Review of Addicted to Love (2010) by Agatha T — 28 May 2017

Ryan and Broderick and the soundtrack somehow manage to make a creepy as fuck premise (two exes set up across the street to stalk the people who dumped them, set up a camera and sound recording, commit credit card fraud, pickpocketing, assault, housebreaking - to touch their things, have sex in their house, and fuck with the new relationship by planting false evidence, even going so far as to *wear the damn false evidence before planting it* (actual quote: "authenticity!" ... ew.) - because they REALLYREALLYREALLY don't deal with rejection well) seem *almost* sweet. Except that you keep coming back to "... jesus, when you ignore the music and the 'quirkiness' of the characters, this is a fucking horrifying movie for the two completely unaware stalkees." No surprises, everybody is with the "right" person in the end, Meg Ryan cracks a REALLY weird boy/dog sex joke to really up the "this IS a quirky romcom and not a creepy horror show, right?" vibe, and somehow neither of the stalkers goes to prison.

AND YET I really enjoy watching this movie. I think it's because while Ryan and Broderick come across as reality-challenged possessive assholes, Tcheky Karyo is just a load of fun to watch. He starts off as just another asshole but watching him descend into poverty, misery and affliction until he's a weeping, sobbing wreck is - well, it just hits a weird combination of notes of both amusing and sympathy-arousing. I ended up really liking the guy by the end, despite what a complete asshole he was in the beginning (girlfriend stealing, oversharing sex story talking, weeeeeeeeird sexual fetish revolving around skulls...).

In short it's a very lighthearted and fun little watch, if you're willing to *completely* forego thinking about it. At all. Which hey, there's a billion summer blockbusters out there whose excuse for being terrible is "we're just mindless fun!", so I'm willing to let Addicted to Love use the same reasoning.