By Keith Walther | Rose Law Group Reporter
After a four-year hiatus of not appearing in a film, Blake Lively returns to the silver screen in a challenging role and delivers a rock-solid performance. Based on the highly popular book by Colleen Hoover, “It Ends with Us” is a romantic drama with a powerful message that will resonate with viewers. Despite reports of conflict amongst the cast and director behind the scenes reminiscent of “Don’t Worry Darling,” the story comes together nicely and is told in a meaningful way.
After attending her father’s funeral, Lily Bloom (Blake Lively) runs to Boston to pursue her dream of opening her own flower shop ironically enough. A chance encounter with a neurosurgeon Ryle Kincaid (Justin Baldoni) leads to an intense connection and passionate romance. When Lily begins to see a darker side to Ryle with his quick-tempered behavior, she has flashbacks to traumatic memories of her parents’ abusive relationship.
Lily’s confusion is heightened when she bumps into her first love, Atlas Corrigan (Brandon Sklenar), whose kindness and empathy reminds her of what they shared as teenagers. Reeling from the prospect of following her mother’s footsteps and the flame Atlas still holds for Lily, her decision about her future is further complicated by another unforeseen circumstance.
“It Ends with Us” is directed by Justin Baldoni, who also stars as the abusive doctor. Pulling double duty like this is a very difficult task and one that Baldoni admittedly did not enjoy. Making matters even more challenging was the rumored involvement of his co-star’s husband Ryan Reynolds, who allegedly meddled in the rewrites of the script, undercutting Baldoni and fostering animosity between them. Fortunately, this didn’t prevent the actor/director from sculpting a cohesive, complex and dynamic story that holds viewers’ attention in a captivating embrace from start to finish.
With painstaking care, Baldoni incorporates well-timed flashbacks that reveal integral snippets of the main character’s memories to establish her persona and background that help explain her reactions and coping mechanisms in her current life. He brilliantly shows the reality of how an abusive relationship is formed and how perception of abuse can be distorted by the victim’s deep seeded love for their abuser. This is a unique aspect of the film that few others ever delve into, rather displaying abusers as monstrous, one-dimensional villains devoid of a soul.
The dialogue is rather clunky and awkward at times with characters talking over each other, but this adds to the charming realism of the movie, which is promoted by a more personal cinematography approach of closeups and handheld shots. However, the number of serendipitous coincidences that repeatedly occur is overdone and detracts from that realism. For instance, the main character bumping into her high school flame in a Boston restaurant is believable but also happening to hire the sister of the guy she just met out of everyone in the city is a stretch of the imagination.
This is easily Blake Lively’s finest performance of her career, but also the most complex starring role she’s ever had. She beautifully portrays an ambitious woman committed to fulfilling her dream who gets swept off her feet in an unexpected romance that slowly devolves into something that resembles her haunted memories of her parents. Lively provides that relatability when she shows the inner turmoil and fear bubbling under the surface while also remembering what true love is supposed to look like.
Despite their limited acting experience, the two male leads held their own in this film. Justin Balboni successfully humanizes his character, showing him as not someone who is simply inherently evil, but a man who is severely flawed resulting from a tragic past. Brandon Sklenar also does well to include his character’s rich backstory that shapes him into the good man he becomes.
Blake Lively nearly displaced her husband from the number one box office spot this past weekend, falling just $4.2 million behind “Deadpool & Wolverine.” “It Ends with Us” is not only a worthy date movie, but it is a moving story about finding oneself in the midst of an abusive relationship. With so few other options in the drama genre currently in theaters right now, don’t miss out on this one, especially if you’re a fan of the book, you won’t be disappointed.
This movie earns:
