Ke Huy Quan’s action movie is painful to watch

You cannot discount on the great amount of good will that Ke Huy Quan generated when All everywhere at once turned him into the official comeback child in 2022. The story read like a true Hollywood success story, though it was Hollywood who sidelined him in the first -deserved Oscar winner. His blend of sunniness and serious screen-fighting chops- Has anyone ever exerted a Fanny package with such grace and deadly force? – made him an ideal allguy action hero. You couldn’t wait to see what KE would do next now that he had a proper limelight to step into.

Had we known that the answer would be Love hurts, We may not have been so anxious or enthusiastic. A stock riff on the Olympic ‘former-murderer-feature-back-in-life scenario, this star vehicle for Quan couldn’t feel more doa, even though the star himself Gamely is trying to inject life into it on every occasion. The mix of pedigree behind the camera, the name-over-titled novelty and the actor’s newly clarified ass-kicking persona should have made this a Surefire mix of tension, waste, humor and chaos. What’s on screen, though, just feels like a lot of poorly choreographed chaos that is masked like an action movie. Fans of the genre might consider suing for false advertising.

Marvin Gables (Quan) is the kind of solid, hard -working citizen that any suburbs would be lucky to count as their neighbor. He couldn’t be happier to sell home in the larger Milwaukee area or proud of his recent victory as the regional real estate agent of the year. His boss (played by colleague Goonie Sean Astin) considers him the model employee, his colleagues consider him a mentor, and his clients love the personal touches he brings, just like the home -baked cookies he sets out when he shows houses. Marvin is the American dream in miniature that was modestly manifested.

Then a Valentine’s Day card arrives. Nothing unusual about it, given that the holidays are just around the corner. But Marvin is instantly spooked. The message inside Freaks him even more out: “I’m back.” The moment he enters his frosted glass office, Marvin is cold. When he wakes up, he discovers a knife that attaches his hand to his desk. An eloquent hit man named “The Raven” (Mustafa Shakir) must deliver a message: go see “Knuckles.” The repeat with the 1930s Puglist’s nickname is a gangster that controls Badger State’s Underworld. He is also Marvin’s brother (Daniel Wu).

For once, Marvin worked for his sibling as an enforcement and had no problem knocking the sketch out and/or putting a bullet in anyone who crossed the boss’s path. (The one controlling rule that everyone repeats ad nauseam in the film, with regard to this criminal empire: “You steal from Knuckles, you die.” Ok!) And Marvin was assigned by his brother to “take care of an employee by Name Rose (Ariana DeBose) who stole from Knuckles. Apart from Marvin was in love with her. So he drives her to a burial ground in the middle of nowhere, and instead of killing her, Marvin lets her go. The reservation is that she can never come back. Which means the message in the Valentine’s Day card is a broken promise that promises broken limbs in the near future of Marvin and another people.

Back to this standoff in Marvin’s office: The best damn real estate agent in the county manages to free himself and go toe to toe with Raven, which is convenient with a knife and some pretty big blades, he also attaches to bracelets. Finally, some fight! However, it takes less than a minute to see the sequence to realize that the close match seems impressive … when you can actually bell what’s going on. It’s an early sign of that Love hurts can be filled with a lot of John Wick-Til stamp, kick, body blasting and rushing sharp objects -so as well as a mild gun fu when with murderers André Ericksen and Marshawn “Beastmode” Lynch appears later -But it doesn’t necessarily mean that the scenes will be choreographed with that kind of creativity, Care and cinematic chutzpah that you associate with the Keanu Reeves franchise.

Which is curious, considering that Ace Stunt Design Collective 87Elteleven, ie. the same company that gave us the wick movies as well as Bob Odekirk-Kicks-ass-thriller No (2021) and a number of other crash-bang-boom genre stands are behind all this. It is also the first director effort from Jonathan Eubenio, whose resumption as stunt and combat coordinator includes several MCU films, The Fall Guy, Matrix Resurrections and both the original and the final John Wick Flicks. These are professionals at work here, and yet the staging of virtually all kinetic showstopper feels randomly. It’s all just noise and infinitely manic, blunt force crashing into things. Combine it with some lazy storytelling, Lincoln tunnel size plot holes and a few gags that fizzle before they even start (see: a rival played by real estate brother Drew Scott, who boasts about his black belt in karate), and instead of staying Bowlet over by first -class elegant violence, you are getting back and wondering: What exactly went wrong here?

Even the half-hearted attempts at quirky, via Raven, are also a poet who works Woos Marvin’s assistant, Ashley (Lio Tipton), has a kind of flop sweat desperation for those who just leave you and feel restless. Quan, surprisingly, saves the day on screen, although he cannot control the Herculean effort to save this poorly executed accident of criminal movie clichés. We really hope someone steps up and gives him a really excellent showcase for his skills one day. Because this is not. Love can hurt, safe. But it’s not almost as painful as being forced to watch a great actor get stuck in a bad movie.