Product Details

• Actors: Hugh Grant, Julia Roberts, Richard McCabe, Rhys Ifans, James Dreyfus
• Directors: Roger Michell
• Writers: Richard Curtis
• Producers: Duncan Kenworthy, Eric Fellner, Mary Richards, Richard Curtis, Tim Bevan
• Format: Closed-captioned, Color, Original recording reissued, Special Edition, NTSC
• Language: English, Spanish
• Rated: PG-13 (Parental Guidance Suggested)
• Number of tapes: 1
• Studio: Universal Studios
• VHS Release Date: April 18, 2000
• Run Time: 124 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (413 customer reviews)
• ASIN: 0783241569
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #149,242 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com essential video

They don't really make many romantic comedies like Notting Hill anymore--blissfully romantic, sincerely sweet, and not grounded in any reality whatsoever. Pure fairy tale, and with a huge debt to Roman Holiday, Notting Hill ponders what would happen if a beautiful, world-famous person were to suddenly drop into your life unannounced and promptly fall in love with you. That's the crux of the situation for William Thacker (Hugh Grant), who owns a travel bookshop in London's fashionable Notting Hill district. Hopelessly ordinary (well, as ordinary as you can be when you're Hugh Grant), William is going about his life when renowned movie star Anna Scott (Julia Roberts) walks into his bookstore and into his heart. After another contrived meet-cute involving spilled orange juice, William and Anna share a spontaneous kiss (big suspension of disbelief required here), and soon both are smitten. The question is, of course, can William and Anna reconcile his decidedly commonplace bookseller existence and her lifestyle as a jet-setting, paparazzi-stalked celebrity? (Take a wild guess at the answer.) Smartly scripted by Richard Curtis (Four Weddings and a Funeral) and directed by Roger Michell (Persuasion), Notting Hill is hardly realistic, but as wish fulfillment and a romantic comedy, it's irresistible. True, Roberts doesn't really have to stretch very far to play a big-time actress who makes $15 million per movie, but she's more winning and relaxed than she's been in years, and Grant is sweetly understated as a man blindsided by love. Together, in moments of quiet, they're a charming couple, and you can feel her craving for real love and his awe and amazement at the wonderful person for whom he has fallen. The only blight on the film is its overbearing pop soundtrack, though Elvis Costello's heart-wrenching version of "She" gets poignant exposure. With Rhys Ifans as Grant's scene-stealing, slovenly housemate and Alec Baldwin in a sly, perfectly cast cameo. --Mark Englehart

Amazon.com

They don't really make many romantic comedies like Notting Hill anymore--blissfully romantic, sincerely sweet, and not grounded in any reality whatsoever. Pure fairy tale, and with a huge debt to Roman Holiday, Notting Hill ponders what would happen if a beautiful, world-famous person were to suddenly drop into your life unannounced and promptly fall in love with you. That's the crux of the situation for William Thacker (Hugh Grant), who owns a travel bookshop in London's fashionable Notting Hill district. Hopelessly ordinary (well, as ordinary as you can be when you're Hugh Grant), William is going about his life when renowned movie star Anna Scott (Julia Roberts) walks into his bookstore and into his heart. After another contrived meet-cute involving spilled orange juice, William and Anna share a spontaneous kiss (big suspension of disbelief required here), and soon both are smitten. The question is, of course, can William and Anna reconcile his decidedly commonplace bookseller existence and her lifestyle as a jet-setting, paparazzi-stalked celebrity? (Take a wild guess at the answer.) Smartly scripted by Richard Curtis (Four Weddings and a Funeral) and directed by Roger Michell (Persuasion), Notting Hill is hardly realistic, but as wish fulfillment and a romantic comedy, it's irresistible. True, Roberts doesn't really have to stretch very far to play a big-time actress who makes $15 million per movie, but she's more winning and relaxed than she's been in years, and Grant is sweetly understated as a man blindsided by love. Together, in moments of quiet, they're a charming couple, and you can feel her craving for real love and his awe and amazement at the wonderful person for whom he has fallen. The only blight on the film is its overbearing pop soundtrack, though Elvis Costello's heart-wrenching version of "She" gets poignant exposure. With Rhys Ifans as Grant's scene-stealing, slovenly housemate and Alec Baldwin in a sly, perfectly cast cameo. --Mark Englehart

See all Editorial Reviews

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

100 of 105 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Pleasantly, not what I'd expected!, May 15, 2000

By 

E. D. Garcia "Biggie-E" (San Francisco, CA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Notting Hill (Collector's Edition) (DVD)

Let me just say that I'm not particularly a Julia Roberts fan. So when my wife asked to go see Notting Hill in the theater, I politely declined... but I figured that I'd give her a suprise and buy the DVD for her. Well, I sat and watched it with her, and was pleasantly suprised, myself!

Set in the real-life Notting Hill section of London, this VERY fairy-tale story is filled with moments of true belly-aching laughter, painful heartbreak, and one delightful "car chase."

Julia Roberts portrays Anna Scott, a fifteen-million-dollar per picture movie actress who gets tangled in the trappings of love with William Thacker, a bumbling, but likeable book-shop owner convincingly played by Hugh Grant. Notting Hill wastes no time in setting up this premise and rockets off from there. The film moves along at a good pace and only has one noticible slow spot. The music chosen to accompany the film is beyond perfect. Watch the screen closely when you hear "Ain't No Sunshine" by Bill Withers.

