Content warning/Editor’s Note: This review will contain spoilers for “Heart Eyes.”
Released on Feb. 7, “Heart Eyes” is a slasher film mixed with a romantic comedy. The movie follows the main character, Ally (Olivia Holt), who is nearly fired from her job for an unromantic advertisement meant for Valentine’s Day. The love interest, Jay (Mason Gooding), is a stereotypical romantic who tries to woo Ally. Their bad date quickly turns into a terrifying escape from the Heart Eyes killer who mistakes them as a couple.
The movie begins with a marriage proposal between a couple with beautiful scenery. The proposal is interrupted when the Heart Eyes killer gruesomely murdered the couple, their cameraman and an innocent worker. After this scene, some detectives and reporters came to look at the crime scene and specified that the killer only attacked on Valentine’s Day and targeted couples. I think the beginning of the movie put the severity of the killer into view and it created anxiety for how Heart Eyes would attack next.
After the first scene, the film shows Ally in a coffee shop on the same day of the first murder, stressing about an upcoming meeting about an advertisement. When her order is called, she meets Jay, a stranger whose order is the same as hers. At first, Jay and Ally seem to think they have a lot in common because of their identical coffee order but when Ally walks away from him to go to her meeting, it turns out that she has to work with Jay to come up with a new advertisement. They turn out to have polar opposite views of love. I thought that this was cute but cliche, but I appreciated that the film had a plot besides the murderer.
When Jay and Ally go to a restaurant together to start working on ideas for the advertisement, it’s clear that Jay has romantic motives with her. When Ally turns down his flirting and firmly states she wants to focus on the task at hand, Jay starts to ask why she is so adamant about not getting to know him. Ally explains that she doesn’t believe in love because some people don’t get lucky enough to find the right person. Ally then starts to insult Jay, resulting in him leaving the restaurant. Ally chases him outside to apologize but kisses him when she sees her ex-boyfriend, Collin (Ben Black), with his new girlfriend. The Heart Eyes killer sees this kiss and makes Jay and Ally the next target. I thought that this was a funny and ironic motive for the killer in the movie, especially since Ally was clearly not trying to date Jay.
For most of the movie, Jay and Ally are running from the Heart Eyes killer. When the police and detectives are called, Jay is believed to be the killer. When Jay is taken in for questioning, the police station is attacked again by the killer. Jay and Ally narrowly escape and hide in a car at a drive-in theater where the killer eventually finds them and kills many couples in the process. While Jay and Ally begin to escape, Ally realizes that they need to work together to stop Heart Eyes from hurting anyone else. The moment seemed to be a love confession from Ally, which I thought wasn’t fitting for her character since her negative view of love was very firm at the start of the film. I think that her development was forced and rushed. At this point in the movie, Ally and Jay kill Heart Eyes together.
After killing Heart Eyes, Jay gives Ally his number and gets in a detective’s car to be driven to the airport and get on his flight. Ally goes home that night and sulks about not having taken a chance with love, but her friend, Monica (Gigi Zumbado), pushes Ally to go to the airport to confess to Jay. At this point in the movie, I thought the film was a cliche love story but I was surprised when Ally picked up a call from the Heart Eyes killer who had Jay kidnapped in a church.
In the church, it is revealed that Heart Eyes was not one person, but instead three people working together but now only two people after Jay and Ally killed the other. The two killers are a detective and her boyfriend, Detective Shaw (Jordana Brewster) and David (Yoson An), who had fixations with killing and idolized the origin of Valentine’s Day. This outcome was foreshadowed throughout the movie with small quips that seemed to be jokes at the time. I enjoyed that this was the motive of the killers instead of a broken heart. Together, Ally and Jay outsmart the killers and confess to each other which I didn’t enjoy since they had barely known each other for 24 hours. At the end of the film, there is a time skip to a year later to show they are in a happy relationship and Ally proposes to Jay.
Overall, I thought the movie was funnier than it was scary, but the gore and violence were still very present. I enjoyed the plot twist but the story still felt very cliche when Ally ended up falling in love with Jay in one night when she had said she didn’t believe in love earlier that day. I would recommend this movie to people who can handle gore and enjoy sappy comedy.
