The Airport (Motif)
A now-famous airport scene opens the romantic comedy Love Actually. We see people reuniting after being separated, as a voiceover narrator tells us that the airport is a place where love can be seen most plainly. The airport recurs throughout the film at a few moments, always representing the ways that the characters are coming together in different ways, the ways that love is ubiquitous. At the end of the film, we see the characters all reconnecting, all of them in different kinds of connections to one another.
Love (Motif)
The thematic thread holding the entire story together is love in all its forms. Some of the characters are experiencing unrequited love, some are just falling in love for the first time, some are realizing that platonic love is important to them, and others are tied to more obligatory love that holds them back. Love is present in every single story in the film, and is perhaps the most important motif in the course of the story.
The Necklace (Symbol)
Whilst Love Actually is famously a romantic comedy, the more tragic storyline featuring Karen and Harry is realized through one symbol: the golden, heart shaped necklace. It first appears in a comical scene with Rufus the jeweler, in which he spends an extended period of time packaging it in gift wrap. In reality, it represents something darker: Harry’s infidelity to his loyal wife. It is through this necklace, which Karen finds but does not receive for Christmas, that she realizes his affair, and their marriage breaks down.
Language (Motif)
Jamie cannot truly express his feelings to Aurelia due to the language barrier between them; she does not speak English and he does not speak Portuguese. Throughout the film, we see them trying to communicate and failing, but they still share a feeling of love for one another. Indeed, even the characters who speak the same language often speak in ways that confuse their relationships rather than clarify them; Natalie and David often say the wrong thing to one another and cannot adequately articulate their admiration. Thus, language is a motif in the film that highlights the ways individuals struggle to connect and understand one another.
Joni Mitchell's "Both Sides Now" (Symbol)
At one point, Karen tells Harry that she loves Joni Mitchell, and that Mitchell's music "taught [his] cold English wife how to feel." In this moment, Joni Mitchell's music symbolizes Karen's emotional intelligence. Later, when Karen expects she is receiving a necklace and actually receives a Joni Mitchell CD from her husband, she excuses herself from the room and listens to the CD in her bedroom. The song that plays is one of Joni Mitchell's early songs "Both Sides Now," but the recording is of Mitchell singing it as an older woman. The song, in this moment, represents Karen's disappointment, as well as the fact that she feels edged out of her husband's affection by her age.
