It’s hard enough to find horror films that keep you on the edge of your seat, let alone one that can make you genuinely laugh along the way too. Indeed, truly worthwhile horror comedies are as rare as hen’s teeth, but the new frightener HEART EYES fits the bill. The movie opens Friday, February 7, and it’s as funny as it is frightening. While not quite as clever as SCREAM or M3GAN, this effort is still cheeky, good fun with some sharp scares, albeit none too gory. HEART EYES even has a decent love story, perfect for its angle of a serial killer wreaking havoc during Valentine’s Day.
But before we meet our leads, the filmmakers introduce us to the title character. He’s a serial killer who wears a signature mask with heart-shaped cut-outs for eyes. The fiend has been cutting couples down to size for a few February 14ths now and his schtick has garnered the world’s attention. To show how ruthless he is, the first few minutes of screen time show him stalking, chasing, and ending the love story of a hapless duo who just got engaged at a winery. With his murderous prowess, Heart Eyes certainly knows how to pick an appropriate red to celebrate the season.
Then we meet the leads, and as is often the case in “meet cutes,” they’re butting heads. First, at a local coffee shop where they bump into each other over the same order, and then at work where they’re forced to work together to save an ad campaign. It seems that up-and-coming copywriter Ally (Olivia Holt) created a spoof of doomed cinematic love affairs for the agency’s big jewelry client and it’s bombed with consumers. Thus, tough-talking creative director Crystal (a deliciously sarcastic Michaela Watkins) has brought in hotshot freelancer Jay (Mason Gooding) to work with Ally to make things better.
Ally and Jay are both ridiculously good-looking, incredibly fashionable, and razor-sharp with their banter. Their clear attraction to each other leads to a combative, yet charged dinner in a fancy restaurant, and then an ersatz kiss between them catches the eyes of you-know-who. Heart Eyes spies them waiting for the restaurant’s valet and designates them as his next prey. The film turns into one big chase scene from there with the terrified couple running throughout the city trying to avoid the wrath of this killing Cupid. A tense stop-over at a police station presents an opportunity for our heroes to banter even more, this time with a couple of cranky cops (Jordana Brewster and Devon Sawa), and it isn’t long before Heart Eyes shows up there to show off his cutlery skills.
Director Josh Rubin and screenwriters Phillip Murphy, Christopher Landon, and Michael Kennedy show zest throughout, never belaboring a gag or a kill, and moving things along at a brisk pace. Sure, there are plenty of liberal borrowings from those aforementioned classic frighteners, not to mention other accomplished horror comedies like HAPPY DEATH DAY, READY OR NOT, and THE HUNT, but this story still has genuine menace and yes, romance. Holt and Gooding play well off each other, the film never wears out its welcome, and the whole shebang finishes up in a deft 97 minutes, including the end credits.
HEART EYES isn’t exceptional horror, but it does maintain its tension and humor with aplomb from start to finish. It even manages to touch the heart in its modest ways this Valentine’s while primarily aiming for the jugular.
