Dating can be hard for those of us who are hopeless romantics and sometimes dating apps don’t make the situation any easier. Luckily for disaster date columnist, Natalie Bauer, she’s finally found a guy that she actually likes! His name is Josh Lin, he’s hot, adventurous, and their humor completely lines up. So being the hopeless romantic that she is, she decides to surprise Josh by flying from L.A. to the East Coast to spend Christmas with him and his family. Incredibly sweet, right? You can imagine Natalie’s surprise when Josh walks out and he is...nothing like his pictures. A now catfished Natalie is devastated and angry (rightfully so) and Josh agrees to help Natalie start dating Tag, who is the guy that Josh used for his fake profile. Christmas is around the corner and Natalie and Josh are in a strange predicament that somehow might bring them closer.
Nina Dobrev stars as Natalie and Jimmy O. Yang stars as Josh in Netflix's new Christmas movie, Love Hard. You might remember Nina from her role as Elena Gilbert in The Vampire Diaries (Team Damon). And You might recognize Jimmy from his hilarious standup (you can see his comedy special on Amazon Prime) and his hilarious role as Bernard Tai in Crazy Rich Asians. This duo was exciting to watch, they had great chemistry and you could tell their hearts were in this project.
I went into this movie with low expectations. I mean, we’ve all seen holiday movies and sometimes they can lean more into cheesy than cute and they can be extremely predictable. With Love Hard, I was pleasantly surprised! Yes, it was slightly predictable but it was a lot of fun. It actually felt fun and the jokes landed very well. But, that’s not shocking considering Jimmy is professionally funny!
It’s important to note that the movie has garnered some controversy, because the plot may fuel the stereotype of Asian men being undesirable and not masculine. At first glance, I can understand the criticism. There’s no room in Hollywood to be perpetuating stereotypes anymore! But, after watching I can say that the movie did paint Asian men in a great light. I feel like they were shown in different dimensions which is refreshing.
All in all, Love Hard is a fun, cute watch for this holiday season. You can stream LoveHard on Netflix now.
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