It Ends with Us

by Philip Price

Photo: Sony Pictures

Director: Justin Baldoni 
Starring: Blake Lively, Justin Baldoni & Jenny Slate 
Rated: PG-13 (domestic violence, sexual content & language)
Runtime: 2 hours & 10 minutes 

​I unashamedly love this kind of elevated Hallmark/Lifetime/Airport paperback romance genre, and if we’re being honest, “It Ends With Us” has it all. You get an incredibly charming meet-cute between an entirely fictional neurosurgeon who looks like a Greek God (played by the director whose movie reminds us he is extremely attractive multiple times throughout) and a boho-chic flower shop owner who looks like Blake Lively. This is followed by the “hard to get” act that occurs after the ridiculous coincidence of the girl who happened to come bounding into our heroine’s flower shop (Jenny Slate) because she is so bored and her husband so rich that she finds local businesses in which to gift free labor is also the sister of said neurosurgeon who our heroine hasn’t seen since their initial meeting many months before.

What are the stakes you might ask? You mean besides waiting to see if these two can help one another navigate their past traumas in order to sustain a successful relationship? Well, as the opening scene suggests, Mrs. Reynolds has a few unresolved issues with her now deceased father but we're also given glimpses into her teenage years (Isabela Ferrer doing a spot-on Lively impression) that feature a first foray into love with a character earnestly named Atlas Corrigan (Brandon Sklenar in the present, Alex Neustaedter in the flashbacks). Atlas has a troubled home life, which leads to him being homeless, after which Lively's Lily Bloom (the movie at least uses this name as solid material during the meet-cute) reaches out and shows compassion, both ultimately learning they need one another -just in different ways - at that awkward stage in their lives. Naturally, once Lily has met and fallen in love with neurosurgeon Ryle Kincaid (director Justin Baldoni), she then crosses paths with Atlas for the first time in many years, making way for the conflict of a love triangle before the film delves into what it's about.

As someone who's never read or was even familiar with the type of books Colleen Hoover writes, I went into this not knowing what to expect, but as soon as they showed Lively driving back home to Plethora, Maine, in a classic car during the fall, I knew I was in trouble. Credit to Baldoni (the director and actor) for taking the wild twists of fate in this book, which allows the story to play out in the fashion it does and adds some genuine weight to them. The initial meeting between Lily and Ryle feels both organic while being cute, and that moment when Lily realizes she is seeing Atlas in front of her for the first time in probably 15 years is chilling. I felt it, so I know fans of the book did. The rhythm and pacing of people continuously talking and relationships growing more complex is more complicated than it appears, the gradual reveal of Ryle's character compliments the more significant themes of the film, and Jenny Slate just killin' it gives everything one could want from these types of tropes and take them to another level that reveal a semblance of validity.

God, I'm such a basic bitch.