Love Hurts (2025) Review: Ke Huy Quan’s Charming Performance and Top-Notch Fight Choreography Lead This Otherwise Sluggish Action Comedy

It sure hurts watching the bad guys getting beat up and at one point, being stabbed repeatedly in the chest in Love Hurts. Jonathan Eusebio, previously a stunt coordinator and second-unit director before making his directorial debut knows action like the back of his hand. Visceral action set pieces, to be exact that define David Leitch’s 87North Productions banner, the same film production company that gave us the John Wick film series and others like Atomic Blonde, The Fall Guy and the upcoming From the World of John Wick: Ballerina.

Love Hurts gets off to a promising start as the story introduces us to a bespectacled, always-smiling Marvin Gable (Ke Huy Quan) getting ready for work and having his heart-shaped pink cookies fresh out of the oven for his staff back in the office. He’s running a successful real estate company and we learn that he’s happy and passionate with his job selling brand-new homes to potential buyers. He seems like a mild-mannered guy who is always optimistic until the past catches up with him.

It isn’t long before he receives an envelope with the recognisable notes and the next thing we know, he’s already in deep trouble. The movie gives us the first fight scene and Eusebio doesn’t disappoint with the choreography, camerawork and editing as Marvin faces a trenchcoat-wearing hitman nicknamed The Raven played by Mustafa Shakir. What follows here is the impressive staging that showcases Quan’s excellent agility who moves as swiftly as Jackie Chan during his prime as he fights against Shakir’s The Raven, whose expertise includes knives and darts. And like a good Jackie Chan-style action scene, this one delivers the goods from the acrobatic martial arts moves to the slapstick-comedy mayhem played for laughs.

As if Marvin’s otherwise great day isn’t bad enough, he gradually finds himself facing another hitman except this time, it’s two men — King (Marshawn “Beastmode” Lynch) and Otis (André Eriksen) — are here for the same mission. And that is to kill Marvin. The ensuing fight between Marvin and the two hitmen is thrillingly staged with enough verve. It’s particularly funny to see Marvin trying to save his recently received certificate for being the “Regional Realtor of the Year” throughout the fight scene.

I was nearly convinced Love Hurts is going to be on my list as one of the top action movies of the year and it helps that Quan’s charming lead performance who equally impresses with his physical dexterity steals the show here. Until the second act takes place and the story begins to meander around in circles with one exposition-heavy scenario after another. While there’s nothing wrong with an action comedy to take a breather in favour of developing the story, the problem with Love Hurts lies in the laborious storytelling that grows unnecessarily convoluted for its own good.

Here, Marvin’s life in jeopardy has to do with his past running away from who he really is in the first place. He used to be a fearsome killer working for his brother, Knuckles (Daniel Wu) but ultimately betrays his trust when he refuses to kill Rose (Ariana DeBose), a young woman who has stolen a large sum of money. He has since left his old life behind for a fresh start working as a realtor under the mentorship of Cliff Cussick (Sean Astin, who previously co-starred with Quan when they were just child actors in The Goonies).

Now that Rose has returned, causing more problems than she already was back then and leaving Marvin with no choice but to face the music. The plot even thickens as Knuckles’ right-hand man, Renny Merlo (Cam Gigandet) has some shady businesses going on while the eventual reunion between Marvin and Rose isn’t exactly a welcoming one.

DeBose looks stunning and being a dancer herself, she proves to be convincing in some of the action sequences but her chemistry with Quan somehow lacks the much-needed sparks. For a movie titled Love Hurts, the attempt at the rom-com angle is largely overshadowed by the more superior action-comedy tropes.

It’s kinda hurt (sorry, I just can’t help re-using the word) to see the otherwise lean 83-minute length feels like it stretches longer than it should, especially given the languid second act. The movie does manage to find its rhythm once the action-packed third act kicks in. It’s far from a great action comedy that it could have been but it’s nice to see Ke Huy Quan getting the much-deserved opportunity to lead a movie.