Love Hard (2021)

(Netflix Streaming, July 2022) While I can complain at length about Netflix’s turn away from licensed content toward many less-than-impressive “original” productions, the one thing that I do like about this new direction is the way it seems to be single-handedly keeping up the mid-budget romantic comedy. This once-staple of Hollywood circa 1990s–2000s did not thrive well in the era of multiplex spectacle and that’s too bad—despite a strong formula, romantic comedies offer likable entertainment value, fun turns for young actors, and sometimes even witty scripts. New romantic comedies have retreated even further into the realm of the comforting formula on Hallmark and Lifetime channels (often Christmas-themed), leaving an opening for slightly-more-complex material. It’s useless to pretend that Love Hard is ambitious filmmaking—after all, it takes place around Christmas, features an urban heroine travelling to a small town, and its resolution is never, ever in doubt. But compared to Hallmark Christmas romances… yes, it tries something more. It proposes as a romantic lead the unconventional Jimmy O. Yang, proposes a far more conventionally attractive man as a rival, goes fishing back to Cyrano de Bergerac for inspiration, and goes on tangents that aren’t to be found in the more efficiently straightforward made-for-TV equivalents. While there’s nothing radically new here, the film occasionally scores a few highlights, whether it’s a pro-consent take on “Baby, it’s cold outside,” discussions comparing Love Actually with Die Hard as exemplary Christmas films (hence the title of this one), some unusually forthright material about the male lead’s reasons for catfishing, and some eccentric supporting characters. Nothing here is revolutionary (and little of the plot survives a critical examination), but there is a pleasant self-awareness to it that results in a romantic comedy for slightly jaded (but not cynical) romantic comedy fans. I happen to be in that group, so I got my time’s worth here—and if Netflix wants to keep cranking up the same kind of slightly-more-complex romantic comedy until Hollywood comes to its senses, then all the better.