Every year we are treated to a lot of good movies. As the cost to make blockbuster movies continues to rise original ideas are mostly ignored for sequels and movies that utilize the same plot points over and over again. You just don’t see a lot of original ideas these days. I have always been a fan of all types of media that actually try to do something original. In particular I really appreciate movies with a quirky premise. This is one of the reasons that I was intrigued by Love Is Blind. The movie is about a woman that for some reason can’t see certain people even if they are standing right in front of her. I have seen a lot of movies and have never seen one with a similar premise. Love Is Blind has a really intriguing premise that it unfortunately fails to capitalize on.
We would like to thank Locomotive, Regency Enterprises, and Vertical Entertainment for the screener of Love Is Blind used for this review. Other than receiving the screener we at Geeky Hobbies received no other compensation. Receiving the screener had no impact on the content of this review or the final score.
Love Is Blind follows the tale of a woman named Bess. Bess appears to be a normal young woman except for the fact that she has a severe case of selective perception. Bess believes her mother died years ago despite the fact that she never actually died. Bess for some reason is unable to see her own mother even when she is directly staring at her. As her father is dealing with his own medical issues, Bess is forced to grow up. This leads her to a local psychiatrist that has decided to take on her case to try and figure out why she has totally erased her mother from existence. One of his prescribed treatments for Bess is to begin talking to a man named Russell who is dealing with suicidal thoughts. The catch is that Bess can’t see Russell just like her mother.
I had high hopes for Love Is Blind and unfortunately the movie didn’t live up to them. This was really disappointing because the premise was so interesting. The idea of a person not being able to see select people was a premise that I had never seen before and it had a lot of potential. The premise was kind of unbelievable in that there is no way it could actually happen in real life, but that sci-fi/fantasy element was really interesting. I am always willing to try out a movie that tries something unique. Watching the trailer it looked like Love Is Blind was going to be a mix between a romantic comedy and a drama with some sci-fi/fantasy mixed in as well. Well I pegged the movie completely wrong because that is not what Love Is Blind is.
If Love Is Blind was meant to be a comedy I was not the intended audience. I don’t think I laughed once during the entire movie. At times it feels like it was following the romantic comedy formula, but forgot to add in the humor. Instead the movie leans into the drama aspects. A lot of the movie is about characters dealing with different mental illnesses in addition to Bess who can’t physically see certain people. In some ways this could have lead to an interesting movie about people dealing with different mental/neurological issues. At times the movie does a good job in this area.
I think the biggest problem with Love Is Blind though is that it doesn’t know what it wants to be. It wants to do all of these different things instead of just focusing on a couple things. One minute it wants to be a romantic comedy and the next it wants to be a drama focusing on various mental illnesses. The movie keeps jumping between these different areas where it is hard to keep track of what is going on. This is really frustrating as there are good elements to the movie. There were several times in the movie where it felt like it was going in an interesting direction and was finally capitalizing on the premise. If the movie continued down these paths it could have mostly lived up to my expectations. The movie then suddenly decides to go off in a totally different direction for no real reason.
As the movie doesn’t seem to know what it wants to be it leads to quite a few unanswered questions. I am not going to get into specifics to avoid spoilers. If you are the type of person that wants clear answers to questions you will be seriously disappointed by Love Is Blind. Too often the movie decides to play it ambiguous when providing answers which makes the movie a little hard to follow at times. Some of the biggest questions are never fully answered or are answered in a way that is not particularly clear what happened. I don’t mind when movies force you to interpret things instead of just giving you the answers. This isn’t the case in Love Is Blind as at times it doesn’t even offer you clues that you can use to come to a conclusion. Things just seem to happen with no further explanation.
As for the acting I would say that it is a little hit or miss. For the most part I thought the acting was pretty good. The problem is that I didn’t really find any of the characters to be particularly interesting. There are glimpses of interesting characters in the movie, but it goes no further than that. I just didn’t particularly care about any of the characters.
While I wasn’t a big fan of some of the elements of Love Is Blind I actually thought the cinematography was quite good. At times the movie feels a little “artsy” but it is shot well. It is clear that Love Is Blind was a smaller budget movie, but it does a good job utilizing its budget. There are some creative scenes in the movie especially when it plays with what is real and what is not real. This adds some whimsy to a movie that otherwise would be kind of dark/depressing. The cinematography doesn’t make up for the inconsistencies in the plot, but it was a bright spot in the movie.
It is a real shame that the movie in my opinion wastes the interesting premise. At times during the movie I could see glimpses of what it could have been. There was potential for it to be a really interesting movie. These avenues are never really explored though. This became pretty frustrating as I could see how the movie could have been changed to make for a more enjoyable movie. Instead the movie takes a different path that leads to a worse movie in my opinion. I think the movie would have been better off dropping some of the plotlines and focused more on the interesting premise of a woman who for some reason can’t see certain people. The movie being so disjointed leads to quite a few slow points. There are good parts to Love Is Blind but they are surrounded by parts that are quite dull.
I was really intrigued by Love Is Blind as I have always been a fan of filmmakers that try to do something unique. Unique definitely describes Love Is Blind as the premise of a woman who can’t see certain people that are directly in front of her was a really interesting idea. Unfortunately the movie never lives up to its potential. There are glimpses of the movie matching its potential. The cinematography is quite good and the acting is pretty good. The problem with Love Is Blind is that the movie doesn’t know what it wants to be. When the movie is headed in the right direction it jumps to another plot and loses all of the momentum. The movie leaves a lot up to viewers’ imagination as it doesn’t give a lot of answers. Ultimately Love Is Blind is kind of boring and wastes a really interesting premise. There are some redeeming qualities, but not enough to overcome its faults.
I personally wasn’t a huge fan of Love Is Blind, but I could see some people enjoying it. If the premise doesn’t interest you, Love Is Blind is probably going to be pretty boring. If you really like the premise though and don’t mind the inconsistent plot you might get some enjoyment out of Love Is Blind.