This Romantic Slasher comedy is not afraid, but it is elegant and sweet

Slasher’s films seem to be having a revival these days, provided they have an orderly hook that adds a little flare to the subgenre. This new wave of Slalashers No Only Slasher movies: they are Slassher movies with a touch. “Heart Eyes” enters, a new movie that asks, “What would happen if a Slasher movie outside also A romantic comedy? “To add some fuel to the fire,” Heart Eyes “also fits into the subgenre of” Christmas horror “, while Christmas seems to reign here (even more than Halloween, how strange it may seem), there are many other holidays in the calendar to become days of mass murder.

As an advantage, “Heart Eyes” has some people talented to the helm: it comes from the independent horror filmmaker Josh Ruben, who directed wonderful movies of small fear like “Scare Me” and “Werewolves Within”, and has a co -written script (with Phillip Murphy) by Christopher Landen (the filmmaker behind the excellent neo-Slashers “Happy Death Day”, “Happy Death Day 2u” and “Freaky”, one of the best modern cheap) and Michael Kennedy, a writer who seems to specialize in The modern slashers with a hook (wrote the “Freaky” Slasher, the Christmas Slasher “is a wonderful knife”, and the recent Netflix Travel Travel “Time Cut” travel slasher).

All this is promising. And, in fact, “Heart Eyes” has a fun and fun script and a surprisingly elegant direction: Ruben has a good eye and takes his time with his shots, even throwing a moment of divided diopter just in case. To sweeten the treatment, “Heart Eyes” also has two lovely and pleasant protagonists in Olivia Holt and Mason Gooding, who play a couple who does not match that he only tries to live the night while a masked murderer ax and makes his way through the hordes of people. There is much to love here. And yet … “eyes of the heart” ends up feeling slightly inert. I had fun with most of this movie, but when the third act arrived and certain characters began to take apparently endless monologues, I felt my glassy eyes. Nor does it help the film looks completely selfless to be terrifying. When it comes to this romantic horror comedy, “Heart Eyes” is heavy for romantic and extremely light comedy in horror.

After a fun and bloody prologue, “Heart Eyes” reveals that during the last two years, a serial murderer known as the heart’s eye murderer (or Hek for abbreviation) has terrified couples on Valentine’s Day. The murderer, who looks a great fetish mask with bright red eyes, first sacrificed people in Boston one year, then the following year he set their heart -shaped sights in Philadelphia (margin note: I projected the film in Philadelphia, and My audience shouted and shouted at the mere mention of the city of Brother Love). Now, Valentine’s Day has appeared again, and nobody knows where the murderer could end below.

In Seattle, Ally (Olivia Holt) finds herself fearing Valentine’s Day, and not because of the eyes of the murderous heart. On the one hand, she recently broke with her boyfriend and cannot stop looking at her frequent publications on social networks with her new girlfriend. For another, his work as a marketing genius for a jewelry company is in danger after his last advertising campaign, which hilariously recreates death scenes among lovers in films, has encountered a reaction. To save the company, your boss has brought a Hot Shot freelancer named Jay (Mason Gooding) to fix things. Jay can be easy in view and extremely lovely, but Ally wants to have anything to do with this guy, worried that he is shooting for his work. So, when Jay insists that they have a business dinner on Valentine’s Day, Ally immediately refuses, but ends up accumulating when he seems to have no choice.

All this has the brands of a standard romantic comedy. Jay and Ally even have a fun meeting in a cafeteria before discovering who it really is. And as many enemy romances have taught us, it will only be a matter of time before these two crazy children fall in love with each other. Of course, “Heart Eyes” throws the additional wrinkle of a serial killer, who begins to harass Jay and Ally throughout the night, accumulating a heavy body count along the way.

The moments that establish the table of the “eyes of the heart” function like the gangbusters, and help that Holt and Gooding do a couple of lovely cables. They have a wonderful round trip pattern and legitimate chemistry that contributes a lot. Gooding in particular is so soft, fun and pleasant here that I left the movie wanting to see it in more things, immediately (seriously, make this type a star). The first moments in which Ally and Jay know each other and begin to fall in love, only to be interrupted by the eyes of the heart, are the best in the film. In fact, although I am a type of terror, I have to say that the elements of horror are the least interesting things about the “eyes of the heart.” I found myself looking forward to this just a romantic comedy on its own, you really don’t need the Slasher angle. It certainly does not help the film seem to run out of steam quite fast.

After Ally and Jay are in the sights of the eyes of the heart, the “eyes of the heart” begin to turn their wheels. You have the feeling that the filmmakers did not think this: they had a great configuration (a romantic comedy) but they did not know where to take it. As a result, the narrative begins to give up strongly. A repetitiveness is established: Jay and Ally move to a location, pursue, look at the people who kill themselves, repeat. To encourage things, the film throws two clumsy police characters: The Clueless Hobbs (Devon Sawa) and The Lovelorn Shaw (Jordana Brewster), and yes, the film makes a flat joke about their names like Hobbs and Shaw, you know like the movie? (Brewster, of course, is already part of the “Fast & Furious” franchise, which adds an additional goal to the gag, but does not make it more fun).

All this is a bit disappointing. I was completely delighted for the first forty minutes of “eyes of the heart”, and I was excited that I had a new Slasher photo to hug. But after its winning configuration, the film never finds its balance again. There are some bloody murders fun here and there, but I kept longing for the film to recover the energy of its first scenes, and never did. Even at 97 minutes, “Heart Eyes” ends up feeling too much time, as an idea of ​​short film that extends to present throughout.

“Heart Eyes” is solid enough to entertain. The earth of the jokes, the protagonists are great, and the history of romance is surprisingly sweet: I thought that Jay and Ally were falling in love with each other, which is not an easy task (if you don’t believe me, I just know that there are Around 100 romantic comedies made for the network where the two potential clients have absolutely zero chemistry together). Ruben’s direction keeps everything fine, and murders probably laughed illicit (intentional) of the crowd.

And yet, by the time “Heart Eyes” comes to an end, everything feels something forgettable. I am glad that new Slasher films continue to arrive, and I give credit to “Heart Eyes” for trying to combine romantic comedies with horror. But as the third completely clumsy act of the film arrives and gives us an answer too obvious about the identity of the heart’s eyes, the emotion has gone. Even so, as the counterprogramming of Valentine’s Day, “Heart Eyes” says, he has its charms.

/Classification of the film: 6 of 10

“Heart Eyes” opens in theaters on February 7, 2024.