If there’s one unexpectedly prevalent genre of films that has popped up in recent years, it’s the “unassuming mild-mannered, middle-aged man is actually a secret murdering badass” genre. Some of them, a la Keanu Reeve’s John Wick series or Bob Odenkirk’s Nobody are passable character explorations with delightfully bone-crunchy action scenes. Others, like Liam Neeson’s action fare post-Taken or the most recent Indiana Jones film, require a much higher suspension of disbelief.
Love Hurts is a new action comedy from Kelly McCormick and David Leitch, who also produced the aforementioned Nobody. While not as polished as some other recent action movies, Love Hurts is dumb fun in the best of ways that doubles down in its style and silliness.
Assuming the current housing market wasn’t ridiculous and unaffordable for the average consumer, let’s say you wanted to buy a house. Your realtor is a cheerful and charming man who has a cardboard cutout of himself displayed in the living room, baked heart-shaped cookies for you and rode his bike to the showing. Aside from recognizing his face from the countless billboards and bus stop benches around town, you would never really give this man a second glance if you saw him on the street, much less suspect him of being a former hitman.
This is the premise of Love Hurts, which stars comeback kid Ke Huy Quan as the lovably soft spoken Marvin Gable. Marvin loves the quiet, orderly life he has created for himself since trading murder for housing markets. It all comes crashing down around him when he is visited by assassins sent by his crime lord brother Alvin AKA Knuckles (Daniel Wu) who wants to hunt down his former lawyer, Rose (Ariana DeBose). You see, Marvin used to be Knuckles’ top killer and right hand man before he got out of the crime game, the condition of which was to kill Rose for stealing millions of dollars from Knuckles. The only problem is that Marvin is in love with Rose and faked her death, but now she’s tired of playing dead and wants to reclaim her life and the money she stole.
As far as action movies go, while Love Hurts falls squarely in the “turn off your brain and just have fun” category, it’s also not quite the dumbest of the dumb fun movies. While it lacks the gravitas of something like Logan or John Wick or the focus of Sisu or Nobody (I promise this is the last time I’ll mention this movie), the writers and director Jonathan Eusebio lean fully into the silliness and combat.
As expected due to the high standards set by modern action films (and what I suspect is some piggybacking on Quan’s martial arts scenes from Everything Everywhere All At Once) the choreography is snappy, crisp and believable. Eusebio’s previous work as a stuntman really plays its part here, and it felt like special detail was paid to keeping the action focused and easy to follow. The actors and camera utilized the spaces of the sets and moved throughout the world without ever getting nauseatingly shaky or relying on rapid editing to keep the action up to pace. I particularly enjoyed the wacky, ridiculous props and guessing what would become the characters’ next weapons. The fight senes were the high point of the film with some story sprinkled in there to move the characters around between brawls.
On the topic of the story, there barely is one. Not that I was expecting much, but it feels like writers Matthew Murray, Josh Stoddard and Luke Passmore threw a bunch of ideas into a bowl and forgot to take some out. The movie being set on Valentine’s Day feels like the flimsiest justification for the film’s title or for the multiple love stories going on between the punches. There’s just enough logic to keep Marvin chugging along, but only barely.
The characters are also sorely lacking in personality, depth or growth, only provided with the barest minimum details to distinguish them. One assassin is a sad boi poet who likes knives and feathers. Another one is having marital problems and has a vague European accent, and his colleague (for some reason) is Marshawn “Beastmode” Lynch playing triple duty as a comedian, muscle, and marriage counselor. The big bad of the movie is Knuckles, however the mystique and danger associated with him never really materializes, nor does any reason in particular for him to be called “Knuckles.” He throws a couple of punches in the movie, I guess, but he also uses a baseball bat so he easily could have been called “Home Run” or something. At least the other Knuckles in recent movie history wears big, spiky gloves. As good as the action in the film is, the inevitable climactic conflict between the brothers feels neither earned nor satisfying.
As the main couple, Marvin and Rose don’t justify the amount of emotional investment we’re asked to give them. As the lead, Marvin has the most depth of any character in the film. However, that only extends to his secret past and his struggle to maintain his life as a realtor while also keeping Rose safe. As far as Rose goes, all we get from her is that she’s angry that she was betrayed, she wants her life back and she wants Marvin to help her whether he wants to or not.
For supposed love interests in what is allegedly a Valentine’s Day movie (I got a box of promotional, movie-branded candy hearts at the screening I attended), there is zero chemistry between Quan and DeBose. The 20-year age gap between the two is the least of the issues in their relationship, and it never feels like there is any genuine attraction between the two, nor any significant backstory between the pair that would give us reason to care other than when Marvin spared her life. Rose is the ultimate toxic ex who shows up unannounced, upending Marvin’s world and putting him at risk simply to take advantage of his lethal skillset with all the benefit to her and pretty much none for him. She’s barely a friend with no benefits, at least none that they can show us on screen.
This is more a fault of the writing than with the actors, who for the most part deliver as best they can with such limited characters. Quan is quite lovable as Marvin and I genuinely felt distress for him as his carefully constructed peace is ripped away. He switches from warmly greeting his clients to exasperation towards Rose to rage for his brother with a natural ease that is worthy of his star on the Walk of Fame. DeBose does shine in her own right, bringing Rose to life with a deliciously demented sense of self-righteous anger and a devil-may-care attitude. The rest of the cast of criminals including Lynch, André Eriksen and Rhys Darby bring plenty of gleeful quips, jokes and unhinged personality to the bloody brawling, with Darby lending a particularly stand-out performance. Wu and Cam Gigandet are the weakest performers as Knuckles and his top enforcer Renny Merlo. Wu comes across as flat and absent of any real malice, though not for lack of effort, and his performance is okay at best. Gigandet, however, is stiff, stilted and really tries to force a performance that lacks any redeeming quality.
The best performances came from Lio Tipton and Mustafa Shakir who play Marvin’s angsty assistant Ashley and the taciturn poet-assassin Raven, respectively. Ashley’s brash and unapologetic personality is the perfect foil for the Raven, who Shakir plays with a contemplative and brooding mystery. All the chemistry that was missing between Quan and DeBose seems to have been given to Tipton and Shakir instead, and the two of them were the most believable and well-developed characters in the film.
In spite of all these issues, I really enjoyed watching Love Hurts mostly because it’s a film that knows it’s silly and fully leans into that with style. The unexpected camera angles and goofy props make every fight feel fresh and fun. The bright colors and energetic soundtrack lean into the sense of confident coolness that give the film its identity. The Valentine’s Day angle, if anything, is a reminder that it’s not that serious and we should just kick back and have fun on the ride.
Love Hurts reminded me that Valentine’s Day is probably the holiday with the most eclectic collection of films. There are the obvious romantic comedies, but also the slasher horrors like My Bloody Valentine and Heart Eyes, and now also a silly beat-em-up. The movieis far from perfect, suffering from a slapdash story and characters flatter than an unfolded candy gram card. That doesn’t take away from how much fun it is to turn your brain off and watch Ke Huy Quan fight off assassins in a fancy house that he is trying to sell at the same time.
Love Hurts is kind of like the Valentine’s Day candies I used to get in school: it’s mostly sugar with no real nutritional substance, but there was still plenty of heart in it.
Rating: 6.5/10