Film review: ‘IT ENDS WITH US’ by Nick Gardener from ‘Built For Speed’

It Ends With Us adapts Colleen Hoover’s highly successful 2016 novel to the big screen. Going into this film I wasn’t familiar with the novel and based on the trailer, had some trepidation that it would be a generic romantic drama.  There are familiar elements here, as well as a few clunky moments but it was a more affecting film than I expected.

Blake Lively plays Lilly Bloom who, perhaps predestined by her name, has finally realised a lifelong dream of opening a flower shop in her adopted home of Boston.  She’s also begun a relationship with a very flirty doctor named Ryle Kincaid (Justin Baldoni, who also directs). Just as life seems to be going perfectly for Lilly, she runs into long-lost love from her teen years, Atlas (Brandon Sklenara).  Jealous of what he thinks are Lilly’s lingering feelings for Atlas, Ryle becomes increasingly paranoid and even violent toward Lilly.  Having seen her mother endure a life of domestic violence, Lilly is determined to avoid the same fate.

While the film relies on a fairly slender plot and at times heads into midday movie territory, It Ends With Us works, for the most part.  Above anything else, this film does at least a decent job of conveying the jolting impact and ugliness of domestic violence.  The sudden shift in the film’s tone from vibrant romance to serious drama is appropriately jarring.

Holding the film together is a strong performance from Blake Lively.  She makes Lilly a convincingly layered character with wit, feistiness and sensitivity.  Justin Baldoni, who looks a little like a younger Paul Stanley from KISS, also brings the right amount of intensity to the role of Ryle and even though he’s a chiselled neurosurgeon, makes Ryle a believable character.  In a slightly unusual but welcome piece of casting, Jenny Slate, who played the unhinged Mona-Lisa Saperstein in the wonderful TV series Parks And Recreation, also chimes in with an eccentric but at times moving performance as Ryle’s sister and Lilly’s bestie Allysa.  As Atlas, though, Brandon Sklenara isn’t as effective as he should have been. He appears sporadically and his slightly morose and taciturn manner leaves us wondering exactly what entrances Lilly about him.  As Lilly’s mother, Amy Morton isn’t given enough opportunity to create an impression.  Her character should have played a bigger role in this film, especially given that her experience of domestic violence so profoundly impacted Lilly.

This film is about character drama rather spectacle but as director, Justin Baldoni has made some interesting if not always successful choices.  He uses a lot of extreme close-ups which, in many films can be seriously off-putting but here it feels appropriate as a way of conveying both intimacy and invasion of personal space.  His frequent reliance on ‘wobble cam’ and choppy editing, though, is irritating.

At times, It Ends With Us stumbles – including odd diversions into quirky humour – but it manages to bring us back to the central drama of Lilly’s experiences and the alarming situation of domestic violence.

Nick’s rating: ***

Genre: Drama.

Classification: M.

Director(s): Justin Baldoni.

Release date: 8th Aug 2024.

Running time: 130 mins.

Reviewer: Nick Gardener can be heard on “Built For Speed” every Friday night from 8-10pm on 88.3 Southern FM.

 

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