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DiscussionThe sexism in "Love, Actually"
Posted November 15, 2022 by 17throwaways17 in Television

It's this time of year again, so lets talk how how ACTUALLY messed up this popular christmas movie actually is:

Colin Firth and the Portuguese woman: He gets "given" this woman as a maid? she speaks no english whatsoever and he falls in love at first sight? then his family tries to "sell him" the other daughter but shes too ugly and fat in their words?

Hugh grant as the horny prime minister and Natalie who despite working her way to the prime ministers office constantly gets called fat by everyone in the movie which is insane shes a size 6.. He fires her for being too hot which is a full lawsuit but ok. He also pulls up a picture of margaret thatcher and says something sexual about her because got forbid a woman exist in this movie not in a sexualised way.

Emma thompson's character is the only female character with more than like 30 words and because of that she gets cheated on by her husband who buys jwerly for his secretary? what was the lesson there exactly?

Keira knightly is marrying some guy and the BEST FRIEND of her husband shot the creepiest wedding film of just close ups of her face and we are supposed to be enamoured by this?

The porno scene? where he has to cup her breasts and simulate sex? what exactly was the point of that?

Laura linney has a mentally ill brother she has to tend to sometimes and thats her big dirty secret that makes the guy she has been in love with for years not wanna sleep with her... umwtf

46 comments

[Deleted]November 15, 2022

I’m so tired of the trope that women enjoy being stalked and violated and that it’s ok because he totally luvs her.

[Deleted]November 15, 2022

Loves, actually. ;)

VeneficcaNovember 15, 2022

Yeah, they actually have Keira kiss him after the creepy reveal when a real woman would never.

ItzpapalotlNovember 15, 2022

Yeah, I can imagine the sick, sinking feeling in my stomach I would get if my (hypothetical) boyfriend/husband’s best friend declared his love for me....can you imagine how mortified and uncomfortable you’d feel :/

velvetpawsNovember 15, 2022

I hate that movie. Like I am passionate about hating it. It’s not just bad, it’s aggressively anti-romantic.

GrimeldaSNovember 16, 2022

I'm with you on this, but I think Emma Thompson's acting in this was excellent. The scene where she opens her gift and finds a cd instead of the necklace was really moving. When she was quietly crying by herself so her family wouldn't hear really got to me.

Been a while since I watched it but maybe it's actually supposed to be an anti love movie, because there isn't a single example of a healthy and stable love in it.

NovemberinthechairNovember 15, 2022

I hate that film.

ProxyMusicNovember 15, 2022(Edited November 15, 2022)

I hated that film too. My memory of it is probably off because when I watched it I kept going blind with rage, but as I recall it the annoying little boy who had the mad crush on a girl was portrayed as cute and sweet when, in fact, his character and story arc were creepy and sexist. The boy was a budding sex pest and stalker. He was applauded and deemed adorable for being totally obsessed with the female "object of his affections" and encouraged to "follow her anywhere" so he could hound her with dramatic, mawkish displays of his OTT feelings in the belief that this is a totally normal, appropriate way for males to behave towards females and it will succeed in "winning her over."

I was really disappointed in all the intelligent actors who took part in this film, as well as in screenwriter and director Richard Curtis.

[Deleted]November 15, 2022(Edited November 15, 2022)

I’ve never understood why this film tops Christmas film lists. Even at the time it came out I thought it was pretty bad. Emma Thompson character was so put upon and he treats her like an old dishrag.

I watched it again recently and it hasn’t aged well at all. The bit with Martin Freeman and Joanna Page was uncomfortable viewing not at all sweet.

The guy with the obsession with his mates wife was awful too, like why would you do that to your friend, and also put his wife in the horrible position of knowing this secret.

You also had the guy encouraging his stepson to chase that girl down at the airport, again creepy.

vulvapeopleNovember 15, 2022

Emma Thompson character was so put upon and he treats her like an old dishrag.

