It Ends with Us: Blake Lively Leads Justin Baldoni’s Emotional Adaptation of Colleen Hoover’s Bestseller

MOVIE REVIEWS

It Ends with Us (2024)
Directed by Justin Baldoni

It took a romance novel with millions of copies sold and an actor-turned-director, on his third film, to revive the glory of the great sentimental film—a Hollywood specialty, capitalizing on the charisma of its stars and unraveling a catalog of traumas that can bring tears to the audience’s eyes. Based on Colleen Hoover’s bestselling novel with autobiographical elements, It Ends with Us finds its magnetic center in Blake Lively. Not only does she radiate light, but she also imbues an archetypal character (a woman seeking a new life but grappling with the repercussions of her past) with a personal touch.

Lively exudes natural star power, transforming into a modern Susan Hayward, playing with stereotypes and easy metaphors: her heroine is named Lily Blossom Bloom (literally “lily flower bloom”), and after her father’s death, she moves to Boston to open a flower shop. Professional fulfillment would be enough, but she ends up falling in love with a sweet and wealthy neurosurgeon she first meets by chance on a rooftop and then encounters again by fate (“A guy like me you’ve only seen in soap operas,” Baldoni jokes, showing little modesty for casting himself as this perfect man). A fairy-tale life, if it weren’t for certain memories from the past that resurface here and there—a mysterious heart tattooed on her collarbone and a dinner at a trendy restaurant: destiny surprises you when you least expect it, especially if it hasn’t finished reckoning with the past, and history threatens to repeat itself.

Without overdoing it or resorting to virtuosity, Baldoni—already the director of two cancer movies, Five Feet Apart and Clouds—frames the story with an eye on pop seriality and another on the rules of classic melodrama: the plot twist arrives at just the right moment, the shift in tone is well-calibrated, the tension builds without becoming exploitative, close-ups map out emotional landscapes, and the cinematography serves the bodies on screen, enhancing a functional autumnal melancholy. As the title suggests (which is, in a way, a spoiler, but also a warning or advice), the protagonist’s journey is as complex as it is exemplary, allowing the female audience to engage in a useful process of identification (in this sense, the figure of the mother is particularly significant).

But It Ends with Us especially succeeds in exploring men’s awareness and the redefinition of a male model, a topic Baldoni has long been committed to (he has produced books, podcasts, and talks on how traditionally defined masculinity has become a social problem), without falling into the Manichean trap of misandry. The scope is broad: patriarchy must be buried (literally: what is written on tombstones is less impactful than what can’t be written on a handkerchief), past trauma cannot be an excuse but a starting point for improvement, aggression must be addressed with specialists, vulnerability should be a strength, and no one can save themselves alone. The film closes beautifully on three fronts: parenting, family, and love.

Lorenzo Ciofani

Cinematografo, August 7, 2024