Certain members of the media services team decided to watch A Very English Scandal recently, having enjoyed Hugh Grant’s villainous turn in Paddington 2. Interestingly, Paddington is played by Ben Whishaw. This reunion of the two actors, as many have remarked, is…uh…a little different.
We all love Ben Whishaw. He’s perfect. He’s perfect in Perfume (HU DVD 3823), in Skyfall (HU DVD 5001), and in The Lobster (HU DVD 13642). Oh, and in Paddington (HU DVD 12216). He was less perfect, possibly, in Cloud Atlas (HU DVD 9072) which was just not a good movie.
But Hugh Grant, who I have loathed since the abomination that is Love, Actually (HU DVD 3510), is actually kind of awesome these days. Hugh Grant the befuddled punchline has become Hugh Grant the master of weaponizing his own loathsomeness. It’s not that he didn’t play sleazy men before. He’s a sleazeball in Bridget Jones’s Diary (HU DVD 8606). It’s some new character of age and reflection that makes, for example, the first “Bunny” scene in A Very English Scandal so distressing and yet funny. It’s like you can see him enjoying it.
As such, I’m inclined to study him further in, for example, Sense and Sensibility (HU DVD 6003), Four Weddings and a Funeral (HU DVD 6282), and Florence Foster Jenkins (HU DVD 13752). I’d love to see The Remains of the Day (HU DVD 6274), which I just found out he was in, but I keep putting off reading the book.
Any guilty Hugh Grant favorites?
Vomit. This movie is absolute vomit.