Directed By Sophie Brooks

Starring – Molly Gordon, Logan Lerman, Geraldine Viswanathan

The Plot – Iris (Gordon) has met her perfect guy, Isaac (Lerman), and is enjoying their first romantic getaway together. What could go wrong? This clever and charmingly odd dark comedy takes on the highs and lows of modern dating and the ways it makes us all go a little crazy.

Rated R for sexual content/some nudity, and adult language.

OH, HI! | Official Trailer (2025)

POSITIVES

Like those persisting through the honeymoon phase of fresh love, the film too has two sides to its mayhem that constantly keeps audiences guessing, all the while illustrating the darkly depraved sides of male and female dating at their absolute worst, once those guarded walls start to finally come tumbling down. In her sophomore effort as a director, Brooks paints us into a bit of a false sense of security visually and tonally that has audiences interpreting this as a romantic comedy during its opening act, with intimately warm and glowing cinematography enacting the radiant chemistry of its loving leads, before deconstructing matters into a psychological thriller of sorts, during the second act, as a result of a twist that quickly has this feeling like the “Very Bad Things” of the dating world. Like Brooks’ previous writing efforts, the script carries with it an ample amount of commentary that proves she did her homework on the very conversations and life-shattering realities of having your once peacefully pleasant world turned upside down, and as to where some directors would find difficulty in crafting the argument between sides with a faithful balance, Brooks effectively illustrates that there’s two sides to toxic idealism when it comes to modern dating, showcasing the most viscerally unrelenting between these two characters that might make it difficult to properly invest in either one of them, but beyond that maintain audience interests throughout the unperceived complexities that develop between this very surreal situation. Despite the film’s eventual shift into darker territories, the script never loses sight of its comedic dominance, bringing with the material a consistency of laughs that play particularly well to Gordon’s off-beat brand of aridly dry humor, as well as the kind that don’t punctuate as apparently with their intended deliveries, instead relying on craziness of the situation to draw out hilarious ironies that make Iris feel like she never quite grasps the extent of her actions, until it’s too late. The film is acted exceptionally by a small but charismatic ensemble, with Molly Gordon and Logan Lerman obviously taking command of characters with quite an emotional duality to their respective portrayals. Gordon revels in the underlining maniacal of a woman constantly tethered by the unpleasantries of the dating world, with Molly’s extensive stares and chilling deliveries bringing to life the untethering imposition of the crazy ex that every man has seemingly come into contact with, and Lerman, while initially unloading an unblinking audacity as a script articulated “Fuckboy”, does eventually balance matters with an eye-opening element of consciousness that breeds with it some measures of empathy for the predicament that his character finds himself in, Together, the two ride all of the highs and lows of relationships with the kind of impeccably natural chemistry that simultaneously allows us to bask in the glow of their gentle radiance, while also appreciating the spills of their various conflicts, and with the occasional cog thrown into the wheel of the dilemma, in order to constantly keep matters and stakes interesting, the script is able to evade alienating the audience while alongside two characters who feel anything other than relatable, especially in the meticulous measurements to how Gordon and Lerman play to a camera that constantly studies their every reactions.

NEGATIVES

Unfortunately, for as much as “Oh, Hi” has working in its favor, it has just as much conflicting motions jeopardizing its executionary momentum, beginning with an opening sequence that once again spoils matters before we’ve ever had a chance to experience even a single solitary minute of these characters or the plot’s set-up. This is a growing trend in cinema that continues to baffle me, as it feels like the worst kind of revealing trailer that telegraphs everything else to follow in the film, and while it won’t bother other moviegoers as much as it did me, I’m confident in assessing that none of them would disagree in the film being better off had it cut this sequence entirely from the movie’s opening, especially in that it elaborates something eerily wrong will eventually happen to this couple, so don’t invest too firmly in their blossoming romance. Beyond this, the film does have quite a evidential few tonal clashes, as expected with a shapeshifting product that delves into various subgenres, and while it doesn’t necessarily affect the movie’s humor, it does compromise the integrity of any semblance of suspense or tension that it garners for itself, leaving a flat climax during the movie’s pivotal third act that had it feeling like it sacrificed its ambition along the way. When you look at a film like “Companion”, a movie that can compare to this in a variety of ways, you get a movie that doesn’t simply stop at its twist, but rather continuously build the dynamic between the characters involved in it, and here, the introduction of Max and Kenny (Played by Viswanathan and John Reynolds, respectively), while two actors whom I adore, does feel like it takes away from the isolation factor and grounded approach of the storytelling, with the former of the two sporting a ridiculously unnecessary Australian accent that periodically comes and goes like weather patterns. This is where I started to lose interest in the film, as not only does the script settle for contrived silliness that involves quite a few dumb decisions by its characters to keep the conflict maintained, but also an ending so ridiculously stupid that you’re immediately reminded that you’re watching a movie, for the worst kind of reasons imaginable, and it just left such a bad taste in my mouth during the movie’s most memorable moments. Of course, the inconsistency of the pacing doesn’t help with this unforeseen obstacle, as the movie’s 89-minute run time has so much of the opening act feeling abridged by intrusive editing that unnaturally moves the story forward, while whiplashed by second act scenes that grind to a screeching halt, when compared to everything that came before it. Because of such, the storytelling never settles into a comfortable medium that could elicit such a comfortable rhythm that is rewarding to its audience, and considering we get less and less time of Iris and Isaac alone together, it starts to feel like the least interesting matter in a film that includes witchcraft, an emerging bromance, and a voyeuristically creepy David Cross as an intruding neighbor, leaving its tacked-on character study during the closing moments feeling a bit underdeveloped and shallow, as a result of it never feeling ingrained synthetically within the storytelling. For my money, if the film spent more time and patience developing the bond and even brief history between Iris and Isaac, then we could’ve gotten a more conscientiously aware insight into the former’s desire to break her back towards making matters work, while understanding the latter’s need to spend so much time and money organizing a weekend getaway just to simply get laid, but the tragic element of their blossoming love loss never quite comes to fruition, and as a result the movie is lacking the kind of compassionate push necessary to uncover some stirring psychology pertaining to its characters to understand their often times illogical motions.

OVERALL
“Oh, Hi” is a tonally exhausting and creatively contrived situational comedy that squanders sentiment for the elaborately preposterous, wasting away the soulfully stirring efforts from a dazzling duo that nearly save it with the kind of effective humor conjured from impeccable timing. While Brooks compels the audience to ask questions about the dating insecurities of contemporary romances, the execution elicited offers nothing nearly substantive to make it as determined to being as educative as it is entertaining, leaving audiences stranded during a weekend getaway that gets silly before it gets sincere

My Grade: 5.9 or D+