You can learn a lot from watching movies. The horror comedy “Crawlers” recently taught us there are three million spiders for every human being on the planet. That’s a fun bit of trivia. “Clayface” claims that putting AI in high-tech shapeshifting nanobots and injecting them into vainglorious, mentally unstable men with a history of hurting women may have some drawbacks. We probably could have figured that one out on our own, but if it prevents even one mad scientist from accidentally creating a homicidal pile of gelatin, I guess “Clayface” will have done its job.
With that in mind, I invite you to consider Joey Powers’ intelligent, lovely romantic comedy “Love Language,” which teaches us two things: First, we should always speak from the heart, and second, if your screenplay is good enough, Chloë Grace Moretz will waive her usual fee in exchange for free burritos.
I haven’t looked at Moretz’s contract, obviously, but there’s no other way to explain how many burritos she eats in “Love Language.” You could probably turn it into a drinking game, but that would be very dangerous. It’s humanizing to watch a dazzling lead actress wolf down one hearty lunch after another in a genre where women are usually only allowed to eat if it’s a comically oversized barrel of ice cream — and even then, only after a brutal breakup. You get those burritos, Chloë Grace Moretz. They look delicious, and you earned them. This movie is great.
“Love Language” begins, of course, with one of those breakups. Moretz plays Lou, who was engaged and now, suddenly, is not. She’s miserable, and her loved ones are sympathetic, but she has an annoying tendency to make every conversation about her own problems, even when she’s in the middle of her best friend Tilda’s bachelorette party. Lou is a struggling author, so when Tilda (Billie Lourd) gets nervous about composing her wedding vows, she asks Lou to write them. Lou does so by taking what were supposed to be her own vows and pasting in Olivia’s fiancé’s name.
The wedding vows bring the house down, and pretty soon every bride in Chicago wants Lou to ghostwrite for them. It’s a lucrative business and it re-energizes Lou’s creative spirit, which gives her the confidence to start dating a hunky and personable new guy, Dash (Anthony Ramos). She’s still smarting from her failed engagement so she keeps it casual. Super casual. Even though it obviously breaks Dash’s heart a little.
The rom-com plot kicks in when Lou accepts a job writing for Olivia (Isabel May), who just happens to be marrying Lou’s college crush, Warren (Manny Jacinto). Lou and Warren fall into an immediate rhythm, and their chemistry is so palpable that Lou can’t write convincing wedding vows for the other woman. So she does what any professional writer would do: Lie and pretend she’s working on it as the deadline fast approaches. I’m sympathetic but Jesus, it’s only like one page of double-spaced text. Just crank it out, Lou. Sheesh.
Ordinarily it would be hard to sympathize with a freelance writer making a ton of money in the year of our lord 2026 while she’s simultaneously wooed by Anthony Ramos and Manny Jacinto. Must be frickin’ nice. But “Love Language” makes it work because these are all incredible actors, and they treat Powers’ rich, emotional screenplay like the gift it is.
These are the rare human beings in a modern rom-com who have multiple interests, strong opinions, distinct senses of humor, recognizable foibles, and difficult, multilayered feelings. Of course they all look dazzling — it’s a romantic comedy, after all — but they’re all real people, brought to life by a cast who seem genuinely excited to star in that rare love story that meets our expectations and then surpasses them, without ever pretending it’s elevating the genre. The genre is just fine, thank you very much, and “Love Language” proves you can tell these slightly contrived, crowd-pleasing stories and still make them feel fresh. Or at least believable.
The characters in Powers’ film say exactly the right thing without sounding rehearsed. Whenever they talk about the people they love they’re honest and sweet, and whenever they deny themselves their chance at happiness it sounds like they believe it’s the right thing to do. Meanwhile, “Love Language” fills every scene with little details that proves these characters exist even when the camera isn’t rolling. At one point we see Lou’s search history and the most recent entry asks if it’s okay to combine antidepressants and antihistamines. Been there, done that. She’s relatable as hell.
“Love Language” plays so effortlessly that we can only conclude it took massive amounts of effort. It embraces the clichés that work and rewrites the ones that don’t until they do. The cast is a delight, the direction is appealing without resorting to glossy affluence, which makes movies like this seem like unattainable fantasies. And sometimes that’s okay, but Joey Powers’ film excels at making those fantasies plausible, as though love really is only just around the corner, and all we have to do is reveal what’s in our hearts. Which, if you eat as many burritos as Lou does, is probably a lot of cholesterol.
