The Wedding Day
Channel 4

Channel 4 marked the eve of St Valentine’s Day with a documentary that held a scented candle to the rites of modern romance. Yet though it may not have been its intention, The Wedding Day (13 February) was both timid and snide. Like an uncertain guest, it hovered about the conversation, never quite bold enough to strike out for real engagement.
Serena and Jordan were planning extravagant nuptials in the luxurious riverside inn owned by Serena’s mother and stepfather. Stress levels, mostly Serena’s, had peaked. Would the artificial weeping willow have to be dismembered to get through the front door? Oh no, the magician had called in sick! Had Alison remembered the spare petals?

Why had Jordan said everything looked “fine” instead of being effusive and making her feel better? Poor Jordan had a tendency towards what his in-laws-to-be disapprovingly called “frugality”. On one occasion he gestured gloomily at a collection of driftwood table ornaments: “Seven hundred quid they were.”