I Would Literally Set Myself On Fire To Simply Touch Hugh Grant’s Hair In ‘Notting Hill’

Nineties-era Hugh Grant was an interesting batch of highly specific, yet widely marketable soup. There were some strong flavours involved in the simmering leading-man mixture of rom-com slop: the charming British babble, the pained yet earnest forehead crease, the billowing linen shirts. But by far the crowning glory, the piece de la resistance of the entire soup recipe is his floppy mop of irresistible hair in Notting Hill.

Roll my broken body into a shallow grave and let me wait for sweet death, because that hair was the most beguiling thatch on the screen in 1999. Can’t even stand it.

Hugh Grant’s hair is often considered to be like a distant superpower nation, gathering power and resources quietly and with intent.

Before 1999, we’d seen hints of the sheer heft and glossiness that we would one day see, but never yet at its full power.

Remember Four Weddings and a Funeral in 1994? The hair then was like a budding flower — but it had not yet bloomed.

By 1999, our Hugh and his burgeoning hair had traversed through several projects — Sense and Sensibility, Nine Months, and The Englishman Who Went Up A Hill And Came Down A Mountain, An Awfully Big Adventure and other excessively British titles. I have no evidence, but I believe every single one of these films has a line in the script which says:

[Repressively]

“Good evening.”

In all of these, we see the hair shift towards its ultimate form — in Nine Months it parts too severely, in Sense And Sensibility it flops at an awkward angle — in An Awfully Big Adventure he wears a monocle, so who fucking cares?

But in Notting Hill… his hair achieves its ultimate form.

Notting Hill? More Like Nutting Hill

In Notting Hill, Hugh Grant plays a casually delicious travel bookstore owner named William, who has a wildly serendipitous relationship with Julia Roberts, the most beautiful and famous woman in the world, playing another sort of version of herself, named Anna, who is the most famous and beautiful woman in the world.

Things happen, romance occurs, it’s a literally perfect movie, and one of director Richard Curtis’s masterpieces.

It’s often referred to as peak British rom-com, and helped create the mega success, for better or worse, of films like Love, Actually or Paddington 2.

Hugh is a bumbling delight, while Julia Roberts herself is a huge smile walking around on long talented legs.

But let’s focus on the hair.

“I Touched A Boy’s Hair”

There is an episode of Gilmore Girls in which Lane Kim, the patron saint of horny adolescent girls everywhere, finds herself so overcome at the sight of a boy’s hair, that she just reaches down and runs her hair through it.

It’s a perfect scene, because she is crushing hard on this boy, but doesn’t particularly know him, or talk to him. The hair touching is unwarranted. She is swept away by that gorgeous tumble of unrestrained locks, during a perfectly ordinary band meeting. After realising what she’s done, she flees in embarrassment and despair.

This is how I felt upon seeing Hugh Grant’s hair in the cinema in 1999.

My theory is that apart from the sheer perfection of his hair — the heft of volume, the casual sweep of the flop, the cascade of fringe — at that young age, it was also the safest thing for me to obsess over. In my later years, I could (and occasionally have) spent time thirsting for all the regular sexy things: the boob, the butt, the peen, the thigh, a well-turned elbow.

But at that age, my closeted, tiny little brain, could only express my deep physical longing for 1999 heartthrob rom-com era Hugh Grant via an obsession with his hair.

I had many nights where I dreamt I was falling off of tall buildings, only to be caught and absorbed in the buoyant mess of his perfectly parted hair, where I would be sliding down long smooth auburn slides, which would later reveal themselves to be locks of late nineties Hugh hair. I would wake up, dishevelled, panting, confused.

I forced my mother to take me to the hairdressers, with a photo of Hugh Grant in Notting Hill as inspiration for my new do. For no fault of the hairdresser, I came out looking more like an animated ferret that was imitating Leonardo DiCaprio in Titanic. So it goes!

Also, in one scene he wears his hair with GLASSES, and it’s so hot that now I’m permanently attracted to NERDS. Thanks for nothing!

Whoopsie Daisy

In a movie which showcases the peak era of peak Hugh Grant, let’s look at the best scenes which helped exemplify the special mop. The cream of the cream of hair-town, as one might say.

The Scene In Which They Break And Enter

In this scene, Hugh’s hair tries to climb up an ivy-wreathed fence, only to continually fall and mutter “whoopsy daisy”, much to Julia Roberts American delight.

Score: 8/10

The hair is extremely bouncy in this scene.

The Scene In Which They Meet

Hugh and his hair are quite butch in this scene, after confronting Bernard Black about the book in his trousers.

Score: 7/10

Great centre part, great contrast of the hair’s deep doe-eye brown with the blue shirt — however points redacted because the flamboyance of the hair makes his attempt to be firm about shoplifting less convincing.

The Scene In Which She Is Just A Girl, Standing In Front Of A Boy

Such an iconic scene, needs a truly iconic hair.

Score: 9/10

His hair is so perfect in this scene that you BELIEVE a wealthy, successful Hollywood actress would prostrate her heart to this poor buffoon. Powerful hair!

The Scene In Which The Readers Of ‘Horse and Hound’ Will Be Delighted

The final scene, in which our handsome idiot rushes through traffic to profess his love through the romantic lens of a press junket. So perfect! Plus, this scene taught me everything I know about journalism.

Score: 10/10

His hair is so romantic! It’s mildly tousled from his rush to get to the hotel, from the tiny car, from his big run. It looks like chocolate milk frozen by a wintery sorceress. It looks like a renaissance painting of a bear rug come to life. It looks like the pubes of Jesus. It’s perfect.

And this is why if I could travel back in time, instead of strangling to death the Baby Hitler with my long hands, I would simply appear on the set of Notting Hill, run my hands through Hugh’s perfect hair, and then disappear into the ether.

---

Patrick Lenton is the Entertainment Editor at Junkee. He tweets @patricklenton.

---

All this week, Junkee is heading back in time to relive the greatest moments in pop culture from 1999. For more 1999 content, head here.