Pretty ironic given her real-life husband is several years younger than she is.

[Deleted]November 16, 2022

Yes, Greg Wise, who got together with her when they made Sense and Sensibility, iirc!

lavenderlondonfogNovember 15, 2022(Edited November 15, 2022)

I hope it's ok to admit here that I despise Richard Curtis's cutesy sentimentality and sensibilities. A lot of his films are fine on the surface but they've never really resonated with me as romances (and I LOVE romcoms) because their conceptions of what love is and how it manifests is so hollow that even as an enjoyer of vapid love stories I'm left feeling a bit empty.

I've seen Love Actually, Notting Hill, Four Weddings and a Funeral, About Time but the only one of his films I've returned to and loved is Bridget Jones's Diary (just the first one), which isn't even his story really.

istaraNovember 15, 2022

I hope it's ok to admit here that I despise Richard Curtis's cutesy sentimentality and sensibilities.

It's not only okay, it's welcome.

I loved Four Weddings. I quite enjoyed Notting Hill.

Love Actually was execrable.

The first two Bridget Jones' Diary films were good. However I think the third, which he wasn't involved in, is by far the best.

[Deleted]November 16, 2022

I lasted twenty minutes into Bridget Jones. Loathed it. Most disappointed.

dragonheartNovember 15, 2022

Finally! Somebody else who sees this film for the sexist garbage it is. I'm so tired of people celebrating this film like it's the pinnacle of true love when really it's a bunch of male fantasies stapled together. The Holiday is a much better film imo.

[Deleted]November 15, 2022

I have not seen this movie in decades, the only thing I remember is being aghast that someone as young as Kiera Knightley was getting married. (She was 18, I was 25 and engaged and felt like I was a little too young to be getting married - and I was right, lol.)

istaraNovember 15, 2022

She really can't act. She was okay in Bend it like Beckham but awful in pretty much everything since. I now avoid any movies with her in.

The other day my kid was watching some Disney movie about Outer Realms or something (a version of the Nutcracker). There was this character in it who was so irritating I had to get my kid to turn the volume down. The voice!!!!

Anyway, I looked up the cast and the character (Sugar Plum Fairy) turned out to be Keira Knightley. Even so disguised I couldn't recognise her, so had no prejudices towards the performance, she was unbearably awful.

NoNameNovember 15, 2022

This goes to show my evolution into feminism, but when I watched it the year it came out as a thirty year old I didn't see that much wrong with it. Someone gave the DVD to me as a Christmas present. I remember watching it later on DVD when I was around 40 and my daughter was 18. I remember my daughter who is anglo American being disgusted with the creepy guy who was selling sandwiches in London and then took a plane ride to Wisconsin (?) and suddenly all the American women were into him. Now I am 50 I see it the same way as the OP.

Thinking back to many movies I watched when I was younger, there was so much sexism. Thinking of the Sixteen Candles movie and the date rape scene which didn't raise any ire at all.

[Deleted]November 15, 2022

My sister seems to think it’s the funniest film ever and insisted on watching it last time I spent Christmas with her. It was awful, boring, tedious, sexist as hell, just NOT FUNNY. I’m glad I’ve forgotten most of it.

VeneficcaNovember 15, 2022

Aren't the deleted scenes also bad? I've heard that for years. I know there's a scene where the old rock star tells a female record label employee to suck his knob or something similar and people had to point out the scene made the character less likeable.

Overall, the movie says the ideal woman is young, subordinate, and doesn't talk much. And that women over a certain age are drudges who must suffer through a life without love or fidelity.

