Entertainment / A Must Watch! “The Broken Hearts Gallery” Celebrates The Remnants Of Love

A Must Watch! “The Broken Hearts Gallery” Celebrates The Remnants Of Love

Entertainment Sep 11, 2020

by Matthew Currie

Geraldine Viswanathan dazzles in The Broken Hearts Gallery, an agreeably quirky rom-com executive-produced by Selena Gomez.

A young woman struggles to master the art of moving on in a thoroughly charming little romantic comedy that offers the perfect showcase for the wit and charisma of up-and-comer Geraldine Viswanathan.

The Australian-born actress has racked up several impressive performances the past few years, including supporting turns in Blockers and HBO’s Bad Education, as well as a more dramatic leading role in Apple TV+ original flick Hala. But The Broken Hearts Gallery is a project uniquely tailored to her comedic chops.

A Must Watch! "The Broken Hearts Gallery" Celebrates The Remnants Of Love — **A Must Watch! *The Broken Hearts Gallery* Celebrates The Remnants Of Love.** Photo Credit: George Kraychyk

She plays Lucy Gulliver, a 20-something chasing her dreams in New York, working as an assistant at a prominent art gallery and dating Max (Utkarsh Ambudkar), a handsome, sophisticated — and as it turns out, kinda sleazy — co-worker. But in one fell swoop (i.e. drunken outburst at a work party), both job and boyfriend disappear. Utterly crushed, Lucy stumbles her way into a meet-cute with Nick (Stranger Things alum Dacre Montgomery), another hard-luck dreamer who’s been struggling to get a boutique hotel up and running. Sparks fly, flirtation ensues.

It may sound like your typical rom-com fare — and in a lot of ways, it is — but what allows writer-director Natalie Krinsky (making her feature debut) to explore the well-worn genre from a fresh angle is one peculiar character quirk of Lucy’s: she has a tendency (more accurately, a compulsion) for hanging onto little mementos from all her exes — a necktie here, a toy pig there. Lucy prefers to think of herself as The Little Mermaid, living in “a cave of souvenirs.” To her friends, she’s more of a hoarder. But the double-whammy of breakup and firing slowly compels our flailing heroine to contemplate why she feels the need to walk through life dragging these reminders of failed relationships behind her. And so it is that, on a whim, while hanging out at Nick’s under-construction hotel, she tacks one of her many knick-knacks to a wall, with the message “Leave your heartache”; to her surprise, strangers actually do start showing up and adding their own bittersweet mementos, in hopes of exorcising the demons of romance gone wrong. Soon enough, Lucy’s “Broken Heart Gallery” is #trending.

Indeed, it’s a novel premise, and Krinsky films it with engaging visual flare — including a series of fourth-wall-breaking talking heads from practically every character who appears onscreen relating funny, heartfelt stories of the little trinkets they’ve kept to remind themselves of past loves. That said, inevitably in a film like this, it all comes down to the star power. And if anyone out there still harboured doubts about Viswanathan’s ability to anchor a movie . . . well, they’d be hard-pressed to make that case after Broken Hearts. She certainly pulls off the more poignant moments, but more than anything else, her Lucy is an irresistible goofball, particularly when paired with her best pals/roommates — played by Animal Kingdom’s Molly Gordon and Hamilton’s Phillipa Soo. Their lived-in dynamic is warm, weird and hilarious, and frankly more compelling than the “rom” part of this rom-com. (Seriously, I want a TV spinoff). Ditto for Lucy’s quip-tacular friendship with Nick’s best friend/contractor Marcos (Arturo Castro), which is also a good bit of goofy fun (albeit a bit too riffy at times).

A Must Watch! The Broken Hearts Gallery Celebrates The Remnants Of Love: Lucy (Viswanathan) and Max (Utkarsh Ambudkar). Photo Credit: Sony Pictures — **A Must Watch! The Broken Hearts Gallery Celebrates The Remnants Of Love: Geraldine Viswanathan as Lucy Gulliver.** Photo Credit: George Kraychyk

And ultimately, that’s where the appeal of The Broken Hearts Gallery lies — not in soapy romance or a profound exploration of the heartache we all cling to — but in characters who, simply put, are a helluva a lot of fun to hang with for two hours.

The Broken Hearts Gallery is in theatres now.

Main Image Photo Credit: George Kraychyk

Matthew Currie

Author

A long-standing entertainment journalist, Currie is a graduate of the Professional Writing program at Toronto’s York University. He has spent the past number of years working as a freelancer for ANOKHI and for diverse publications such as Sharp, TV Week, CAA’s Westworld and BC Business. Currie ...

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A Must Watch! “The Broken Hearts Gallery” Celebrates The Remnants Of Love

by Matthew Currie

Matthew Currie

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