{"id":60506,"date":"2025-02-11T18:54:06","date_gmt":"2025-02-11T23:54:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/?p=60506"},"modified":"2025-02-11T18:54:51","modified_gmt":"2025-02-11T23:54:51","slug":"valentines-triple-feature","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/2025\/02\/valentines-triple-feature\/","title":{"rendered":"Valentine\u2019s Triple Feature"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Bob Garver<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 For whatever reason, the studios decided that what America wanted this Valentine\u2019s season wasn\u2019t romantic comedies or sweeping dramas, but violent R-rated fare with varying degrees of love and relationship theming. Frankly, none of these movies are going to be big commercial hits, with \u201cDog Man\u201d still ruling the box office this past weekend and \u201cCaptain America: Brave New World\u201d sure to dominate Valentine\u2019s Day itself. That\u2019s why I\u2019m smooshing these movies all together here because they have a way of canceling each other out. For example, even though the lot includes my favorite film of 2025 so far, it also includes my least favorite. Which brings me to\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cLove Hurts\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n

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            Ke Huy Quan stars as Marvin Gable, a suburban realtor with a dark past. He used to be an enforcer for his crime-boss brother Knuckles (Daniel Wu), but quit when he couldn\u2019t kill loose-end lawyer Rose (Ariana DeBose). He let Rose live on the condition that she disappear and let Knuckles think she was dead, but now she\u2019s tired of hiding. She wants to take Knuckles down for good and she wants Marvin to help her do it. Should Marvin leave his agreeable new life behind? Do he and Rose even have what it takes to defeat Knuckles and his army of henchmen and hitmen?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

            The film is a storytelling mess, with a convoluted storyline about stolen money distracting from Marvin\u2019s key arc. Supporting players, most of them hitmen, try to steal scenes by being quirky, but they\u2019re just annoying time-wasters (although Quan\u2019s \u201cGoonies\u201d co-star Sean Astin has a juicy scene as his best friend). Exposition is dumped in awkward narration. The choppy action scenes are even more awkward. This is a movie that wants to be nothing more than a series of fights, has no idea how to put a story around them, and then doesn\u2019t even get the fights right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Grade: D<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cLove Hurts\u201d is rated R for strong\/bloody violence and language throughout. Its running time is 83 minutes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHeart Eyes\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n

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            \u201cHeart Eyes\u201d stars Olivia Holt and Mason Gooding as a pair of bickering co-workers who, by the law of romantic comedies, are destined to fall in love on Valentine\u2019s Day. Problem is, this is no rom-com, this is a slasher movie with a killer whose fetish is killing loving couples. Our leads run afoul of the killer, even though they\u2019re not really a couple, though they might end up as one through this shared experience\u2026 if they manage to live, of course.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

            The movie has two charismatic leads and some genuinely funny, twisted jokes. But its constant need to subvert cliches becomes predictable after a while (\u201cwhat will ruin the sweet moment this time?\u201d) and it really falls apart toward the end when it starts playing its horror straight. There are some fun ideas in play here, but not enough for me to say that I love this movie.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Grade: C<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHeart Eyes\u201d is rated R for strong violence and gore, language and some sexual content. Its running time is 97 minutes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cCompanion\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n

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            \u201cCompanion\u201d stars Sophie Thatcher as Iris, a woman being taken by her boyfriend Josh (Jack Quaid) to a remote mansion in the woods to meet his friends. She tries to fit in for Josh\u2019s sake, but his friends seem weirdly standoffish. One of them assaults her and an even more brutal act of violence follows. In the aftermath, we learn that the seemingly mild-mannered Josh has been more\u2026 \u201ccontrolling\u201d of Iris than previously thought.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

            The film is an equally funny and sick series of cat-and-mouse games between the two leads. Thatcher, between this and last year\u2019s trapping \u201cHeretic,\u201d can now officially call herself a Scream Queen. But it\u2019s Jack Quaid who steals the movie. This role is going to make it hard for him to get a date for a while. I\u2019m not saying that he isn\u2019t handsome, but there\u2019s an unmistakable brand of inner ugliness in play. See this movie with a date and you\u2019ll both have fun squirming.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Grade: B<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cCompanion\u201d is rated R for strong violence, sexual content, and language throughout. Its running time is 97 minutes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Bob Garver \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 For whatever reason, the studios decided that what America wanted this Valentine\u2019s season wasn\u2019t romantic comedies or sweeping dramas, but violent R-rated fare with varying degrees… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":60509,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[108],"tags":[2976],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60506"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=60506"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60506\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":60510,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60506\/revisions\/60510"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/60509"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=60506"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=60506"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=60506"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}