NO HARD FEELINGS: A WELCOME ADDITION TO A DWINDLING GENRE

No Hard Feelings is an American Sex Comedy Film directed by Gene Stupnitsky from a screenplay he co-wrote with John Phillips about a 32-year-old Uber driver who answers an ad to date a shy 19-year-old called in order to boost his confidence prior to college. The film stars Jennifer Lawrence and Andrew Barth Feldman, with Laura Benanti, Natalie Morales, and Matthew Broderick co-starring. The film was released in the United States by Sony Pictures Releasing on June 23, 2023.

The film currently has a 70% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, with a much higher Audience Score of just 87%. It also has a Metascore of 59 (based on 50 critic reviews) on Metacritic, with a User Score of 7.0 (based on 146 ratings), and a 6.4/10 on IMDB (based on approximately 59,000 reviews).

Romantic Comedies are something of a dying genres these days, so whenever a good one rears its head, I personally like to celebrate it, and that’s what I see here, a film that reminds me a lot of “She’s Out of my League” starring Jay Baruchel and Alice Eve, with a bit of a reverse angle in its storytelling.

The film’s premise felt strangely unique, and the story itself felt slightly less than formulaic than that of the typical big budget “Rom-Com”. The writing was witty and funny, and though Jennifer Lawrence has come into her own over the years as a dramatic actor, she really impressed me in this film with her comedic chops. And if you’ve heard anything about this film, you’ve probably heard about Jennifer’s nude beach scene, which, I have to say, was truly one of the most hilariously fantastic things I’ve ever witnessed in a film like this. Andrew Barth Feldman’s performance of Hall and Oates’ “Maneater” was also a nice addition to the film.

The story moves at a fairly brisk pace, getting to the “promise of premise” a bit quicker than normal, and this was one of the few romantic comedies that manage to get you through the first half of the third act without making you want to pause it and go find something sharp to stick in your eye, which was a really nice surprise. I also really liked the decision here to abstain from actual sex between the two stars, despite the “American Pie-like” raunchiness of the film.

In short, this film was actually a lot of fun to watch. And Jennifer Lawrence was a big reason why. She managed a rather commanding performance in this film that reminded me a lot of Emma Stone in “Easy A”. This movie had twice the budget of “She’s Out of my League”, released back in 2010. It also had a larger budget than both “Friends with Benefits” and “No Strings Attached”, which came just a year later. And at a time when less and less of these types of movies are getting made, in favor of over-long, over-produced, overly-formulaic content that can sometimes feel like a chore to get through, No Hard Feelings enters the “Rom-Com” conversation, truly meaning no harm, and that’s why I loved it.

The movie is currently available on cable On Demand ($6.99). It’s also available on Amazon Prime Video, Apple TV, YouTube, Google Play Movies and Vudu ($5.99).