Ke Huy Quan Fights Hard to Save the Rocky Love Hurts
Something like Love Hurts was probably inevitable for Ke Huy Quan after the actor, fight choreographer and stunt coordinator broke through (again) with Everything Everywhere All At Once. Quan’s work in that film, in which he flexed his emotional muscles as well as his martial arts ones, was more than enough to earn him an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor, and it was only a matter of time before someone decided he should be a leading man in a martial arts comedy of his very own.
So here we are at Love Hurts, a film that casts Quan as a retired hitman pulled back into action by the arrival of an old flame, and the question now is what does Quan, and the filmmaking team around him, do with this moment? How does the child actor turned rising adult star, now in his early 50s, react to this kind of role in this kind of film?
The answer: He attacks it with the same blend of earnestness and raw kinetic intrigue that made his Everything Everywhere character so memorable, but in the case of Love Hurts, that’s not always enough. Though Quan and his supporting cast are often a delight, and the film’s fight scenes are worth strapping in for, this is a movie that makes a choppy mess of its brisk runtime, and wastes a lot of its potential with a molasses-slow, often baffling second act.
Quan takes on the classic action cinema role of Ordinary Guy with a Dark Secret for this one, playing Marvin, a realtor who truly, deeply loves finding the right homes for families. For Marvin, the homes are a symbol of freedom, much like the freedom he himself attained when he broke away from his crime boss brother Knuckles (Daniel Wu) and decided to live a life removed from the violence of his earlier years. Marvin is happy, fulfilled, and genuinely grateful for every day he gets to spend with his freedom from days spent as a hired killer.
Because this is an action movie, though, it’s not long before Marvin’s past comes back to kick him in the face. It seems his old flame, Rose (Ariana DeBose), is back in town, ready to settle some old scores with Knuckles and his crew, and because Marvin was the last person to see her, everything thinks he must be in on it. Marvin’s barely made it through his office door before Knuckles’ enforcers are out to get him, and suddenly the movie’s off, revealing a years-old conspiracy, romantic subplots, and a side of Marvin he’s tried desperately to keep hidden.
We’re on solid footing so far, right? This is all expected-but-fun action stuff, and as the film launches out of the gate director Jonathan Eusebio (a stunt man turned director whose past credits include The Fall Guy and the John Wick franchise) feels in control and ready to deliver smooth, cool fights. In the first third of the film we get two truly wonderful fight scenes, including one in Marvin’s own home that’s as hilarious as it is thrilling, and it feels like we’re in for a hell of a ride. The fight choreography, much of it done by Quan himself, is crisp and graceful, the jokes are landing, it’s all good … right?
Love Hurts never fully derails, thanks to the action and the cast and the general buoyancy of the whole picture, but as it turns into its second act, the film very nearly goes to pieces through what feels like sheer lethargy. The script – credited to Matthew Murray, Josh Stoddard, and Luke Passmore – has a lot of fleshing out to do in just 83 minutes of runtime, and it decides to do most, if not all, of it in the film’s middle third by just about grinding everything to a halt.
Scene after scene passes of characters explaining the film’s lore to each other, including things that, by virtue of their involvement in this whole criminal enterprise, they should mostly know by now. The dramatic tension inherent in what one character does know that others don’t is wasted, information is repeated to make sure the audience is keeping up, and the film’s use of voiceover drifts in and out with no real sense of perspective or context. At one point, the film’s own internal logic goes out the window when we learn that a character who had supposedly vanished in the wake of faking her death was living in an apartment nearby under her regular old name, written right there on her mailbox in the lobby.
Whether this is what actually happened behind the scenes or not, Love Hurts starts to feel like a chopped up movie, its pieces slid around by committee rather than by purposeful storytelling, and the sudden disappearance of the action sequences that so drove the early minutes only highlights the issue.
Even while this is happening, though, the film stays afloat thanks to its cast, led by a nearly effervescent Quan, who reminds us why he won an Oscar just two years ago. Even as the movie drags, even as he’s forced to hit the same emotional beats over and over again as the script tries to drive home self-evident points, he is graceful, vulnerable, and capable of some seriously impressive action acting, which is always harder than it looks. And as good as Quan is, he’s also elevated by the presence of bona fide scene stealers, including Marshawn Lynch, Sean Astin, Rhys Darby, and Mustafa Shakir. Even DeBose, who bears the brunt of the sloppy second act storytelling, is clearly having a good time in this movie.
By the end of the film, Love Hurts feels like it most has its swing back, and that return to form, plus the sheer appeal of the cast, is enough to make it a reasonably pleasant time at the movies. It’s not an outright mess, but it is a partial mess fighting valiantly to be a decent movie, and only squeaking by in that mission. Here’s hoping that Quan gets more roles like this one, because for all his hard work in this film, Love Hurts still feels like it’s nowhere near what he deserves.
Love Hurts is in theaters February 7.
Director: Jonathan Eusebio
Writer: Matthew Murray, Josh Stoddard, and Luke Passmore
Stars: Ke Huy Quan, Ariana DeBose, Daniel Wu, Mustafa Shakir, Sean Astin, and Marshawn Lynch
Release date: Feb. 7, 2025
Matthew Jackson is a pop culture writer and nerd-for-hire who’s been writing about entertainment for more than a decade. His writing about movies, TV, comics, and more regularly appears at SYFY WIRE, Looper, Mental Floss, Decider, BookPage, and other outlets. He lives in Austin, Texas, and when he’s not writing he’s usually counting the days until Christmas.