It Ends With Us (2024) Flawed Yet Beautiful?

We hate the things we fear the most that we may become. I don’t know if I saw this quote somewhere or I thought of it myself but that was the line in my head after I saw this film today. It’s strange to me that I only just stumbled on this film when I remember how eagerly I’d been waiting on it in 2024, since I’d read the book some time before then. But I did watch this movie yesterday because I knew I’d want to talk about it, and I have, so, here are my thoughts.

It Ends With Us (2024)

Based on the novel by Colleen Hoover with the same name, It Ends With Us tells the story of Lily Bloom who is all grown up and storms out from the Church after being unable to give a eulogy on her abusive dad’s funeral. She’s at the rooftop of a building in Boston, and that’s where she meets Rule Kincaid, an ambitious neurosurgeon who she is almost immediately drawn to. After a blossoming chemistry between them that night, Lily is sure that they’d never meet again, however, fate has a different thing in store for her. Whether it’s the start of something new, or an ugly past reincarnated, Lily will have to see.

My Thoughts and Rating

I say it a million times, the movie almost never is as good, let alone better than the book, but I have read the overflowing negative comments on this film, and I don’t feel it’s quite accurate. This movie was beautiful. I felt it more because even though I’d read the book in 2021, I recalled and said some of the lines just as the actors said them, and being able to tell what was going to be said or what was about to happen should have been off-putting, but it crystallized the entire movie experience for me.

Blake Lively did an amazing job as an actress. She may not have been the best pick for the role, but she did interpret what was expected nicely enough. Justin Baldoni as Ryle Kincaid could not have fit any less. Switching from sexy and charming to mean and psychotic was nearly too clean cut to be real, and the guy who played grown up Atlas was easy on the eyes in the best way possible. I feel like we could have seen more of him, but he wasn’t too present even in the book, so I guess that can be the excused.

Another thing I appreciate about this movie is the slight of hand in Lily’s case where the movie captured that she saw only what she wanted to see. Because of traumatic experiences, the hits were seen as accidents, the push down the stairs was simply a slip of hand, but when it all went down, the scales came off, and we, the audience, could witness those scales falling off with her. I loved it. Oh, how I did.

I just wish, even though this is a movie, and let’s be realistic, you simply cannot capture everything, that some core elements that shaped this story were not left out. The diary, for one. The diary was deeply crucial to the unfurling of events in this story, and there was merely a simple flashback and that was about it.

The naiveté and charm that made me sympathetic to Lily and shocked at Ryle’s true colours respectively were not as delved into as they should have been. Yeah, the central theme of domestic abuse, personal growth and choice were taken carefully into consideration, but that raw vulnerability that made us feel for each of the characters in different ways were handled in a way that seemed rather rushed.

I wouldn’t what to disparage the efforts of the actors and director who made this movie adaptation what it was, but overly colourful aesthetics, frumpy outfits and glossed over necessities made what was so compelling and convincing in print nearly superficial. Nearly. But I won’t lie, I enjoyed this film and maybe would’ve barely criticized it if I didn't read the book. This was a beautiful but flawed adaptation but it deserves to be seen and appreciated in its own right. A decent 6/10 for me. It was a hard but lovely weekend watch.

Jhymi🖤

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_{Images from IMDB.}

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