The title of writer-director Sophie Brooks’s feature-length debut, Oh, Hi!, an anti-rom-com, appears almost immediately in an exchange between longtime best friends, Iris (Molly Gordon) and Max (Geraldine Viswanathan).
Usually saved for a moment combining surprise and levity, here “Oh, hi!” has a more ominous, sinister feeling, the result of Iris confessing she’s done a very “bad thing” with said bad thing involving her currently absent boyfriend, Isaac (Logan Lerman).
Just as quickly, Brooks hits the rewind button, flashing back to earlier the same weekend as Iris and Isaac, casual daters apparently on their first weekend getaway, drive to a rural rental in upstate New York. Exchanging the usual banter typical of still-new couples, singing along to the radio, and stopping by a roadside stand for cherries, all seems copacetic for Iris and Issac. Only Iris’s barely suppressed jealousy at the cherry seller raises an inkling of what’s to come, and what’s to come involves Iris becoming increasingly unglued, mentally, emotionally, and otherwise, as her dream weekend with Isaac goes pear shaped.
Everything goes perfectly — until, of course, it doesn’t — as Iris and Isaac do new couple things on their first night and day. Despite dating for several months, they don’t seem to know all that much about each other, suggesting either a real lack in their approach to dating (i.e., superficial until now) or perhaps, a minor misstep with Brooks’ screenplay and the underlying story she developed with Gordon several years ago during the height of the pandemic. That, however, isn’t where the film's story-based issues lie; they’re later down the proverbial and/or metaphorical road for Iris and Issac.
The sudden appearance of an oddball neighbor, Steve (David Cross), adds another ominous note, but it’s a post-prandial game involving light BDSM that leads Iris and Isaac away from familiar rom-com tropes toward much more treacherous, more intriguing drama and quite possibly, horror. It’s there, at Isaac’s most literally vulnerable moment that he naively confesses a personal truth, i.e., his approach to dating and romantic relationships that Iris, operating from a major misunderstanding and/or delusion, takes matters into her own hands (again literally) and makes an emotion-driven decision with consequences that will far reverberate past their weekend together.
Max and her longtime steady, Kenny (John Reynolds), blithely unaware of the situation, enter soon thereafter, raising the distinct, obvious possibility that the slightly irrational Iris, fueled by the previously mentioned misunderstanding and/or (self) delusion, has brought them irrevocably into her reality-warping and -denying predicament.
Brooks’s happlly leans into Gordon’s off-kilter charms, overemphasizing a word or phrase, throwing back a glance, or using language to convey Iris’s barely suppressed insecurities. She’s not new to romantic relationships, but she’s relatively fresh off a major breakup, a bit heart-sore, and eager to find an idealized replacement for what she’s lost in Isaac. When Isaac disappoints — as he was always going to do — Iris’s “rapid disassembly in flight” (to borrow a phrase) is all but predictable, though how far Iris will go and how far Brooks and Gordon are willing to take their audience is another matter.
Unfortunately, Brooks fails to fully exploit Oh, Hi!’s premise and its promise of Stephen King-inspired bedroom horror for all its worth. Initially, it’s enough to keep the audience on the other side of the screen engaged. Once Max and Kenny enter the film, individually and collectively representing the flip side of Iris and Isaac, they also add a not entirely unwelcome, question-raising complication and associated horror tropes. But those positives give way to increasingly ludicrous plot twists, turns, and switchbacks, reflecting Brooks and Gordon’s desire to “save” Iris from the reel-world consequences of her actions.
Despite the third-act letdown, the journey there offers more than a few positives, including Gordon’s increasingly unhinged performance, Viswanathan’s “ride or die” best friend, and Reynolds delivering deadpan drollery reminiscent of Jason Segel. Lerman’s limited role leaves him far less to do — he’s more plot device than character — but he still makes for a believable, easygoing foil, the unrequited object of Iris’s affection, and an unrepentant “soft boi,” as Max calls Issac.
Oh, Hi! premiered at the Sundance Film Festival. Visit the film's page at the official festival site for more information.