It’s been a while since we’ve seen anything resembling a Jackie Chan movie. That is to say, a movie that brilliantly blended physical comedy with inventive martial arts action. His best movies included "Rush Hour" (1998) and "Rush Hour 2" (2001).
You could say that Jackie created a genre unto himself. He put everything he had up there on the silver screen. His dedication to his craft and his art was legendary. He once said that he had nearly broken every bone in his body over the course of his career, performing his unparalleled fights and stunts.
Jackie’s absence from the screen due to age and injury has left a gap. It may never truly be filled. But that doesn’t stop actors and filmmakers from trying.
The most recent attempt is from Director Jonathan Eusebio and Ke Huy Quan, the child actor who played the sidekick of Indiana Jones in "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom" (1984). He also co-starred more recently in the "Everything Everywhere All at Once" in 2022 where he displayed some dazzling martial arts moves. The combination of those skills and his good guy looks and likeability were clearly what landed him his starring role in "Love Hurts," a Valentine’s Day tale of violence and love.
He plays Marvin Gable, a mild-mannered, boyishly handsome real estate agent with a dark past that creeps up to haunt him and disrupt his life in the opening reel. We soon learn that Marvin is the brother of a brutal crime boss known as “Knuckles” who ruthlessly kills anyone who steals from him, and that includes a beautiful woman named Rose (Ariana DeBose) who Marvin was ordered to kill.
Unbeknownst to his evil brother, Marvin set her free. Unbeknownst to Marvin, Rose has hatched a plan of her own to wreak revenge and steal the money back. When she returns to town and “Knuckles” finds out, all hell breaks loose, triggering a non-stop stream of violence and blood.
The violence is pretty graphic at times. People get their eyes stabbed out. People get shot through the head. Our hero gets stabbed through his hand in the opening scenes.
Marvin faces down a small army of thugs and hired killers who are out to get him. Having been a professional killer himself—a plot point that gets downplayed in the story—he is more than capable of taking care of himself and his would-be girlfriend (who is no stranger to fast cars, stun guns and revolvers).
"Love Hurt"s is all about choreographed fight scenes and occasional graphic gore. It all takes place around Valentine’s Day which is meant to add a touch of romance to the mayhem. Make no mistake, hurt way outweighs love in the story.
Sean Astin plays Marvin’s unsuspecting real estate boss who wears a cowboy hat and considers himself to be Marvin’s rehabilitative, surrogate brother. Movie fans will recall that he and Ke Huy Quan co-starred in "The Goonies" back in 1985 when they were kids.
Rhys Darby plays a hilariously funny sleazebag criminal who threatens to rat out Marvin and Rose to “Knuckles.” Viewers will recognize Rys as the lame manager Murray in the HBO comedy series “Flight of the Concords.”
"Love Hurts" has its moments.
What hurts, from a critical standpoint, is the fact that it never rises to the level of martial arts magic or physical comedy that Jackie Chan was able to achieve in his movies. He set the bar pretty high. As they say in show business, he is a hard act to follow.
It is a movie with the right intentions that lacks the finesse to pull it all off. What it does have, at the center of it all, is Ke Huy Quan who, in the spirit of Jackie Chan, gives it everything he’s got.
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