The Broken Hearts Gallery (12A)

Twenty-something gallery assistant Lucy lives in New York City with roommates Amanda and Nadine. They become shoulders to cry on when Lucy's boyfriend Max breaks up with her because he claims there are "in different places". Lucy is encouraged to empty her room of items she has hoarded from previous relationships and display them as a pop-up exhibition. Handsome would-be hotel owner Nick helps Lucy to spread the word about the show.

LondonNet Film Review
The Broken Hearts Gallery (12A)

Pain is inevitable. It’s what you do with it that matters. Those words, spoken by Tony Award-winning Broadway star Bernadette Peters in a scene-stealing role as a gallery owner, are the guiding light of writer-director Natalie Krinsky’s exuberant romantic comedy, which fizzes sweetly like a mouth full of rainbow dust. Anchored by winning lead performances from Geraldine Viswanathan and Dacre Montgomery, The Broken Hearts Gallery proves that a little of what you want is exactly what you need by polishing well-thumbed genre tropes to a lustre…

Krinsky’s script is laden with whip-smart dialogue and cracking one-liners (“You’re the hero in your love story and the villain in mine”) that sing when delivered at speed by an ensemble cast, who genuinely look like they are having a blast in every joy-infused frame. A booze-soaked karaoke scene has the pleasingly chaotic feel of actors letting off steam after work courtesy of Sir Elton John and Kiki Dee. The winning combination of Viswanathan and Montgomery as love-scarred singletons, brought together through a meet cute in the back of a car, is matched by eye-catching supporting performances from Molly Gordon and Phillipa Soo as sassy roommates. Soo earns bountiful laughs by stealth as a lesbian ladykiller who has perfected the art of the public break-up and jokes that she may be poisoned by Vladimir Putin if she continues to bed and discard Russian supermodels at her current rate.

Twenty-something gallery assistant Lucy (Viswanathan) is an emotional hoarder who collects mementos from relationships and scatters them around her room, which resembles a mausoleum to failed love. “I live in a cave of souvenirs like the Little Mermaid,” she argues, romanticising her obsession to despairing gal pals Amanda (Gordon) and Nadine (Soo). A tie belonging to Lucy’s boyfriend Max (Utkarsh Ambudkar) becomes the latest addition when he breaks up with her because they are “in different places”.

Adding insult to injury, Lucy also loses her job at the Woolf Gallery managed by New York art doyenne Eva (Peters), who famously “discovered Cindy Sherman in a laundromat”. A chance encounter with Nick (Montgomery), who has been self-financing the construction of a boutique hotel in the shell of an old YMCA, encourages Lucy to create a pop-up exhibition entitled The Broken Hearts Gallery. Fellow New Yorkers arrive with bizarre keepsakes, expanding the collection to hundreds of trinkets. With an increasingly smitten Nick at her side, Lucy salves emotional wounds and becomes a cause celebre of the city’s vibrant art scene.

The Broken Hearts Gallery is naughty but nice in the best sense, striking a delightful balance between potty-mouthed banter and emotional vulnerability. A subplot connected to the board game Monopoly plucks heartstrings, teeing up a grand gesture that we know is coming from the moment Viswanathan and Montgomery lock twinkling eyes.

– Jo Planter