‘Oh, Hi’ spirals into a haywire attempt at a dark romantic comedy that wants to say something about modern love but mostly just says … not much
By Dana Barbuto/Boston Movie News
You know a relationship is screwed the moment someone says, “Our first trip as a couple feels too easy.” It’s the emotional equivalent of saying “no-hitter” in the dugout—something bad is bound to happen. That offhand line sets off the unraveling in “Oh, Hi,” a film that fancies itself a sly, dark rom-com, a modern-day “Misery” with a millennial sheen and handcuffs. What it actually is: shallow, half-hearted ideas dressed up as insight.
Iris (Molly Gordon) and Isaac (Logan Lerman) are four months into dating when they head to a lake house for a cozy, intimate getaway. They swim, they read, they dance in the dark, have sex in the daylight. It’s all montage-level infatuation, but the air feels strange. One of them definitely likes the other more, and it’s not hard to guess who.
Things heat up when they discover a hidden stash of BDSM gear in a closet. They decide to play. Iris cuffs Isaac to the bed—lightly kinky, vaguely funny—and then, in full afterglow glory, Isaac casually drops that he’s not looking for anything serious.
What a fucking idiot. She’s still holding the keys, bro.
Instead of letting him go, Iris takes the next 12 hours to try to change his mind, turning the weekend into a hostage situation and the bedroom into a crime scene. What unfolds is a forced march through monologues, dance routines, and her sad-girl oversharing about first crushes, birth stories, even bedwetting—because (note sarcasm) those topics will undoubtedly deepen the connection.
Sophie Brooks, directing her second feature, takes what should have been a tight and twisted bad romance story and lets it unravel into something that feels both overthought and underwritten. She never figures out how to dig Iris—or us—out of this sticky wicket. All we get is a drawn-out exercise in narrative wheel-spinning and a script that treats the distinction between a “fuck boy” and a “soft boy” as if it’s some grand emotional truth. That’s not profound—that’s content. And we already have TikTok for that. Mostly, though, the movie is a collection of half-formed ideas about relationships stitched together without rhythm or reason. It feels like Brooks is dragging us through a prolonged, incoherent therapy session that we never asked to attend.
Late in the game, the story takes another turn for the absurd when Iris teams up with her best friend (Geraldine Viswanathan, stranded in sidekick hell) for some cringe-inducing “Witches of Eastwick” bullshit. The two try to brew some sort of memory-erasing potion to fix things. Yes, a potion. And it’s as stupid as it sounds.
For his part, Lerman plays Isaac as a bland, emotionally detached drifter, 10 paces ahead of commitment. However, he comes across as a guy who has ghosted a few girls and thinks that makes him deep. Gordon gives more, but she’s stuck with a character who’s written as a series of contradictions and breakdowns, not a real person. And the script never decides whether we should sympathize with Iris or slowly back away from her. One minute she’s thinking about stabbing Isaac, the next she’s making him French toast. It also bothers me that there’s no real heat between Gordon (“The Bear”) and Lerman (“Indignation”), which is a problem when your entire movie hinges on the friction between two people. The relationship doesn’t just lack spark—it lacks a reason to exist.
By the end, “Oh, Hi” hasn’t said anything new about vulnerability, intimacy or even delusion. It gestures at depth but settles for the tired idea that men are cads and women are crazy. Let’s dump that thinking—it goes both ways. Yes, people want different things, feelings get hurt, someone always cares more—that’s fertile ground, and plenty of great films have explored it. This just isn’t one of them.
‘Oh, Hi’
Rating: R for language, sexual content and some nudity
Cast: Molly Gordon, Logan Lerman, Geraldine Viswanathan, David Cross and John Reynolds
Director/writer: Sophie Brooks
Runtime: 95 minutes
Where: In theaters July 25
Grade: C-
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