Daños del amor
A man, a woman... and the other woman
One of the great things about reviewing films for a site like this is that I am able to occasionally use phrases like “kung-fu romantic action comedy.” Which brings us neatly to Steve Kahn’s excellent Daños del amor (Love Hurts).
The film starts romantically enough with scenes of Bender (Steve Kahn) and Mia (America Young), a young and obviously happy couple. And then Bender makes the inevitable mistake of becoming unusually animated in the presence of a Columbian woman who happens to be dancing in the street. And everything comes screeching to a halt.
Some time later, Bender and Mia bump into each other again.
I really don’t want to say any more about the plot because what comes next is pure comedy gold, heightened by the sheer outlandishness of the concept.
Kahn has pulled together all of the stereotypes of the romantic genre and subverts them brilliantly. It’s tightly scripted, well acted, superbly choreographed and had me laughing out loud several times.
As with many short films, Daños del amor takes a single idea and runs with it. There is no padding and the film moves along at a cracking pace. But the real strength of the film, for me, comes from the fact that Kahn has managed to draw several genres together rather than leaping from one to another.
Whatever else is happening on the screen, and however bizarre the film becomes, Kahn never loses sight of the fact that this is a love story. In doing so, he has made a love story like no other.
Daños del amor is a very funny film that deserves to be seen by as wide an audience as possible, and I will be very interested in seeing what Steve Kahn does next.
0 comments Thursday 01 Feb 2007 | Paul Pritchard | Action, Comedy
