Just in time for Valentine’s Day, Love Hurts has everything you need for a great Rom-Com. Great chemistry between the leads, witty dialogue and dollops of romance. Oh, and what would a romantic comedy be without a generous helping of violent fight scenes? What more could you ask for?
Well, it would seem a lot would ask for more as I have already seen some considerably bad reviews online for the film. This is just further proof that the world is full of miserable bastards. It seems most of the complaints are levied at what the film isn’t rather than looking at what it is, an enjoyably fun action comedy that never overstays its welcome.
Turning his back on his former life as an assassin, Marvin Gables (Ke Huy Quan) has built himself a tranquil life as a successful real estate agent. Everything is going great for him, with his boss and best friend Cliff (Sean Astin) even presenting him with an award for all his hard work. His perfect life however is about to come crashing down around him with the reappearance of Rose (Ariana DeBose), a young lawyer Marvin was meant to have killed on the order of his brother Knuckles (Daniel Wu).
Due to being in love with her, Marvin was unable to finish the job. Instead Rose went into hiding and Marvin left his life of violence behind. Flash forward and Marvin receives a letter from Rose. Without having much time to react he is quickly confronted by an assortment of assassins, all of whom know that Rose is alive and seem to think Marvin knows of her whereabouts. With him and Rose eventually re-uniting, Marvin is forced to confront his past, a confrontation that will bring him face to face with his brother.
Now the idea of an assassin in hiding isn’t exactly new. It’s a genre trope that’s been carted out for decades. Love Hurts is never going to win any awards for originality. But I appreciated that it wasn’t trying to. The film never alludes to be anything more than a simple action comedy, with it being a fast paced and undemanding watch.
While this may be Jonathan Eusebio’s directorial debut, being an 87North Production your pretty much guaranteed that the action will be of a high quality. Whilst Love Hurts is certainly smaller scale than the likes of the John Wick movies or Bullet Train (2022), there are more than enough quality fight scenes peppered throughout the runtime to keep action fans happy.
The action has a strong Hong Kong movie flavor, with fight choreographer Can Aydin’s fight scenes being heavily reminiscent of the works of Jackie Chan or Yuen Kwai. Similar to Chan and Yuen’s fight scenes, there’s a nice mixture of hard hits and comedy, with Quan using whatever is at hand as a weapon. One memorable sequence even has him use two cookie cutters against his opponents.
To some there may be too much comedy injected into the action, as much of Love Hurts has its tongue firmly in its cheek, but even so, the fight scenes still hold your attention. This is down to Eusebio making you care about the films characters, no matter how ridiculous events appear.
I did notice some critics online suggesting that Eusebio was copying the style of Edgar Wright, focusing on his movie Scott Pilgrim, overlooking the fact that Wright himself was inspired by countless action films from the 80s and 90s. As stylish a director Wright is, he didn’t invent the genre and it is a disservice to the hard work put into a film like Love Hurts to suggest it is merely a cut and paste job. Sure, it may not be original, but show me an action film that is these days.
While Eusebio may lack the visual finesse of someone like Wright, he still keeps things moving along at a decent pace, with the film clocking in at under 90 minutes. The voice overs incorporated during the film are clearly only there for expository purposes, with their inclusion making some of the script’s shortcomings too apparent. However, the quality of the performers help paper over such drawbacks. Also, as much as the voice overs seemed like an unnecessary addition, allowing the audience to hear the internal thoughts of multiple characters did give Love Hurts something of a Wong Kar-Wai vibe.
With his Oscar win for Everything Everywhere All At Once (2022) behind him, I’m surprised it has taken this long for Ke Huy Quan to have his own starring vehicle. Rather than going for something with a bit more prestige, it’s heartwarming to see that he is willing to star in more genre fare. The role of Marvin is tailor made for Quan’s personality, that is until it is not with his character showing off his darker side towards the latter stages of the film. He doesn’t exactly turn into Hannibal Lecter, but Marvin does become more brutal, especially during the finale where he shows no compunction in repeatedly stabbing his opponents.
As expected, Quan handles the comedy and action with aplomb, with him getting multiple opportunities to show off his martial arts skills. The only drawback for me was the romance aspect of his character. While he and co-star Ariana DeBose definitely have chemistry, I thought more could have been made with their relationship. It seems very chaste for what is an R rated actioner.
Speaking of DeBose, she certainly fares better here than she did in last year’s Kraven: The Hunter (2024). Rather than being forced into the sidelines, she actually plays an integral part, with her character being central to the plot. In comparison to Quan, DeBose doesn’t get as much to do in terms of action, but the small bits she is involved with are handled well.
Marvin and Rose isn’t the only romance that Love Hurts focuses on. A good amount of screen time is given to the budding relationship between Marvin’s fellow assassin Raven (Mustafa Shakir) and Ashley (Lio Tipton), Marvin’s assistant. Some may think their characters detract too much from the main plot, but I personally appreciated this enjoyable diversion. Shakir’s character is particularly fun, with his towering height and deadly skills hiding his real motivations, mainly a love for poetry which is uncovered by Tipton’s Ashley.
Typically cast in supporting roles, Shakir always manages to impress. Although Raven isn’t the lead, the amount of screen time Shakir is given allows him to make more of an impression. I could certainly see this leading to more action-centric roles for Shakir. Well that is if the film didn’t die on its arse at the box office. However, Love Hurts is definitely the type of film I could see building an audience on streaming.
Adding more comedy into the mix is the inclusion of the likes of Rhys Darby, Marshawn Lynch and André Eriksen who all inject a lot of personality into their smaller roles. Then there’s Quan’s fellow Goonie Sean Astin, showing up here as Marvin’s boss and friend Cliff. His screen time is short but he gets one of the film’s best scenes, where he and Daniel Wu’s Knuckles meet for the first time. Playing like a lesser take on the Christopher Walken and Dennis Hopper scene from True Romance (1993), both Astin and Wu play off each other exceptionally well.
Speaking of Daniel Wu, any martial arts film fan will be happy to see him make an appearance, even if they may be disappointed that he doesn’t get more of an opportunity to show off his skills. In total he only gets one fight scene in the film, although it is an especially good one. For the most part Wu just acts menacingly and drinks Boba Tea. There is some noticeable ADR used in his performance which indicates certain lines were changed in post. Even so, Wu is still as likeable and charismatic as ever, even when playing a character as despicable as Knuckles.
Clearly I enjoyed Love Hurts a lot more than others. I recognize that the film has its issues, but even with these it still managed to be a fun time. Obviously it’s not destined to become an action classic, but those who grew up in the 80’s and 90’s and grew accustomed to the medium budgeted star vehicles of the time such as The Perfect Weapon (1991) and Excessive Force (1993) will find a lot to enjoy in Love Hurts lo-fi pleasures.
If anything, Love Hurts also makes one ask the question of how come so many of Hollywood’s action movies cost over $100 million dollars. Love Hurts may be smaller scale than others, but the fact the filmmakers were able to turn this out for a reported $18 million just shows how overblown much of Hollywood’s output has become.
Plot: 3/5
Acting: 4/5
Action: 3.5/5
Overall: 3.5/5
