Movie Review: 'It Ends With Us' Starring Blake Lively

It Ends with Us (2024)

Directed by Justin Baldoni

Written by Justin Baldoni

Starring Blake Lively, Justin Baldoni, Brandon Sklenar

Release Date August 8th, 2024

Published August 8th, 2024

It Ends with Us is the story of Lily Bloom, a flower shop owner in Boston with a tragic backstory. Lily grew up with an abusive father who has, as we join the story, recently passed away. His death has brought back a lot of the worst parts of Lily’s childhood. With that, Lily sets out on a new path. She’s moved to Boston, bought a storefront, and is intending to live her dream of growing and selling beautiful flowers. Naturally, she’s going to fall in love as without that, there is no movie to be called It Ends With Us.

Enter Rye Kincaid, played by writer-director-and actor, Justin Baldoni. He’s a hunk of a man. Muscled up, soulful, he’s a doctor, and he has the kind of permanent five o’clock shadow that is some kind of genetic miracle for how it always looks the same. He must have been born with it. He’s also a walking red flag as he is introduced in the angriest possible way, kicking a chair on a rooftop so hard it flies like a football off of a tee. Lily happens to witness this childish outburst but this guy’s chin is so perfectly sculpted that she’s willing to overlook his needless violence.

The two flirt and banter and he bluntly asks her for sex before he’s called away to perform actual brain surgery on someone. In a coincidence of shocking proportions, Rye’s sister, Alyssa (Jenny Slate) walks into Lily’s soon to be remodeled flower shop looking for a job. Lily hires her on the spot and over the course of a montage, the place transforms into a strange but lovely and quaint shop. Once again, enter Rye who comes to see his sister only to find the girl of his s dreams and the almost sex. Rye pursues Lily and things get hot and heavy.

Meanwhile, we are getting pieces of Lily’s tragic backstory via flashbacks that inform her relationship with Rye. As a teenager, Lily met and fell for a homeless kid named Atlas. Atlas lived in an abandoned house next door to Lily and she took pity on him by dropping off food and a sleeping bag. She gives him old clothes from her dad, and the two develop the kind of intense and fraught relationship that only teenagers can. Big shoutout to the casting director of It Ends With Us. Isabella Ferrer, who plays young Lily, is a dead ringer for Blake Lively. It’s uncanny.

These scenes of teenage angst and connection are my favorite parts of It Ends With Us. Ferrer is lovely and delicate and Alex Neustaedter as young Atlas, is weary and shy, and the two have wonderful chemistry. There is a terrifically charming scene where Lily is showing Atlas her garden and they have a very sweet conversation. It’s a small scene, but it's exceptionally performed and warmly executed. As I said, these scenes of these two young actors are wonderful and I can’t praise them enough.

Eagle eyed readers may have noticed that I said that Alex Neustaedter plays the young Atlas and that was intentional. The plot of It Ends With Us kicks in with the introduction of Brandon Sklenar as the grown up Atlas. In the time since he last saw his childhood love, Lily, he’s grown up and become a successful businessman, a restaurant owner and chef. In another standout scene, Blake Lively as Lily recognizes Atlas from a scar on his hand and the whirlwind of emotions on her face, that she’s desperately trying to withhold, are overwhelming. I choked up nearly as much as she did.

There is a lot to praise about It Ends With Us. First and foremost are its good intentions. For those somehow unaware of Colleen Hoover’s ubiquitous bestselling novel, the story is about overcoming domestic abuse. Rye becomes jealous and abusive, especially after learning about Lily’s connection to Atlas and Atlas being in such close proximity. The film portrays the abuse in a controversial fashion, first showing it to be accidental, a result of an explicable incident. Then, later, the film circles back to show us the abuse in a more straightforward fashion.

This choice serves to underline the perspective of a victim who wants to believe that they are not a victim and the slow, painful realization of being victimized by someone you love. It’s an interesting approach but clumsily employed in It Ends With Us. The muddled editing of these scenes and Justin Baldoni’s flat performance fail to convey the gravity of the situation. The film is just a little too cozy, sexy, and languid in pacing to make these scenes have the intended effect, beyond what is bluntly obvious, abuse is wrong.

The film is trying to thread a delicate needle by not having Rye become some monster from a movie of the week while also making it plain that he is a continuing threat to Lily’s safety who must be kept at a distance. I understand and recognize the challenge and I don’t think the film is quite up to that challenge. The film lingers too long on several scenes and the leisurely pace, though clearly intentional, hampers our involvement in the story.

Then we have our supporting characters who seem to have been imported from some other movie universe. Jenny Slate and Hasan Minhaj play Rye’s sister and brother and law and it’s pretty much a disaster aside from one good scene for Slate. In most of her scenes, Slate appears to be playing a variation on her wonderful Parks and Recreation character and if you are aware of that character, you’d want to keep that kind of broad comedy far away from this movie. Minhaj meanwhile, wants to riff on day-trader bros and hustle-grind culture and it leaves you wondering if he read any part of the script that his character isn’t in. If he had, he might have thought better of his attempts at improv humor.

Those complaints aside, I don’t think It Ends With Us is a bad movie. Blake Lively is so good that her energy and spirit actually allows her to have a wonderfully genuine scene with Slate’s Alyssa where even that cartoon of a character becomes a warm and human presence. Lively has a wonderful face with expressive eyes and her ability to act without words is a great strength for the movie. She communicates love, compassion and hurt with just a flash of her eyes, a tilt of her head, or a sly smile. She’s a movie star but more than just a pretty face.

There is value in the bluntness of the message of It Ends With Us. Sometimes saying directly that physically assaulting people, especially the people you claim to love is wrong. That is something that should be obvious. It’s not something people often say because love assumes that you would never do harm. There is value in stating plainly that abuse is wrong, that causing physical and emotional harm is wrong and those who do it should be ashamed. In that way, It Ends With Us is valuable as a blunt statement to those who would try and justify the harm they commit. That the blunt aspect only comes in at the very end of the movie is another matter, but is effectively stated nonetheless.

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