What the hell was that?
It’s not just that Love Hurts, the latest “seemingly average dude is secretly a murder maestro” movie, is bad. Oh, it is bad. But it is also not really a movie.
If you got ChatGPT super drunk, this is the loose impression of a movie it may vomit out. It has some parts of a movie. There are actors in it. It had lights and sound. I’m 99% sure I saw it in a theater, unless this was all a fever dream… But at no point in the rambling, incoherent 83 minutes was it even close to anything that could be considered a movie.
See if you agree.
The charming, Ke Huy Quan is Marvin Gable. You only name a character Marvin Gable if you intend to make a joke about Marvin Gaye. It does not. Marvin is a real estate agent who is visited by The Raven (Mustafa Shakir), an assassin who throws feathered darts at people and writes poetry. He does neither particularly well.
The Raven is looking for Rose (Ariana DeBose). Marvin was supposed to have killed her, back when they were both working for “Knuckles” (Daniel Wu). No, this is not a Sonic the Hedgehog crossover. Yes, that would have been better. Marvin didn’t kill Rose because they like each other. Not that you would know from the inverse chemistry between them, but the “script” features a voiceover that tells and never shows.
It is unclear what Marvin’s plan is, other than running back and forth. The vast majority of Love Hurts features people in transit, which is notoriously everyone’s favorite part of a “movie.” Forget plot or action, we just want to see how people commute from one place to another. Marshawn Lynch shows up as a Rosenkrantzian or Guildensternesque hitman. He’s credited as Marshawn “Beastmode” Lynch and then yells “BEASTMODE!” during one scene. Rhys Darby shows up as an accountant with missing front teeth. One of the Property Brothers pops up as a realtor who thinks he knows karate.
Do you see what I’m saying? It’s like random notes written on napkins assembled into a movie. It isn’t quirky or irreverent, it is gibberish. The most defining characteristic of the villain is that he absolutely loves boba tea. It is a repeated plot point. If you squint, you can see how the conceit of an action film set on Valentine’s Day could work. You could have fights set to love ballads and center it around a couple who act like they want to be in the same room together.
This isn’t to disparage Quan or DeBose, both of whom are likeable, talented, and seem utterly baffled as to what they are doing here. Presumably shot in less than 24 hours and edited in less, this feels like a group project due at midnight and turned in at 11:59. Funny, sweet kung fu can work, just ask Jacky Chan. Just don’t make him watch this. Don’t watch this. Nobody watch this. It’s not an actual movie.
Grade = F
Other Critical Voices to Be Considered
Rain Jokinen at Mulling Movies says “the film really doesn’t have much of a plot, and is instead scene after scene of fighting and shootouts, shootouts and fighting. As good as some of these sequences are – director Jonathan Eusebio does his best to place the camera in some unexpected places – it gets very repetitive very quickly, to the point of exhaustion.”
Sherin Nicole at Riotus says “From the set-ups to the cameos, the hilariously bloody set pieces to the pair of bizarre love stories, LOVE HURTS isn’t a good movie, but it’s a good time. A ridiculously over-the-top (both campy and absurd), questionably romantic, bombastically violent, big ole mess that I enjoyed so much.”
Shakyl Lambert at CGMagazine says “Worst of all is Ariana DeBose, who, between this and Kraven the Hunter back-to-back, I’m convinced is in full-on ‘Oscar slump’ territory. While Quan manages to stay afloat due to his ‘aw shucks’ likeability, DeBose spends more time being irritating than intriguing, and the pair’s chemistry is completely inert.”