Review: Love Actually (15)

Writer Richard Curtis is a very funny man: his backlist includes Blackadder and Mr Bean; Notting Hill, Bridget Jones and Four Weddings and a Funeral.

Love Actually is the perfect vehicle for his talents, a sweeping vision of love in its many forms, but full of middle class niceness, endearing English quirks and rosy images of a picture postcard London.

Hugh Grant is back as a bumbling prime minister who falls for tea lady Martine McCutcheon, in one of ten overlapping plots about love.

Others include a writer (Colin Firth) finding a new home and new romance in France, Martin Freeman (The Office) as a porn movie worker, and a splendid innings from Bill Nighy as a has-been rock star knocking out a cheesy rendition of 'Love is All Around' (a Christmas number one?).

Cameo after cameo flickers by as Ant and Dec, Rowan Atkinson and Billy Bob Thornton have their say in this enjoyable Brit flick comedy that's as feelgood as warm toast.

Curtis makes his directorial debut here and while not risking any big surprises, he competently moves things forward with great one liners and memorable scenes (Grant dancing, Firth diving into a lake fully clothed).

With so many sub-plots and an outrageous amount of talent on show from both experienced and fresh actors, some strands sadly get lost along the way, or fail to reach any conclusion.

A gritty and incisive portrayal of modern Britain this ain't, but this flick has all the hallmarks that made Notting Hill such a success.

It's a touch long, and some of it veers towards over-sentimentality, leaving the flintier-hearted viewer to suppress a dry retch, but hey, it's set in the run-up to Christmas and love is all around.

Mono rating: seven out of ten