qnhvfp Review of The Hating Game

The Hating Game (2021)

I thought there could be no worse rom-com film adaption than Something Borrowed, but here we are.

[2/10 · 11 December 2021]

The Hating Game is another beautifully written book turned into a low-budget mess of a film. Lucy Hale and Austin Stowell are well cast as Lucy and Josh and share great chemistry, but they have nothing to work with here. The script is missing all of the emotional intimacy, sexual tension, and sexiness of the book. The dialogue, instead of capturing the depth of Lucy's internal dialogue and connection with Josh, is almost entirely inane banter. The order of key scenes is changed up, completely throwing off the emotional beats of the story. The direction, production quality, and music are terrible. The book's climactic sex scene is reduced to a non-event, just a passionless quickie briefly interrupted by a random shot of a mountain (?!?). A second sex scene is just a collection of bizarre shots of Josh's bedroom. Danny gets way too much screen time as a minor character. I could go on, but... I need to go read the book again to help scrub this movie from my brain.