{"id":30597,"date":"2025-02-06T12:26:41","date_gmt":"2025-02-06T20:26:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.cinemastance.com\/?p=30597"},"modified":"2025-02-06T12:26:41","modified_gmt":"2025-02-06T20:26:41","slug":"love-hurts-doesnt-land-a-knockout-punch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/?p=30597","title":{"rendered":"LOVE HURTS Doesn\u2019t Land a Knockout Punch"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Running Time: 83 minutes<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This film from Universal Pictures opens exclusively in\ntheaters on February 7th<\/sup>.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was wonderful to see Ke Huy Quan, who got his start as a\nchild actor in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom<\/em> and The Goonies<\/em>,\nhave a career resurgence as an adult and win the Best Supporting Actor prize\nfor his work in Everything Everywhere All at Once<\/em>. This success has\nearned him a lead role in the action\/comedy Love Hurts<\/em>, which benefits\nfrom his likable persona. Alas, the script itself is not as winning and one\nwishes that the film had been more outrageous and funnier than it ends up\nbeing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Marvin Gable (Ke Huy Quan) is Milwaukee\u2019s friendliest and\nmost upbeat real estate agent, helping match customers with their dream homes.\nOn Valentine\u2019s Day, the lead thinks his biggest problem will be closing a sale\nand dealing with his holiday-hating assistant Ashley (Lio Tipton). However, all\nsorts of individuals and issues from his past suddenly appear out of the\nwoodwork. A figure known as The Raven (Mustafa Shakir) attacks the lead at his\nplace of work, demanding to know the whereabouts of an old associate named Rose\n(Ariana DeBose). More thugs, including Otis (Andre Eriksen), King (Marshawn\nLynch) and Renny Merlo (Cam Gigandet), are more aggressive. It\u2019s revealed that\nMarvin was once a violent killer working for his brother, gangster Alivn\n\u201cKnuckles\u201d Gable (Daniel Wu), until he refused a hit on life of Rose and\ndisappeared from his sibling\u2019s organization.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The running time is brief and the pacing rapid right from\nthe outset. After just a brief montage of Marvin\u2019s happy but somewhat bland\nexistence before the villains and Rose reappear and cause havoc. We are meant\nto believe that the lead is deeply in love with Rose, but other than a quick\nflashback or two later in the film, there\u2019s little in the story to make the\nviewer understand that the pair have a deep bond or romantic chemistry. As\nviewers, we are just asked to accept that he adores her and she may miss him as\nwell.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Characters are introduced in the simplest of terms, bluntly\nfilling in plot details and stating their goals in an overly straightforward\nmanner. A few individuals do come off as quirky, but others are more awkward\nthan engaging. It’s also a very violent picture. The hero is essentially\ntortured and beaten in the first third of the movie, which doesn\u2019t exactly\ninspire laughter at jokes early on. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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And while the actors and crew do their best to add spectacle\nand interest to the confrontations with some unique angles (including shots\nfrom inside appliances), one wishes that the oddness and contrasting elements\nof mob violence and martial arts occurring in suburbia had been emphasized.\nThis script also suffers from a bizarre close. The moral almost seems to be\nthat a once nasty person should just keep on being a cruel individual and not\nseek any kind of redemption or way to better themselves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It isn\u2019t all bad, though. The cast do manage to eke some\nlaughs out of the slim story. The unexpected, budding relationship between\nassistant Ashley and The Raven does earn a few chuckles and serves as a\nhighlight. As events get over-the-top towards the final dustup, the movie\nstarts to build some momentum and goodwill. This includes the use of oversized\ncutlery props during an exaggerated fight. An amusing cameo involving Marvin\u2019s\nreal estate rival (Drew Scott) lands very effectively. In fact, this moment is\nlikely the best gag in the entire picture, because it\u2019s so outrageous that the\ngraphic nature of what is occurring isn\u2019t bothersome.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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It\u2019s great to see Quan on top in Hollywood. He\u2019s an\nendearing presence and still manages to acquit himself well here as a lead.\nThere are some laughs and a few inspired moments of action and mayhem. But\nsadly, the underdeveloped and at times mean-spirited screenplay of Love\nHurts<\/em> prevents the movie from earning the adoration of this\nviewer.  <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Running Time: 83 minutes This film from Universal Pictures opens exclusively in theaters on February 7th. It was wonderful to see Ke Huy Quan, who got his start as a child actor in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom and The Goonies, have a career resurgence as an adult and win the Best Supporting […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":30598,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[216,697,1360,1785,1896,3784,4660,5154,8100,11531,12466,12697,12698,12699,12700,13294,14433,16744,23571],"class_list":["post-30597","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-movie-reviews","tag-216","tag-action","tag-andre-eriksen","tag-ariana-debose","tag-assassin","tag-cam-gigandet","tag-comedy","tag-daniel-wu","tag-gangster","tag-ke-huy-quan","tag-lio-tipton","tag-love-hurts","tag-love-hurts-film-review","tag-love-hurts-movie-review","tag-love-hurts-review","tag-marshawn-lynch","tag-mustafa-shakir","tag-real-estate","tag-universal-pictures"],"blocksy_meta":{"styles_descriptor":{"styles":{"desktop":"","tablet":"","mobile":""},"google_fonts":[],"version":8}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30597","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=30597"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30597\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=30597"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=30597"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cinemastance.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=30597"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}