My favorite Christmas film of all time is the 2003 British movie LOVE ACTUALLY

 LOVE ACTUALLY was written and directed by Richard Curtis, and it features a large ensemble cast of characters whose 10 different stories surprisingly interlink in the end. Not everybody gets a HEA (Happily Ever After), but the tears caused in one scene are followed by howls of laughter or jumps of jubilation from the next.

The cast list is phenomenal :

• Hugh Grant
• Liam Neeson
• Colin Firth
• Laura Linney
• Emma Thompson
• Alan Rickman
• Keira Knightley
• Martine McCutcheon
• Bill Nighy
• Rowan Atkinson and many more faces just now becoming household names.

I don’t want to spoil anything, but here is one scene that makes me over the moon each time. When the PM and his “Copper” sing carols…..

When the movie was first released in the US, it arrived to mixed reviews, but one week later, after opening in the UK, the audience declared it a hit by turning out to see it again and again. The 45 million movie budget turned into a 200 million dollar profit in the first year alone. Now it is a holiday classic and I watch it every year at least once.

But did you know there is a sequel?

In 2017, Richard Curtis wrote a script for the charity event Red Nose Day which reunited several of our favorite characters and picked up their storylines 14 years later.

Red Nose Day Actually premiered in the US on May 25, 2017.

Here is the link to the full 17 minute sequel which still lives on FB through NBC TV as it was recorded live. https://fb.watch/2AsIyFJAWP/

From WIKIPEDIA:

An additional sequence with Laura Linney and Patrick Dempsey was shot after the UK airing, for the US broadcast on NBC on 25 May 2017. It features Linney’s character, Sarah, answering her cell as if it were her brother calling as in the film, only to reveal the caller is Patrick Dempsey, who remarks that he loves the way she always answers her phone and that she is a wonderful wife, thus giving her character a decidedly happy ending.

The US version also includes alternate versions of the two Rowan Atkinson scenes, set in the US.

So that is a small gift from me to you this holiday season. When you go looking for this mini movie sequel on YouTube, most people end up in a rabbit hole of trailers and don’t find the real prize.

Enjoy and Happy Holidays to all, and to all a good night!

Susan Saunders 12/24/20