Love Actually director Richard Curtis has admitted that big errors in the film make him “feel uncomfortable.”
The 2003 romcom is considered a modern-day staple of the festive season, but the director, also known for Four Weddings and a Funeral and Notting Hill, isn’t entirely happy with elements of the film two decades on from its release.
Speaking with US TV channel ABC for a one-hour special, The Laughter & Secrets of Love Actually: 20 Years Later, Curtis said parts of the film were now outdated, namely its lack of diversity.
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“There are things that you would change, but thank God society is changing,” he said. “My film is bound in some moments to feel out of date. The lack of diversity makes me feel uncomfortable and a bit stupid.”
Curtis, whose most recent directorial effort was 2013’s About Time, added that he wished he’d made a documentary about human love, whilst wishing his film was “better”.
“There is such extraordinary love that goes on every minute in so many ways all around the world,” he said. “[It] makes me wish my film was better; it makes me wish [that] I'd made a documentary just to kind of observe it.”
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Curtis appeared on the special alongside stars Hugh Grant, Emma Thompson and Bill Nighy, with the former saying his famous Downing Street dance was the most “excruciating scene ever committed to celluloid.”
“I think I saw it in the script and thought 'I'll hate doing that'” said Grant. “No Englishman can dance when they're sober at 8am in the morning. And to this day, you know, there's many people, and I agree with them, and we think it's the most excruciating scene ever committed to celluloid,” he continued.
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Reporter, Digital Spy George is a freelance writer who specialises in Movies and TV. After graduating with a degree in Film Studies and Journalism from De Montfort University, in which he analysed the early works of Richard Linklater for his dissertation, he wrote for several websites for GRV Media. His film tastes vary from blockbusters like Mission: Impossible and John Wick to international directors such as Paolo Sorrentino and Hirokazu Kore-eda, and has attended both the London and Berlin film festivals.