LadylucyNovember 15, 2022

You get a lot of things wrong about Love Actually. The Prime Minister doesn’t fire Natalie, she quit. Colin Firth’s maid’s family fully supports their daughter’s (heavily chaperoned) relationship. Laura Linley’s character is often with her brother because he constantly calling her. The man, her crush, doesn’t refuse to have sex with her. She has to leave him, because her brother called and needs her. I’m not sure that the Alan Rickman character cheated on his wife because she said over 30 words. More like a mid-life crisis with a sexy younger woman.

pennygadgetNovember 15, 2022

It baffles me that so many women swoon over this film and make it a Christmas tradition. Not only is it problematic for all the reasons you listed. But its not even good in a guilty pleasure sort of way. The actors don't have great chemistry. And, because there's so many characters, the audience doesn't have a chance to get to know them well enough to care about their love lives. I really don't get how anyone could enjoy this movie enough to make it a tradition

immersangNovember 15, 2022

I watched it once, hated it and stay absolutely baffled to this day by the seemingly universal love it gets. I don't think I've met a single other woman in person yet who feels about it the way I do.

(My mom simply hasn't seen it, so I don't really count her there. But all female friends, acquaintances, as well as seemingly every single gay man in my live, rave about this goddamn movie.)

ramaniNovember 15, 2022

YES‼️ OMG When I first saw this film I wasn’t anywhere near into women’s rights (in my typical suburban libfem days), and I was still so unsettled by it!

I think it’s truly one of the most disturbing things I’ve seen - right up there with Pretty Woman. I don’t for the life of me understand the appeal of movies like this.

istaraNovember 15, 2022

I absolutely loathe this film. It is just luvvie London pretentious wank.

Actually the only plotline I did enjoy was the Hugh Grant/Martine McCutcheon one (albeit those issues you mentioned could have been better managed) and I think it would have made a very sweet film in its own right, expanded obviously.

vulvapeopleNovember 15, 2022

I have a thing for Christmas movies, including conventional (A Christmas Carol), unconventional (Die Hard), and profoundly stupid (the various bad TV Christmas movies I love... to hate), but I do not like this one.

Many fictional romances are profoundly problematic, but Love, Actually isn't just problematic, it's also tiresome and unfunny.

MikkalNovember 15, 2022

This is on the list of "popular movies I don't like and don't understand why other people like it".

I think there was one or two characters that were at least interesting, but I didn't enjoy watching the movie or understand it.

3catnightNovember 15, 2022

Thank you. I can't stand that movie. The sexism is rank.

feministforever2020November 16, 2022

I loved this movie when I was teenager. Then I watched it again in my twenties and was HORRIFIED.

AlwaysOrdduNovember 15, 2022

I think I saw this movie but holy shit I must not remember it. Going to be sure to avoid it going forward for sure.

[Deleted]November 15, 2022

I suffered through it at the behest of my then-best friend because she loved it so much. I can't remember feeling a thing for it. I generally hate romance movies to begin with because I find them cheesy and usually not good at portraying healthy relationships.

SameseksNovember 15, 2022

This is the worst movie I have ever seen. Not only for the reasons you mentioned, but because its attempts at "humor" as pure cringe

It's unbelievably bad

Lilith-FairNovember 15, 2022

Unpopular opinion but this movie is quite old. If we go through all the books and movies even 8-10 years ago and earlier, we're bound to find things that wouldn't be ok by today's standard. The way people did things in the past were based on how life was in the past, right or wrong. People navigated customs of the past as they knew how, and that's how things evolved. In 20 years, someone who isn't born yet will watch movies made today and find all sorts of things wrong with them. And so on and so on into the future.

Also this is a comedy. Not a slapstick with blatant in your face jokes, but more an implication of fallacy of imperfect people. The things you pointed out were in fact being portrayed as not ok. And how people get on with life despite all their flaws and fallacies. If every character were all perfect and did things as they should, there would be no movie.

Not saying this directly at OP, just my 2c generally about today. I think people getting upset feeling angry about injustices in the past is a wasted energy that does nothing except bring negativity to themselves harming their own mental well being. Because we literally cannot change the past. We can't "cancel" the past anymore than we can make a man into a woman. And there are enough things to be upset about today, so anger and time spent being infuriated about the past is wasting energy we can spend on the present and the future. All we can do is learn from the past and take it forward to figure out how to improve.

