The only way to overcome one’s fears, Burke (Aaron Eckhart) learns, in Love Happens, is to face it. A famous motivational guru, he walks over hot coal and teaches his readers and audiences how to get over their grief and move on, but he himself hasn’t at all succeeded.
One fine morning, he bumps into a florist, Eloise (Jennifer Aniston). He says hello. She’s all shaken up. She smiles, and pretends to be deaf and dumb. Then, she goes over to her boyfriend’s place with some fresh flowers, sees lipstick on a coffee mug, and walks out.
Very convenient script: The boyfriend does not appear again in the film, or try to call her, paving the way for the couple to get together! The idea of having a florist bringing cheer to the sad protagonist’s life is fresh. Aniston is a delightful mix of practicality and charm. In romance and wit, he’s stiff. There are no fireworks to their chemistry. Their love is of a very mature kind, stable and grounded.
Of course, the real focus of the story, even though the title suggests otherwise, is about people coming to terms with the loss of their loved ones. “Life sometimes offers you lemons”, the narrator’s voice over tells us in the opening image. “When that happens, you can either wear a sour face, or make lemonade”.
Like his two-faced role in The Dark Knight, Eckhart once again puts up an impressive Janus act. In Love Happens, however, he doesn’t have a good and an evil side; just two sides. One is a public one that is all smiles and oozing with confidence, the other, a private one that is plain dead scared.
The cinematographer captures the change quite finely: Standing alone, Eckhart is tensed. Then, the door leading to the conference room opens, and in an instant his expression undergoes a radical transformation. The next moment, a camera on a crane circles around a charismatic, smiling superstar as he runs into a hall, packed to capacity with an applauding audience.
People who refuse to totally forget the scars of their past, though, have an immense capacity to spread their suppressed depression to those with whom they interact. For even the best smile does not completely hide the truth.
Dominated by dry and gloomy characters, Brandon Camp’s self-help drama, which attempts to pass off as a romance, has an atmosphere of sullen dullness hanging over it, and isn’t exactly all that inspiring.
