Sounds Like Love – Quick Movie Review

“Just as Maca’s career reaches an inflection point, the enigmatic ex who broke her heart reappears in Madrid and she turns to her friends for support.”

Netflix Description of the 2021 film ‘Sounds Like Love’

Directed by Juana Macias, this Spanish film is based on a novel by Elisabet Benavent and is a decent ‘chick-flick’ pick for a weekend. Although ‘enigmatic-ex’ is sugar-coating a guy who simply ghosts his girlfriend of 5 years and disappears from her life without a trace. Maca (Maria Valverde) never gets closure, and has romantic ‘PTSD” in her words, which is why she stays away from serious relationships and has a ‘fuck buddy’ on speed dial.

The cinematography of this film is very vibrant, there are a lot of colors, the mood is constantly bright and in tandem with the diverse lives Maca and her best-friends live. Some of the scene transitions are done beautifully and the director also uses the classic ‘good side’ vs ‘bad side’ trope, which we rarely see in movies anymore – basically, Maca is shown making decisions while having conversations with two versions of her.

Maria Valverde is fun as Maca, and she constantly reminded me of Wynona Ryder through the film. However, her two best friends Jimena & Adriana played by Elisabeth Casanovas & Susana Abaitua respectively, had more interesting stories and the actors were more entertaining in their roles too. Casanovas as the cuckoo Jimena who keeps hunting for her dead-boyfriend’s reincarnated spirits through tinder dates was a riot. Susana Abaitua as Adriana, a woman stuck in a dying marriage was very believable, and I feel like the actor is quite underrated.

The primary protagonist’s story-line – the underappreciated hard-worker who works for rich star (‘influencer’ in this film’s case) & is in love with an asshole, well haven’t we seen that too many times on screen already? Although, Alex Gonzalez who plays Leo, the ex who the heroine can’t get over it, is a total hottie, so we can understand why moving on isn’t easy. One of the funniest things about the plot is how the director keeps forgetting about characters. Like we don’t know what happens to Maca’s sex-friend, or Leo’s new girl-friend.

It’s the female friendships portrayed in “Sounds Like Love” that was most fun to watch. I like how the three girlfriends constantly hang-out with each other and are there whenever the other needs them. The runtime could’ve been shorter, it gets a bit of a drag in between. The climax to the viewer’s relief isn’t the same cliched ending we see in all rom-coms, and the makers even add a smug imaginative scene declaring “this is how it would’ve ended if it was a romantic comedy”, sort of negating the brownie points they earn by not going the ‘every rom-com’ ever way. Anyway, it was cute silly film and all the ladies are adorable.

It’s a 6/10 from me.