This book explores how British filmmakers of the 2000s engaged with the themes of love, sex and desire in a wide variety of movies. It ranges from powerful contemporary dramas such as Kidulthood, Closer and Disobedience to the lighter mood of the Bridget Jones series. It also analyses how the lives, loves and traumas of historical figures such as Oscar Wilde, Sylvia Plath and Iris Murdoch were dramatised on film. The book will appeal to literature enthusiasts, film students and readers interested in exploring how we may currently live out our hopes, fears and dreams in relation to sexual matters and affairs of the heart. -- .

'Tears of laughter' examines the interactions of comedy and drama in three vital thematic strands of British cinema during the 1990s: comedies exploring issues of class, culture and community in British society, 'ethnic' comedy-dramas engaging with complex issues of identity and allegiance in modern Britain, and romantic comedies featuring characters searching (somewhat desperately or frantically) for a suitable and desirable long-term or short-term partner. Films to be discussed in detail include 'Brassed Off' (1996), 'The Full Monty' (1997), 'East is East' (1999), 'Four Weddings and a Funeral' (1994), 'Notting Hill' (1999) and a post-1990s romantic comedy, 'Love Actually' (2003). The study discusses these specific films and a range of other 1990s British comedy-drama films within the context of community-orientated Ealing comedy classics, contentious situation comedies treating race relations as both a laughing matter and a site of conflict ('Till Death Us Do Part' and 'Love Thy Neighbour'), and romantic comedies set and produced in Britain. It is aimed at film studies academics, students and film enthusiasts. -- .