General opinion's starting to make out that we live in a world of hatred and greed - but I don't see that - seems to me that love is everywhere.

Igniting laughter, wreaking havoc, breaking hearts, daring commitments, forcing choices, catapulting spirits, forging inroads, creating risks - ecstatic, exciting, unexpected, unwelcome, inconvenient, inexplicable, inelegant, unequalled.

Love actually is all around.

From the new bachelor Prime Minister (HUGH GRANT) instantly falling in love with a refreshingly real member of the staff (MARTINE McCUTCHEON) moments after entering 10 Downing Street...

To a writer (COLIN FIRTH) escaping to the south of France to nurse his re-broken heart who find love in a take...

From a comfortably married woman (EMMA THOMPSON) suspecting that her husband (ALAN RICKMAN) is slipping away...

To a new bride (KEIRA KNIGHTLEY) mistaking the distance of her husband's best griend for something it's not...

From a schoolboy seeking to win the attention of the most unattainable girl in school...

To a widowed stepfather (LIAM NEESON) trying to connect with a son he suddenly barely knows...

From a lovelorn junior manager (LAURA LINNEY) seizing a chance with her long-tended, unspoken office crush...

To an aging 'seen it all, remember very little of it' rock star (BILL NIGHY) jonesing for an end-of-career comeback in his own uncompromising way...

Love, the equal-opportunity mischief-maker, is causing chaos for all.

These London lives and loves collide, mingle and climax on Christmas Eve - again and again and again - with romantic, hilarious and bittersweet consequences for anyone lucky (or unlucky) enough to be under love's spell.