Love Hurts
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A real estate agent finds himself reunited with a woman from his past as an assassin in Love Hurts. Marvin Gable (Ke Huy Quan) is a dedicated realtor in the Milwaukee suburbs. Entering his office on Valentine’s Day, Marvin is handed a crimson envelope by his assistant Ashley (Lio Tipton) and finds a knife-wielding assassin named The Raven (Mustafa Shakir).
Marvin was once an assassin working for his crime lord brother Knuckles (Daniel Wu), who discovered that Marvin had spared the life of Rose Carlisle (Ariana DeBose). Rose has emerged from hiding and wants Marvin’s help to get her life back. However, the two will have to deal with both The Raven and a pair of thugs sent by Knuckles’ second-in-command Renny Merlo (Cam Gigandet), who has his reasons to want both Marvin and Rose dead.
Love Hurts Synopsis
Love Hurts is an action-comedy and the feature directorial debut from stunt coordinator turned filmmaker Jonathan Eusebio. Co-produced by David Leitch (John Wick, Bullet Train, The Fall Guy), Love Hurts is the first major leading role from Oscar winner Ke Huy Quan (Everything Everywhere All at Once), who gets to show off his impressive martial arts skills as the assassin-turned-realtor Marvin Gable. Fellow Oscar-winner Ariana DeBose (West Side Story, Argylle) co-stars as Rose Carlisle, who Marvin saved from certain death because he secretly loves her.
Rose is not content with living the rest of her life in hiding, so she suddenly reemerges. This causes complications for Marvin, who is content with his new life selling houses. However, Marvin is forced to bring out his skills as an assassin, if he and Rose ever expect to survive the wrath of Marvin’s brother Knuckles.
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There is a very meta scene early on in Love Hurts, where Ke Huy Quan’s Marvin Gable receives an Employee of the Month award from his boss Cliff Cussick, played by Quan’s The Goonies co-star Sean Astin, who proceeds to tell Marvin how proud he is of him. Indeed, Love Hurts can be viewed as a victory lap in the career comeback of Ke Huy Quan. At 53 years old, the former child actor is back doing what he loves.
Despite how proud we should be of Ke Huy Quan’s career trajectory, his first starring role, after winning the Best Supporting Actor Oscar for Everything Everywhere All At Once, is a generic action-comedy at best. Given the stunt work background of everything involved with the film, including Ke Huy Quan himself, Love Hurts has some exceptionally well-done martial arts fight choreography, showing off Quan’s skills as a second-degree black belt in taekwondo. Many of the action scenes, with their mix of violence and slapstick comedy, are quite reminiscent of Jackie Chan in his prime.
Despite the action, the plot of Love Hurts comes off as painted by numbers and generic. This includes filler subplots, such as Marvin’s assistant Ashley, played by Lio Tipton (Riddle of Fire), falling for Mustafa Shakir’s The Raven over his penchant for writing poetry. The film also wastes an appearance by comedian Rhys Darby (Flight of the Conchords, Relax, I’m from the Future) as exposition-spouting accountant Kippy Betts. While it is still great that Ke Huy Quan is getting lead roles this late in his career, Love Hurts ends up being a lukewarm way to follow up his Oscar win.
Trailer for Love Hurts
