Opening Sequence Analysis- Love Actually

Love Actually

Love Actually is a romance that follows the lives of eight different couples, dealing with love in their lives in various situations all set during a frantic month before Christmas in London, England. The movie is directed by Richard Curtis and stars Liam Neeson, Hugh Grant, Colin Firth, Keira Knightly and many more.

The movie begins in a setting of a busy airport with people waiting for their loved ones.A soft non-diegetic music is playing in the background which creates a tranquil feeling to the audience. Different types of love is explored through the characters. This shot is a long shot of two people hugging which allows the audience to promptly gain an insight of the affectionate and devoted relationship between the two.

The camera then cuts away a few times to show a variety of different people in equivalent situations, hugging and kissing one other.

From this close up shot, the bright lighting can demonstrate the mood of the character which is happiness. This is also highlighted through the characters big smile. The audience can see that the daughter is hugging her mum, showing family love.


After 20 seconds into the opening sequence title, a man begins to talk about love. He says 'Whenever I get gloomy with the state of the world, I think about the arrivals gate at Heathrow airport'. This clarifies to the audience the genre of the movie which is romance. Filming at Heathrow airport was a very effective location for the movie as it is known to most people and the audience can relate the film much more. Also, the fact that real life people were used show real and true facial expressions which means the characters are represented well as the emotions that are being shown are believable. .In addition to this, the plain, casual clothing adds to the realism of the movie.

After this, the man lists the different types of love:

'Fathers and sons, mothers and daughters, husbands and wives, boyfriends, girlfriends, old friends.'

During this, the camera zooms to blissful faces of girlfriends, boyfriends, friends, mothers and fathers which generates an enigma with curiosity of why these people are so happy and warm in this situation. This links in with the representation of the characters and the stereotypical American lifestyle that is portrayed as being joyful and grateful of those surrounding them.

There is a soft focus set in place while people are hugging. This is used to distort the sight of other people and to focus and bring attention to the situation.

The speaker then says "When the planes hit the twin towers, as far as I know, none of the people on board were messages of hate or revenge, they were all messages of love. If you look for it I've got a sneaky feeling you'll realise that actually love is all around." As the speaker reads out 'love is all around' the words form at the bottom of the screen. All of the words are written in a white font however the word 'is', is in red. The colour red clearly represents love but is also used to highlight the dominant ideology of the film and to signify the importance of love. This makes the audience think about love themselves and the ways they embrace it, watching to see a different perspective.

Link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PMScPVO4rLw&feature=related