Again OP this is not directed at you. I've been feeling this way about things and you just open the door for me to get this off my chest.

ProxyMusicNovember 15, 2022(Edited November 15, 2022)

Unpopular opinion but this movie is quite old.

Since when is a movie from 2003 "quite old"?

The way people did things in the past were based on how life was in the past, right or wrong. People navigated customs of the past as they knew how, and that's how things evolved

Wut? You are making it seem like people in Britain 19 years ago lived in an entirely different historical epoch to today, sort of like the Middle Ages or Victorian era.

Actually, many people like me and JK Rowling think that 19 years ago - before internet porn, social media, smart phones, ubiquitous wi-fi, Only Fans, and widespread gender identity ideology, trans tyranny, lib faux feminism, hyper-sexualization of girls and women, and "sex work is work" and "TWAW" - British/American/Western culture was way more clued in about sexism and far less overtly misogynistic than today.

ETA: I saw this movie when it was first released in 2003. My response to it as described in my other comment on this thread is how I responded to it back then. My feminist sensibilities and response to movies and books today are pretty close to what they were 19 years ago - and 50 years ago too. Since you implied that the women objecting to "Love Actually" on this thread don't get that it's supposed to be a comedy: I and everyone else who saw the film in 2003 and in the years since understood that at the time we viewed it too.

Also, the reason OP has brought up this supposedly "quite old" film now and it's a relevant topic of discussion today in 2022 is because this year and for several years now "Love Actually" has become the most-broadcast and supposedly most popular and most beloved Christmas films of all times. Eclipsing other films that previously ranked highest as the most played and most beloved Christmas movies such as "It's A Wonderful Life," "Babes in Toyland/March of the Wooden Soldiers," "Miracle on 34th Street" and "White Christmas" (which by your reckoning were all made when the dinosaurs still inhabited the earth, LOL) - and more recent Christmas films such as "Home Alone" and "Elf." None of which managed to be anywhere near as blatantly sexist, weird and objectionable in their depiction of women and of male-female romances as "Love Actually."

Lilith-FairNovember 15, 2022

Like I already said, mine is an unpopular opinion so I expected the downvotes and it doesn't faze me.

Yes by today's standard 2003 is old. In 2003 people would laugh if we told them men would be competing in women's sports by self-identifying as women, and public bathrooms would become "gender neutral". I find the pace of supposed morality changing a a rapid pace that makes even things 5 years ago outdated. 2003 we didn't even have smart phones. And no social media.

danaseilhanNovember 16, 2022

You're in your 20s, right? Wait til you hit your 40s. Then you won't think of 20 years ago as "old."

It took me a long time to realize that Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was murdered six years before I was born. The way my teachers all talked about it, it seemed like it had been decades before my time -- and I could do math, and it didn't even occur to me to check. History is closer than you think it is. Decades aren't as long as you think they are. Don't waste your life, because it's gone in a blink.

Lilith-FairNovember 16, 2022

In my 40s??!! 😃 I sure wish. (On second thought, reliving my 20s? No thank you.) I'm GenX. I'm willing to bet I'm older than you.

Everything moves faster now. All thanks to social media. I have the actual experience of seeing the speed of how fads, trends, and culture change in the past comparing to the present.

[Deleted]November 15, 2022

Whose “today’s standards”? 20somethings? Teenagers?

pennygadgetNovember 15, 2022

But lots of people TODAY still see it as a great romance worth watching every Christmas. That's the annoying part

Lilith-FairNovember 16, 2022

Lot of people today also watch black and white movies from the 30s and 40s as great holiday and romance stories. And the sexism of movies back then were even more blatant. I think most people are able to see certain things are of the past while still enjoy them as classics. Otherwise we'd never be able to read books of the past or watch movies and tv shows from the past.

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