wears that weird outfit with the over shirt and the over-shoulder umbrella she’s wearing to go wedding dress shopping and accompany Charles to meet his irate brother at the BFI.

(And the weird outfit she wears to the Charles and Hen wedding…?) Which I suppose was chosen to work in the climactic scene where she’s soaked in the rain, but looks quite odd amidst everyone else’s wedding gear…?)

dhand I had our first date watching 4 Weddings in a packed Leicester square cinema. It had been open 2 or 3 days. I recall a full cinema laughing a lot.

I have a soft spot for this movie due to this.

Im surprised so many didnt get the gay couole (teens taken aside) there is a part early on where John Hannah character wipes shaving foam off Simon Callows to me that made their intimacy clear.

There are some great lines in this movie. Like the already mentioned "that Branson chap is doing awfully well"

"The recipe for duck ala banana"

Fiona: "I was a lesbian once at school, but only for about fifteen minutes. I don't think it counts

Charles: Do you think there really are people who can just go up and say, "Hi, babe. Name's Charles. This is your lucky night?"
Matthew: Well, if there are, they're not English.

I do adore Tom. Ive known guys like him..

Simon Callow (Garath) is gay and he and Hugh Grant were in the film Maurice (based on E.M Forster’s book ) about homosexual love.

I remember a friend of mine wearing a white suit to a wedding around 2002. It was the wedding of her partner’s best friend from school and she was quite jealous of how close the group was. She showed me the official photo of the friendship group on the day and she stands out hugely. Bright white suit in the front row. I remember at the time thinking it was just her doing a “fuck
you, everyone look at me” and that it was pretty rude.

My MIL wore cream to my wedding. I do remember being slightly surprised but it wasn't the big non no it is now. I wore a hat up DD's wedding but there were very few. I have an invitation to a wedding next year where the invitation says "hats most welcome". Now there's a challenge...

We all had a crush on Mathew (john Hannah) right ? Or maybe it was just me but I had/have a huge crush on him.

Was that Nicola Walker singing the twee songs at the first wedding?

I did used to wear hats on a glorious occasion in 1987 I went as a 21 year to a wedding in America. I was informed by the British bride the dress code was formal. Pre internet and phone calls were very expensive so it was minimal information, plus it just didn’t occur to ask about hats. I had attended lots of wedding as a guest and had sung at lots as a chorister and hats were very much part of formal weddings back then . Well I turned up in a large picture hat with a shallow crown. I was the only person out of 200 guests, the Americans adored me.

I have attached a pic of a hat that looks really similar to mine. I wore it with a long coral hacking jacket and cream skirt. I’m at 36 weddings as a guest so far and indeed hats are rare now. I did wear one to my sisters wedding a couple of years ago.

Prince Charles’s medals were on the wrong side so I thought it was just a joke. Poor darling Fi.

so many memorable phrases we still use today - “splendid, I thought” for anything remotely good, “frightful Americans”, “fuck-a-doodle-doo” was deployed just last week.

Almost everyone wore a hat at my wedding in 2008, only one fascinator, but then I’m posh ☺️ (not really)

I don’t think it’s only a flaw in the writing - her delivery of the lines joking about getting married after her ONS with Charles fell really flat. As did the ‘Is it raining, I hadn’t noticed’ line which might have been slightly funny delivered by someone else.