Movie Meow: ‘Heart Eyes’ is a Valentine’s splatter-fest

Romance is dead — or so they say if you are living in the greater Washington State area of the country. For the past few years, a killer with red heart eyes is lurking around killing young couples on Valentine’s Day if they are caught showing affection in public. Sure sounds to me like somebody has a bone to pick with St. Cupid!

Valentine’s Day, which just recently passed, is known as the Feast Day of Saint Valentine: the celebration of love and affection. Of course, every year you hear the cynics whining that the pseudo holiday is a manufactured day just to sell greeting cards, chocolates and flowers.

Speaking of flowers, nearly 250 million roses are grown in preparation for Valentine’s Day each year. With these kinds of numbers being thrown around it is no wonder that this love birds’ day won’t be going anywhere in our lifetime.

In 2023 alone, the National Retail Federation stated Americans spent nearly $26 billion on Valentines Day gifts. Talk about a real money-maker. Me? I say to heck with true love, and just wanna shake my “moneymaker”.

Although kind of cliche, it is no surprise that this holiday goes down as one of the most popular days for proposals behind Christmas and New Year’s Day.

Quite possibly the most popular Valentine’s Day horror film to date was “My Bloody Valentine,” that is — until now. Still boasting a strong showing even weeks after the initial holiday release, Heart Eyes stars Mason Gooding (“Scream 6”) who just so happens to be the son to actor Cuba Gooding Jr. Here the handsome Mason plays “Jay Simmonds,” a businessman on the rise sent in to help save a high-profile company’s failing love campaign.

Olivia Holt plays “Ally McCabe,” a jilted damsel in distress on the verge of losing her job. Together the two workplace opponents must band together to dodge the blade of the evil Valentine killer, or is it killers?

“Heart Eyes” would never have come to exist if it wasn’t for the trailblazing original “Scream” film by Wes Craven. This slasher comedy has a very similar formula, so no doubt we have seen this recipe before. Filmed in Auckland, New Zealand, standing in for a Washington State double, “Heart Eyes” does boast a few good jump scares and the necessary gratuitous violence one would come to expect from an R-rating.

So, whether you are someone who is currently in love, or fed up with love, or caught up anywhere in between, there is a bit of a rom-com twist mixed in here with the blood and gore. If you are not feeling a splatter-fest, perhaps you should sit out “Heart Eyes” and maybe substitute this for the brand-new “Bridget Jones Diary: All About the Boy” streamer starring Renee Zellweger instead.

“Heart Eyes,” starring: Mason Gooding, Olivia Holt

Christopher’s “Meow” Score: “6” paws out of 10.