REVIEW: ‘The Heartbreak Agency’ Is Broken

The Heartbreak Agency (Die Liebeskümmerer) is a German-language Netflix Original rom-com directed by Shirel Peleg and written by Antonia Rothe-Liermann, Elena-Katharina Sohn, and Malte Welding. It’s born from one of the most annoying rom-com tropes there is. Karl (Laurence Rupp) is a deeply unlikable, sad, pathetic man. His girlfriend understandably breaks up with him on the advice of a popular therapist, Maria (Rosalie Thomass, dubbed The Heartbreak Agency. As retribution, Karl stages an interview with Maria for his magazine and besmirches her and the entire concept of heartbreak. To repent for his misogyny and breach of workplace trust, Karl has to take therapy from Maria and redo his article sincerely. It’s a classic horrible-man-is-fixed-by-a-woman-he-doesn’t initially-deserve story.

Karl is incredibly aggravating for the first half of the movie. His sexism is exaggerated. He’s barely even attractive. Everything about him is designed to make you hate his guts. Why should anybody want to watch a movie about a deeply unlikable protagonist? And why does the genuinely charming female lead have to fix him to be satisfied? The trope itself isn’t the problem. The second half of The Heartbreak Agency is fairly endearing. You could almost forget how awful the first half is. It’s just incredibly frustrating to be forced to feel sorry for somebody who does nothing to earn an apology.

Throughout the movie’s first half, the number of offensive or asinine things that come out of Karl’s mouth is painful. And then, in the second half, you suddenly learn his meager backstory, meet his kind mother, and discover the heartbreak that made him a grump who hates women. Suddenly, you’re supposed to just stop hating him. Apparently, he’s actually a nice person who loves kids and is great in bed.

The switch works as well as it can, but it feels like it never should have to have happened in the first place. A movie can be funny and sappy about a man who can’t love because his heart was broken without making him an offensively gross person for the first half. The only reason Maria even gives him the time of day initially is because she is his therapist, which is gross and unethical in the first place.

Maria is the only reason The Heartbreak Agency works on any level. She is genuinely charming and even a little bit funny. She even has a cute kid to boot. The whole cheating on her partner while he’s away saving the world thing is maybe not the greatest indicator of the movie’s morality, but at least you feel genuinely sorry for her. It’s not a movie glorifying being unfaithful, but it does suffer enormously from the cardinal sin of Netflix movies: abysmal communication.

Just when Karl and Maria finally start feeling less annoying, the final act kicks in. The whole thing revolves around them simply not talking to each other. They had been wide-open books until then. It’s a worse plot crutch than any of Karl’s bad initial characterization. Countless other plot devices could have upped the tension between the two. Instead, they’re separated, mope, and forget how to talk like adults. It’s beyond aggravating that this is the only way Netflix romances know how to create tension.

The Heartbreak Agency doesn’t completely lack charm, but it does lack thoughtfulness. The main character is gross for the first half of the movie. His love interest has no reason to give him the time of day. And when they finally capture some goodwill, it’s wasted on an awful plot twist. It’s not only obviously from a mile away, but it should have stayed there too. The movie may have worked if the whole thing was presented with the balance of sincerity and humor of the fourth act. But in pursuit of the cheapest tricks, it loses any of what little luster it earns in the middle. Granted, The Heartbreak Agency could work with the increasingly common Netflix rom-com sequel treatment. If it focused on the couple as the people they evolved into instead of the people they started as, it may be a worthy endeavor.

The Heartbreak Agency is streaming now on Netflix.