Rent The Holiday (2006)

Lovely romantic comedy - The Holiday review by CP Customer

I really loved this flm, and so did my husband. It revolves around Iris, a journalist who lives in Surry, and Amanda, who owns a company in LA which makes movie trailers. Both are competent, verging on workaholic, and both have unhappy love lives. Iris's story is all about the unrequited love she has for her colleague, played caddishly by Rufus Sewell and in the same vein as Bridget Jones's Daniel Cleaver. Amanda's partner has cheated on her as she is always working and he feels neglected. They meet on the internet and exchange homes for 2 weeks to get away from their current lives. Amanda promptly meets Iris's brother who seems like a drunken playboy/ladies man at first but all is not as it seems! Iris gets involved in the local community and meets a cute, funny colleague of Amanda's. The beauty of this film is the adorable characters, who you just want nice things to happen to. It's gently funny too and a real feel-good movie.

Simple but nice. - The Holiday review by CP Customer

Very nice British Comedy about two women who decide to go on holiday to forget their ex partners.

The chemistry between the actors is exellent and it it a very entertaining movie.

When Heartbreak Becomes a Property Programme - The Holiday review by griggs

The Holiday is basically a rom-com about rom-coms, with Nancy Meyers turning heartbreak into a property show: beautiful kitchens, soft lighting, and problems that can be solved by a brisk walk and a hot drink. ?

It also can’t stop name-dropping cinema history. Arthur (Eli Wallach) gives Iris a crash course in “leading lady” energy, and the script outright borrows his “meet-cute” example from Bluebeard’s Eighth Wife (Ernst Lubitsch). Iris and Miles even geek out over The Lady Eve (Preston Sturges), while Metropolis (Fritz Lang) pops up on the shelves like a film-nerd wink. And there’s that wonderful old-Hollywood aside where Iris clocks Arthur’s “Louis B. Mayer’s office boy?” origin story (well, via Western Union).

The soundtrack is doing its own tour of duty too: Wham!, Brenda Lee, The Killers, Jet, Frou Frou, Simon & Garfunkel, Al Green, Kylie, Imogen Heap, Aretha, plus film-score gags performed in-scene by Jack Black (yes, Chariots of Fire, Jaws, Raiders March, even the Tara Theme). ?

One last nerd note: the film has Arthur claiming Cary Grant was “from Surrey” — he wasn’t. Grant was born in Bristol which makes that little exchange a proper howler.