With Everything Everywhere All at Once, Ke Huy Quan became an Oscar winner. With Love Hurts, he aims to become a movie star. Quan possesses all the qualities to have a career in the vein of Jackie Chan’s. He’s funny, charming, skilled in martial arts… basically, he can do it all. Likewise, Love Hurts is a film that tries to do a lot. It’s an action picture, a revenge thriller, and a romantic comedy all rolled into one. The results are mixed with the film hitting its mark in the action department. The “Love” in Love Hurts never quite pierces our hearts, however.
Quan plays Marvin Gable, a real estate agent who loves his simple suburban life. Marvin has a history of violence, though, leaving behind his old life as an enforcer for his brother (Daniel Wu). The past inevitably comes back to haunt Marvin along with a blast from the past. Ariana DeBose brings a wild card charisma to Rose, who Marvin was supposed to put six feet under. Unwilling to kill the woman he secretly loves, Marvin spared Rose, who’s causing trouble for his brother’s business again. Marvin is forced to come out of retirement, but that doesn’t mean he’s giving up the life he’s built without a fight.
First-time director Jonathan Eusebio comes from a stunt background, having worked on multiple Marvel and John Wick movies, not to mention The Fall Guy. This shines through in the action, which manages to turn a setting as mundane as a kitchen into a gladiator arena. An early sequence throws in everything other than the kitchen sink – although the fridge is tossed. Quan is up to the task, performing almost all of his stunts with the flexibility of Chan and the grace of Chaplin. Whenever the punching resumes, Love Hurts springs to life. It’s the dialogue where the film begins to drag.
The banter interspersed between the action isn’t as amusing as one would hope. While the humor never becomes grating, it can feel out of place amid the hard-R, occasionally mean-spirited violence. The only thing more gratuitous than some of the gore is the voiceover narration, which the screenwriters needlessly shoehorn in. Whatever shortcomings the script has, the cast manages to compensate. There are several fun supporting performances from Rhys Darby, Cam Gigandet, and former running back Marshawn Lynch. One of Quan’s fellow Goonies even shows up, although I won’t spoil who in case you haven’t seen the trailer.
What doesn’t work at all is the love story between Marvin and Rose, the latter of whom feels underdeveloped. Half of the time, you forget this is a Valentine’s movie. While Quan and DeBose are trying, they have no romantic chemistry. That might be because the film doesn’t allow them much time to form a believable connection. Then again, there’s instantaneous chemistry between Lio Tipton as Milton’s assistant and Mustafa Shakir as a hitman with the heart of a poet. Although their spontaneous romance is played for laughs, they’re a far more interesting couple than Marvin and Rose. You almost wish the movie was about them, but that would deprive us of a compelling lead performance from Quan. Even if Love Hurts doesn’t entirely work, Quan elevates it every step of the way. That’s the true sign of a movie star.