In the age of Nineties romantic comedies, one film stood out in 1994 and captured the hearts of millions, and even caught the eye of the Academy Awards. But 25 years later, we ask does it still hold up?
Hugh Grant’s Charles leads a group of eligible misfits who attend their friends’ weddings, and he meets Carrie, an American Vogue model that seems to be destined to be the girl of his dreams as they meet up at every wedding, including each other’s. As they travel through their relationship, Charles struggles to get his own life together from battling past girlfriends to flip-flopping his commitments, which seems to be the major theme of the day.Then one of their own, Gareth, a roundly, joyful old soul, collapses at the third titular wedding, triggering the titular funeral and leaving his life partner, Richard, alone.
The fourth wedding is Charles’ and he decides to marry Henrietta, a “duck faced” girlfriend from his past. But his little brother and companion convinced him that he loves Carrie and to call off the wedding. The movie ends with the iconic “Is it raining? I haven’t noticed” and everyone in the group getting married, including Richard.
The movie is definitely enjoyable in the sense of enjoying the little things, like Charles and his friend, Scarlett, always running late to every wedding, yelling “f*ck” all the way. The friends are going out to mingle at the weddings and always wind up empty-handed, especially Charles, traumatized by his past and Carrie moving too fast.
I feel the movie wasted an opportunity to reveal Henrietta in a way that would remain shocking to this day. Though the movie kept dropping hints you didn’t know was happening, I imagine the nameless bride walking down the aisle to Charles. Then, Charles lifts the veil to reveal, gasp, Duck Face. Instead, it’s said in passing only to confirm your suspicion from the name concealed on the invitation. The movie also sparked a trend of romantic comedies to follow in which a person is uncomfortably witnessing sex in action from Charles being stuck in a closet.
The ending was kind of blah. The third wedding is Carrie’s, the fourth is Charles’ and both still wind up available. Then the picture montage showed them having children. I guess it’s called “Four Weddings” but I was hoping Carrie would object to Charles getting married, but noooo. We have to stick to consistency.
I guess the raining quote was iconic at the time in a way “You had me at hello” was iconic, but she really didn’t notice that her face is wet and wondering why is that, or why Charles’ shirt was soaking wet?
So to answer the question, does it still hold up? I think so if you’re nostalgic for Nineties romantic comedies and the uncomfortable positions they show to entertain us, like Charles being stuck at a table with every girl he ever dated.
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Released On: April 15, 1994
Rating: R
Stars: Hugh Grant, Andie MacDowell
Director: Mike Newell
Rotten Tomatoes Score: 95% Certified Fresh
IMDb Score: 7.1/10
Awards
Academy Awards
- Best Picture - Nominated
- Best Original Screenplay - Nominated
Golden Globe Awards
- Best Actor in a Musical or Comedy Hugh Grant - Winner
- Best Musical or Comedy - Nominated
- Best Screenplay - Nominated
- Best Actress in a Musical or Comedy Andie MacDowell - Nominated
- (Click here to view more awards for "Four Weddings and a Funeral")
