As the saying goes, “action speaks louder than words,” and in the case of Love Hurts, it has way too many words. Ke Huy Quan seems to be having the time of his life in a big lead role; especially sharing scenes with his fellow Goonie, Sean Astin. Except that he has very little to do aside from being charming and kicking butt, while Ariana DeBose continues her post-Oscar streak of unfortunate roles.
And, yet, butt kicking is extremely few and far between. Director Jonathan Eusebio does what he can when he finally gets to unleash his cast against each other. It’s just a shame that Matthew Murray, Josh Stoddard, and Luke Passmore have cobbled together the limpest screenplay Jackie Chan might have rejected.
Marvin Gable (Quan) wants to sell you a home more than anything in the world. But his past has come back to haunt him when a mark he let go — Rose (Ariana DeBose) — returns. Turns out, she has information that could take down Marvin’s brother “Knuckles” (Daniel Wu), and his empire, so now all of his current baddies — Renny (Cam Gigandet) and King (Marshawn “Beastmode” Lynch) — are sent to bring in Marvin in order to get Rose to turn herself in. But just wouldn’t you know it, Marvin might have some unresolved feelings for Rose and takes things into his own hands to save her and take down his brother, no matter the cost.
If the plot sounds extremely convoluted, you’d be correct. And all this unfolds in what should have been a faster paced 83 minutes. Even cutting out the end credits, that only leaves around 78 minutes, but as Roger Ebert once said, “no good movie is long enough and no bad movie is short enough.” And there are some long stretches that make you wish people would stop talking and start fighting.
Thankfully, when it finally does ramp up, there is some fantastic choreography, cinematography, and editing s. I jokingly called Quan “Jackie Chan-lite” before the movie started, but in every scene he holds his own and if he wants to be his successor, he’s more than welcome. Fights set in an office and a kitchen are showstoppers. And the final showdown seems to be cut down and never winds up being the big finale it should have.
The biggest problem with Love Hurts is that it’s marketed as an action comedy, but it just can’t figure out if it’s also a true comedy, a romance, or a gangster film. I guess Eusebio is trying to have his cake and eat it too. It’s like he’s trying to do all the things in one movie just in case he never gets to make another one. Which shouldn’t be the case. With a better script he could make one helluva spectacle. Here’s hoping that maybe it’ll find an audience in streaming — it’s bound to wind up on Peacock very quickly — because seeing it in a theater only lives up to its title.
