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Prime Video is looking to turn up the heat just in time for Valentine’s Day with its latest original movie, Love Me Love Me. Based on the first novel of Stefania S.’s “Love Me, Love Me” tetrology, this romantic drama title follows a young woman (Mia Jenkins) who moves from the UK to Italy for a fresh start after her brother’s death. At her new school, she becomes torn between a star student (Luca Melucci) and his bad-boy best friend (Pepe Barroso Silva), creating a messy love triangle and some awkward situations. It definitely has the energy of a movie with origins in Wattpad, so this could either be an entertaining or excruciating watch, depending on how you feel about that. Keep reading to get our full scoop!
LOVE ME LOVE ME: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?
The Gist: Two years after her beloved brother’s death, a still-mourning June White (Mia Jenkins) and her mother, April (Elizabeth Kinnear), move from the United Kingdom to Milan, Italy, for April’s work. Here, they hope to build a new life for themselves and heal from past hurts, and June looks forward to starting fresh at a new school. Immediately upon arriving at the beautiful St. Mary’s International School for the wealthy, influential, and beautiful, June is practically adopted by classmates Amelia (Andrea Guo) and Blaze (Michelangelo Vizzini), who immediately notice June on school grounds and take her under their wing.
It doesn’t take long for June to make a name for herself at St. Mary’s as she quickly catches the eye of school honor student and resident nice guy, Will (Luca Melucci), while simultaneously somehow earning the antipathy of Will’s best friend, the troublemaking and alluring James (Pepe Barroso Silva). Will and June hit it off, but James keeps trying to keep June away from Will in the name of protecting his friend from potential heartache, but the more that James pushes June’s buttons, the more she can’t help but be drawn to him.
Things grow more complicated as June finds herself attending school-wide parties where MMA fighting is the main attraction, and James is the top contender. She finds it hard to witness his brutality in the ring, and even more difficult to watch James’s controlling and money-hungry trainer, Austin (Tommaso Caporali), inject James with drugs before each match. The closer June gets to James and his world, the more danger and drama enter her life, thrusting her into the middle of a volatile love triangle that threatens to unravel all three teens in the process.
Photo: Amazon MGM StudiosWhat Movies Will It Remind You Of? Love Me Love Me may remind you of other over-the-top romance movies featuring “bad boy” love interests like the After, Through My Window, and Culpa mía (My Fault) film series.
Performance Worth Watching: I respect Mia Jenkins’s full commitment to going all in with June, embracing the camp of this kind of movie and seeming to have fun with it along the way.
Memorable Dialogue: My favorite line of the entire movie was when James drags her into the boys’ locker room, causing June to get flashed by some random guy and exclaim, “Oh my God! I’m so sorry. I saw your willy.”
Sex And Skin: While the important bits are covered, there are enough bare torsos, butts, and sexual scenarios to make this title fairly NSFW (or at least slightly embarrassing to watch with a family member present).
Photo: Amazon MGM StudiosOur Take: Love Me Love Me had a promising start. The setting was beautiful, the school grounds gorgeous, the cinematography crisp. June initially felt refreshing and charming. The movie didn’t waste time with exposition and cut right to the action of June diving into her new life at St. Mary’s. Unfortunately, the deeper we dive into the movie, the more that many of these early impressions unravel.
It turns out Love Me Love Me could have used more exposition after all, because the characters generally felt underdeveloped, and the performances hollow. A lot of the intended romantic elements just made me wince or feel uncomfortable, as both James and Will seem to lack a proper understanding of boundaries. I couldn’t figure out why she liked either of them, or why they liked her, because we don’t really know much about them. They allude to things, but it’s all so vague that you’re left with more questions than answers about the characters, and it feels hard to connect with any of them.
I’ve never read the original Wattpad novels on which this movie is based, so maybe there’s more context in the written version that I’m missing. Instead, you’re just left with the feeling of watching a mid-2000s teen melodrama that somehow traveled forward in time. Even where June seemed initially likable, she turns out to be more of a “not like other girls” caricature who can inexplicably quote Othello by heart, do wheelies on motorcycles, always wears matching pajama sets, and has the medical know-how to help someone who has overdosed on drugs. Sure, she makes bad decisions to remind us that she’s flawed, but not in a way that feels consistently human.
Ultimately, while I sometimes found myself entertained, it was more in a “so cringe it’s fun” kind of way than because it’s an actually great piece of media. I think that Love Me Love Me would make for wonderful drinking game fodder or an amusing thing to watch at a gathering among friends. But hey, the ending seems to set up a sequel, so maybe they’ll only step up their game and expand the world of these characters from here.
Our Call: If you enjoyed the original Wattpad-written version of Love Me Love Me or if you love a cringey romance movie, then this could be worth a watch, but otherwise, you’re probably safe to SKIP IT.
How To Watch Love Me Love Me
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Maddy Casale is a Chicago-based writer and comedian who covers everything from animated series to Hallmark movies. Follow her on Duolingo @MCasale.
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