Content Warning: This story contains discussions of domestic violence and sexual assault.
Between the unjustified tonal switch at the halfway point, the horribly written characters, and the lack of any clear understanding of what point it was trying to make, It Ends With Us was easily one of the least enjoyable movies I have ever seen in my life. I left the theatre unable to think about anything other than how upset I was that I had just wasted close to two hours of my life on this sorry excuse of a film.
The most noticeable and pervasive issue in the movie is the dialogue. From the opening scene to the cut-to-credits, the only consistent feature of the movie is how awfully written it is. From “I’m an unreliable narrator,” to “I happen to love you too,” or even, “You somehow became my favorite person,” you really get the sense that the writers wanted this movie to be as unwatchable as humanly possible. Considering our story is told from our main character Lily Bloom’s POV, it seems like she’s telling us the story. But instead of just telling the story, she’s adding in her weird flair to make herself seem cool or funny.
Poor writing is far from the worst thing about this film. I think one of the weakest aspects of the movie is its own characteristic inconsistencies. Throughout the film, every character constantly tells us things about Lily. They say that she’s kind, or giving, or the best person they’ve ever met. But these all ring hollow because they refuse to show us anything that reflects this in any way.
We’re told that she’s kind hearted because she had a relationship with a homeless boy as a teen. But in recounting this story, she acts humiliated at the idea of it, like it was disgusting that she would even consider being interested in him. We’re told that she has so much love in her heart, but at no point in the movie does she ever stop smirking and giggling at the people around her, as if they’re annoying her with how stupid they are. And again, with the story being from her POV, it makes her seem very unsympathetic. Because she’s telling you these things about her, but very few of those characteristics reflect who she truly is.
Despite the cheery, floral marketing and its PG-13 rating, this movie has some very heavy themes. At nearly the exact halfway point, it suddenly switches from a romcom to a drama/thriller with seemingly no warning. This switch is completely whiplash inducing and honestly made some of the later scenes feel overly brutal due to their juxtaposition.
There are multiple long and drawn out moments that show abuse and even sexual assault in grotesque detail. I’m not someone who finds myself very sensitive to that kind of thing, but I was nearly brought to tears by it just because of how insistent and merciless the depiction felt. There’s no build up to this; it doesn’t feel like a crescendo in the story or a shocking turn of events. It feels like a jumpscare put in to insult the audience who made the mistake of thinking they were going to see some fun summer romance. I can’t imagine what showing this kind of thing to someone who has a history with abuse could do to them. And I think it’s extremely irresponsible if not downright sinister to keep it in the film without any kind of trigger warning. It feels purposefully upsetting.
I really wanted to give this movie the benefit of the doubt. Despite all the bad press I’ve seen it get, I thought it couldn’t be that bad. This movie made the definite choice to prove me wrong and spit on me for thinking it might be something even tangentially good.
I was immensely disappointed by the way this film turned out. If you’re a fan of the book it’s based on, or you like any of the actors, or you just want to see it out of curiosity, I genuinely implore you not to. I don’t think any amount of fandom could change what this movie is: a poorly directed and cheaply shot piece of hate mail towards anyone experiencing abuse.