I would be remiss if I did not mention "Spike". Rhys Ifans plays Spike, William's very odd, very Welsh flat mate. You can't help but laugh every time he's on the screen. Luckily, the director and editor didn't over-do Spike's antics, so we can truly enjoy the moments when he's on.

The Collector's Edition goodies make the DVD a true gem and a great bargain. The musical highlights let you quickly jump into the middle of the movie to enjoy a song while watching the movie roll. (After you've watched the movie, go find "Ain't No Sunshine"!) The deleted scenes give a glimpse of what could have happened in the film. After watching, I'd say that I agree with the director's choice of endings.

This movie proves that romantic comedies can still be done well... and you don't have to have Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan to do it.

47 of 53 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars About a girl, asking a boy to love her., September 6, 2003

By 

Daniel J. Hamlow (Narita, Japan) - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Notting Hill [VHS] (VHS Tape)

Hugh Grant's role as Travel Book Shop employee William Thacker reprises the same shy, humble, lovable, but lonely character with a small group of friends that made him a star in Four Weddings And A Funeral. That may be because Notting Hill, like FW&AF, was written by Richard Curtis. "And so it was another hopeless Wednesday when I walked a thousand yards to work, not suspecting that this was going to be the day my life would be changed forever." In two words, that catalyst is Anna Scott, currently one of Hollywood's biggest stars, who is promoting her latest film Helix, a sci-fi film whose costume design and one interior setting owes a nod to Kubrick's 2001. She happens in his bookshop, but that first meeting sets off a series of meetings where they spend time with each other.

Eccentric barely describes Spike, his Welsh roommate with a shock of wild blond hair. Never have I seen a more comical opposites since Felix and Oscar of the Odd Couple. Spike is clearly the Oscar of the pair, but then again, I doubt if Oscar would have worn a T-shirt saying, "Get It Here", with an arrow pointing downwards, or unwittingly mistake mayonnaise for yogurt.

In the course of meeting Anna, he in turn introduces her to his small group, including a married couple, Max and Belle, the latter in a wheelchair, a stockbroker named Bernie, and William's wild-looking sister Honey, whose bulging eyes and feathery hair makes her nevertheless lovable in a different sort of way.

However, they live in two different worlds. As William puts it, "I live in Notting Hill, you live in Beverly Hills." Both have different schedules, lifestyles, and perspectives on things. Yet his inner smile lights up whenever she pops in and spends some time with him. And applying a metaphor used, Anna is a goddess. "You know what happens to mortals who get involved with the gods?" That's terrible for William, who confides in Spike that it's like "taking love heroin and I couldn't have it again. I've opened Pandora's Box and there's trouble inside."

Anna is a typical box-office draw who has to put up with the tail side of the fame coin. The many boyfriends, the laying out of her private life in the tabloids, but also how she's unable to live an ordinary life and how she has to put up with unkind words, as when she overhears a group of businessmen saying how actresses are equal to prostitutes and that she is the definitive actress. Ouch! But despite the fame, in the end, she's "just a girl asking a boy to love her."

The one pullback aerial shot that has the couple approaching the bench dedicated to a loved one, while Ronan Keating sings Keith Whitley's "When You Say Nothing At All" was a perfect combination of great camera work enhanced by a haunting love song.

Hugh Grant has another winning role and seems to have the knack of starring opposite great female leads and being compatible. Be it Andie McDowell (Four Weddings) or Emma Thompson (Sense And Sensibility), he does himself and Julia Roberts great credit. After seeing this at the theatre when it first came out, I sighed with relief that I finally found the most charming movie with Julia Roberts since Pretty Woman. All the actors portraying Williams' small circle also lend great support, but Rhys Ifan steals the show as the outlandish Spike. Those who liked Four Weddings will definitely go for Notting Hill, which has a tad more sweetness, like apricot and honey.

26 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Charming,lite romantic comedy, July 2, 2000

By 

"techgal" (New Britain, Ct USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Notting Hill (Collector's Edition) (DVD)

I was hesitant to see this film at the theater.I enjoy Hugh Grant but never cared much for Julia Roberts.Well,being a DVD and home theater nut,I decided to check this out..PLEASENTLY SURPRISED! ..First Hugh Grant is just fantastic.In a way,his character can be discribed as the thinking mans Mathew Perry.Actually,their humor derives from similar delivery of lines..This is a delightful tale of the ever so polite,but aloof, British male,winning over the, seen to many shallow male actor movie star..Julia pretty much plays herself,with both touching honesty and charm..Tired of the world that incorporates her hollywood life,on a trip to England she finds herself drawn to Grants simple yet honest and gentle sincerity...Along the way,the typical trials and tribulations that would surely plague such a relationship appear..Yet,this movie demonstrates that regardless of our superficial world around us,something as age-old as love can lead to true inner happiness...A great British supporting cast make up this movie,and the scence stealing Spike is hilarious...Guys,this is not just a chick flick! Give it a shot with that special someone and you both will be the better off for it..!