To always cry at the Emma Thompson bits in Love Actually?

[summerbreezer]

Against my will, I've been forced to watch LA this evening. I find this film to be cheesy and irritating..apart from her part.

The bit where she is standing in her room after discovering that her husband has another woman. OMG. Wonderful film making.

It is a good 30 - 40 seconds of watching a woman do nothing, and yet it so beautifully charged with emotion. She blinks back her tears so her children don't see her cry. She goes to straighten the duvet as if it is a reflex action.

Then later on she tells Alan Rickman he has made "the life I lead seem foolish too". So lovely, so dignified. I also like the fact he doesn't get as far as having a physical affair, but that doesn't matter. The damage is done.

Gives me goosebumps.

I always thought that the meaning behind that scene was, the OW may have got the fancy expensive necklace, but she is sat alone in her house wearing it while he is home with his wife and his family. I also didn't think they had just had sex. I got the impression the OW woman didn't want a genuine relationship with him, it was a game and a way of getting expensive gifts. That was why she was smug.

Anyway OP YANBU and I also like the whole film!

I love this film and watch it every Christmas.

Adore the ET scene and bought the Joni Mitchell album on the strength of it, which is wonderful played very loud.

And "where the fuck is my fucking coat" is one of the funniest bits in the movie imvho, and is a standing joke in this house.

I love LA - the whole cheesy lot of it!

I watched it last week while I was ill. It cheered me up so yar boo sucks, with knobs on to the haterz! [may not be completely better yet ]

Originally, the ET story wasn't ambiguous. It had a happy ending, no implication of a physical affair at all and they sorted things out and moved on apparently. But Richard Curtis was told it was too saccharine amid the other happy stories and to make it flatter and more open to interpretation. I'm torn because it's very realistic and well done but it rankles slightly that in a film full of ludicrous happy endings, it's the marriage which had to suffer. But then I suppose ET was the only one who could play it that well. Alongside Laura Linney of course. I disagree that she would turn off her phone and ignore her brother. If you have a family member with severe mental health issues and you are their support, it really can end up like that.

Emma Thompson is just sublime.

I don't think there was a physical affair in the ET story, though it wasn't a happy ending. In the bedroom scene, where she wears the necklace, only one side of the bed appeared to have been slept in, the PA appears to have been alone (I think).

I'd forgotten about the Laura Linney story, I liked that too

Agree ShowOfHands

I think the relationship between her and brother is also very touching.

The one bum not, to me, actually is the very wooden Love Interest (he was also the guy in that atrocious Chanel advert from a few years ago with Nicole Kidman on a roof exclaiming pointlessly "I'm a dancer, I love to dance")

bum note

Gosh Trissie - that must be tough. Does your DH know?

Incidentally, my brother is a TV producer and he often refers to things as being 'a bit Richard Curtis' - ie iconic scenes of London in the run up to Xmas, cold outside, warm and cosy indoors etc. In his world, it's all a bit cliched now. I still love LA though!

It's been a while since I saw the film, but I think when I first saw it, their (ET and AR) lives seemed so separate that I thought they were already divorced. I also thought that when the PA put the necklace on, she was waiting for him to turn up, rather than already having shagged him. This thread has made me really want to watch it again, but as I read through, I keep being reminded of really annoying bits, and thinking maybe I don't want to watch it again after all. Am going to have a look for Last Chance Harvey though.

Yes, I agree. Doubt she' d be wearing the underwear if she was post-coital and AR had left.

I also thought it very significant that AR and his PA don't shag. Everybody loses. ET's life is made foolish, AR's marriage is irrepairably tarnished, and all the PA gets is a necklace.

Another one who gets all emotional at the airport reunion scene. was an expat and remember going to the airport with my young children to pick up their dad just after my mum had died. Saw grandparents arrive to be greeted with their GC - was lovely to see but hard knowing my kids would never be welcoming their gran like that.

and I love, love The Holiday (not my usually type and not a fan of any of the actors) .