It Ends With US review: A Hallmark version of domestic violence ill-equipped to deal with the weight of the subject

IT ENDS WITH US

(15) 130mins    

★★☆☆☆

THERE were moments in this adaptation of Colleen Hoover’s novel that I wanted someone to turn into a Hammer Horror psycho.

Or fly off a building.

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Or even wake up from a long dream.

Simply because I couldn’t believe that protagonists in a film about complicated relationships could be this one-dimensional.

Surely these characters can’t be so flat and clichéd?

They MUST have hidden secrets that are just going to burst out any second.

Alas, they did not.

The story is one worthy of making, about a woman whose upbringing with a violent father leads her into the arms of a man who is also abusive.

But she is blinded by love.

Florist Lily Bloom (Blake Lively) lives a near-comical perfect life.

She is beautiful, fashionable, grew up in a huge house and now lives in a stunning brownstone in Boston where she sits on her bed scrapbooking.

She meets Ryle (Justin Baldoni), a womanising neurosurgeon.

The pair then have an excruciatingly tedious cat-and-mouse dating chase, longer than relationships I have had.

As their love, finally, intensifies, so does Ryle’s temper and jealousy.

We get plenty of flashbacks into Lily’s troubled teenage years that involved her first love, a homeless boy called Atlas.

While Ryle is just a show-off prat, it is near impossible to know who Lily is.

She has a wardrobe like Carrie Bradshaw, but doesn’t have her sass or humour.

She owns a successful business, but is simpering and silly rather than clever and ambitious.

Sometimes she’s independent and shuns being in a relationship.

At others she’s bending over backwards to accommodate her boyfriend’s needs.

She is not realistic enough to engage with.

Later in the film, it starts to get a storyline when Lily bumps into an adult version of Atlas (Brandon Sklenar), who is now an entrepreneur running a restaurant in Boston.

A restaurant that Ryle insists on visiting several times.

And where he then gets jealous and demanding of Lily’s attention.

There’s a little bit of humour thrown in with Ryle’s quirky sister, played by Jenny Slate.

This soon feels out of place.

Ryle being written as a good guy gone bad feels dated, making this Hallmark version of domestic violence ill-equipped to deal with the weight of the subject.

THE INSTIGATORS

(15) 101mins

★★★☆☆

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THERE’S something I find very comforting about Matt Damon leading a film.

It’s the movie equivalent of sitting down at my favourite restaurant – I know I’m in safe hands.

And so I relaxed into this mid-budget heist movie about former military man Rory (Damon), who is down on his luck, and career criminal Cobby (Casey Affleck).

The pair have been employed by a gang boss in Boston to steal millions of dollars from the dodgy mayor.

Things do not go quite as planned and soon they are on the run – but not before picking up Donna (Hong Chau), Rory’s PTSD therapist, in a fake-kidnap plot.

Unlike Cobby, Rory is not used to criminality. He’s a little naive, broken and needs the money to pay backdated child support so he can see his son.

He doesn’t want to hurt anyone, takes notes when instructed on the heist and is accused of being “about 60”.

Affleck gives a relaxed, amusing and believable performance, as does Chau, making this easygoing crime caper on Apple TV+ perfectly watchable.

But you probably won’t go for seconds.

BORDERLANDS

(12A) 100mins

★☆☆☆☆

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TURNING popular computer games into film is a well-trodden path for Hollywood.

And when this movie starts with a convoluted tale – narrated by leading lady Cate Blanchett – about various planets and underground vaults that hold treasure, you will soon wish you were behind a console.

Director Eli Roth’s adaptation of the hit game about a looter is desperately unfunny and uninspired, often feeling like it is filmed in a simulator rather than on a movie set.

It is not short of stars and has Blanchett playing bounty hunter Lilith, who is employed by mad billionaire Atlas (Edgar Ramirez) to find his kidnapped daughter Tiny Tina (Ariana Greenblatt).

To do this she has to return to the planet Pandora, which she hates. There, she finds Tina with soldier Roland (Kevin Hart), a talking robot called Claptrap (Jack Black) and a huge psycho called Krom (Olivier Richters).

The motley crew are then joined by Dr Tannis (Jamie Lee Curtis) and spend ages faffing around in tunnels.

Sadly Blanchett cannot cover up this dud that is not even style over substance, as the style is lacking.