‘If you look for it . . . love actually is all around’
The secret airport footage that opens Love Actually actually makes me tear up
In this series, our writers own up to the entertainment that never fails to bring a tear, or a torrent of them, to their eyes.
When it comes to feeling better about the planet, Hugh Grant (when he’s posing as a fictional British Prime Minister) and I have something in common.
Whenever he’s feeling bummed about the world, he tells audiences in the opening scene of Richard Curtis’ Christmasy rom-com Love Actually (2003), he thinks about the reunions that happen at airport arrivals.
“General opinion is starting to make out that we live in a world of hatred and greed,” he says, speaking over a reel that includes footage of a woman walking through a crowd to a man who pulls her in towards her, smiling kids excitedly jumping into a woman’s open arms and two older women hugging.
“But I don’t see that,” he continues over the montage of gleeful encounters. “It seems to me that love is everywhere.” Something in my eye, one sec. OK, so of course I understand that gushy airport meetups are in no way representative of the state of the world’s current affairs — but at times when scrolling through news on Twitter starts feeling like diving into a raging garbage fire, it can be wonderful to remember that moments like these do actually happen all the time. Like, there are probably people kissing at Pearson airport 24/7/365. And while that doesn’t change much in the big scheme of all the world’s problems, it’s still pretty great.
I move a lot and always have. I have to dial a long distance code to reach most of my closest friends, and it’s rare if more than two of my immediate family members are ever in the time zone. I’m familiar with being on one side of the arrivals doors, or the other — so, this one probably hits home a little extra for me.
Every time I watch the Love Actually intro, I start splicing the footage with my own airport reunions in my head.
I remember picking up my sweaty but smiling parents in Zanzibar after
There are probably people kissing at Pearson airport 24/7/365. And while that doesn’t change much in the big scheme of all the world’s problems, it’s still pretty great
they walked off the final of the six (yes, somehow six) planes they took to visit me at my home there in Stone Town. My Dad got so excited when he saw me wave that he tried — and failed — to run through security for a hug before clearing customs.
I think about the time when the distance part of a long distance relationship disappeared — a stupidly early morning after a red-eye flight to Pearson.
And the trip when I met some of my best friends at Schiphol in Amsterdam — the Netherlands being the halfway point between the places we were all living at the time, and the country where most of us met. I felt super sick that day but was thrilled to be in the same city as them, even if just for a bit.
To my knowledge, the montages that open and close Love Actually —a film that more than a decade later remains a feel-good staple in many people’s collections — are the only parts of it that weren’t scripted.
According to reports, the opening scene was shot by secret cameras at the arrivals gate at London’s Heath- row Airport over a week.
You can see a live version of it whenever you want. Watch it next time you fly or pick someone up — it’s less cheesy without the background music and even more wonderful in real life.
“If you look for it,” Grant says, before the movie launches into a bunch of intertwining love stories (that will probably make you cry several more times).
“I’ve got a sneaky feeling you’ll find that love actually is all around.” Love Actually is streaming on Netflix.