Enough

If you look to your left, you might remember this scene from the hit romantic comedy, Love Actually. It's not your typical romcom/chick flick, as it is one of the few movies to have multiple storylines that converge in the end and do it quite well. Sure it's still overly optimistic and has mad dash's to the airport which is typical of romantic comedies since time in memorial. However there is a hint of tragedy lying there somewhere and the airport scene is done in a manner that would be considered borderline satire. It's an amazing little movie with a great cast (Alan Rickman, Bill Nighy and Rowan Atkinson, what's not to like?) and is only one Hugh Laurie and John Cleese away from total awesomeness if not godhood.

The scene depicted is perhaps one of the most memorable awwww-inspiring moments. Bloggers and bloggerettes have cited that scene a bajillion times which is somewhat strange because it pales in comparison to the wedding scene, which you'll have to watch as descbring it does it no justice. (Also, let's see you pull that off in your wedding). Now, if you haven't seen it, or plan on actually seeing it, it would probably be best you stop reading now. As the next paragraph might contain spoilers and overly mushy bullcrap.

Now, I mentioned the word tragedy and if you've seen the flick you're thinking to yourself, "how did that happen? Everyone in the goddamn movie found love even that douchebag pervert Colin!" (actually no they didn't). My sister had warned me that watching this would be depressing. And to be quite honest, it is, but not in the manner in which she thought it would be. Being single for nearly 3 years isn't the reason why the movie's ending can depress a man like myself. That scene, and many others however, is the black cloud, so to speak. What you missed here is what comes after, sure Keira Knightley's character went and gave him a kiss, the asshole is trying steal the girl from his best friend, but hey let's forgive him he just went in there WITHOUT HOPE OR AGENDA and told her the truth! No the truth did not set him free! It was the last word in that entire scene that freed the man, and it's a word that a lot of us struggle to use, for whatever motherfucking reasons we delude ourselve to believing. You know that word is?

ENOUGH.

Yes, that word. Wherein we finally admit that this was crazy, this feelings are wrong and Love Actually isn't all around because it missed by a motherfucking mile here. Yes I'm angry right now, not only because I can relate to it but also because it oh so fucking brilliant! Brilliant that one could hide behind the phrase "WITHOUT HOPE OR AGENDA" tell the truth, say Merry Fucking Christmas and go on with life. But guess what? It doesn't work that way. Even as much as we want to say that we simply came in and told the truth, not hoping for anything, not tyring to meet an end goal other than bearing your heart out, the aftermath is still there, and unlike a movie that can write it out and skip it, we still have to go through it.

Despite this rage-filled comment, I still like the movie. Despite the shallowness, the ridiculous optimism and feel-good-ish vibe, the story works. It's a bunch of love stories trying to prove to us that love is all around, regardless of what kind of love that is, what age, what nationalty and whether or not it works out in the end. Most people only see the sap and the mushiness, but I think there hasn't been a movie that can cover so many spectrums of love, the good and the bad while still making you smile in the end.

[Photo above taken from http://www.robertopereztoledo.com]