Love Actually

Wednesday

Matt Purple

I’m dreaming of a ‘problematic’ Christmas

A new edict has just been handed down by our woke betters. According to an article at the Huffington Post, it is now forbidden to use the (distinctly holiday) phrase "let's work off ___," as in "let's go to the gym and work off those seventeen snickerdoodles and entire burlap sack of peppermint bark we ate yesterday." Per HuffPo, such fat-shaming, "while surely intended as a lighthearted joke, is seriously problematic, according to experts." It's the "according to experts" that always slays me there. And while I don't want to pit the authorities against each other, the doctors I've talked to have all warned that one consequence of engorging on sweets is that eventually you do turn into a lardass.

Friday

Alexander Larman

The problem with Christmas movies

The first time I saw Love, Actually was upon its release in 2003. I thought it was generally fine, with good and bad bits jostling alongside one another, and scene-stealing performances by Bill Nighy and Emma Thompson going a long way to counteracting the dreadfulness of some of the supporting cast and general Richard Curtis-ness of it all. But what I was unprepared for was that it would go from being a reasonably enjoyable portmanteau rom-com into a film that epitomizes "the contemporary spirit of Christmas," or some such rubbish. Every year, it becomes ever more ubiquitous, whether on streaming platforms, television or even in theater re-releases. And every year, something inside me dies a little harder.