Ex Ex Lovers Review
Director: JP Habac
Date Created: 2025-05-21 00:15
3.5
Ex Ex Lovers Review: This Filipino rom-com finally found its way to Netflix after a few months in theatres earlier this year, directed by JP Habac and written by Antoinette Jadaone and Kristine Gabriel. The movie stars Jolina Magdangal as Joy and Marvin Agustin as Ced, the film also stars Karlos Labajo and Loisa Andalio, who play important roles in this family drama. It appears on the surface to be yet another rom-com, but the film gets at deeper wounds of broken relationships and the pains of closure.
The plot of this Filipino movie Ex Ex Lovers is that a single mom named Joy is forced to come to terms with her past when her daughter tells her that she’s getting married and won’t let her separated-from-the-family father miss out on this baloney. This sets off a chain regarding past feelings, past hurts, and shocking truths are released. It’s the kind of premise that wouldn’t be out of place in anyone’s favourite soap opera (or Filipino soap opera, if you’re a connoisseur like that), but this film takes another path to recover one’s vulnerable heart and ego.
Ex Ex Lovers Review
From the first shots, I just enjoyed how real the characters felt. Joy isn’t the typical rom-com heroine. She’s a mess, emotional, clingy, and totally real. That’s sufficient to make me cheer for her. Jolina Magdangal does a great job at giving Joy depth that you feel for her character, with never an explanation, merely a need to.
The thing about Ex Ex Lovers that was one of my absolute favourite rotations is that it would never even dream of forcing some sappy romantic conclusion. What the film does instead is spend time figuring out what it really means to start over, not from a person, necessarily, but from the guilt, the regret, the uncertainty of a relationship that has broken down. That made it feel more grown-up and deliberate than most romantic comedies.
There is genuine chemistry between Ced and Joy, and the movie’s tightrope walk between hilarious and tear-jerking moments is brilliant. Some scenes made me smile, some made me laugh, and some of the time, think about the degree to which we let the past direct us. The humour is organic and not slapstick, which helped to ground the more emotional parts of the film.
I also enjoyed that the film makes neither partner wrong nor right. The way in which both of these weak points emerge. Ced is no model ex, and Joy is no model victim. That mix of the two made their story believable. I have watched so many movies that try to wrap it all together in the bow of a loving reconciliation, but here is one with the guts to ask, “What if reconciling isn’t the best resolution?”
And still, as emotionally embodied as it is, Ex Ex Lovers on Netflix is not flawless. One of the biggest problems I have with the movie is the pacing in the middle. A few of the scenes dragged on a bit too long, times when Joy and Ced were talking about the past. I understand that those scenes were supposed to show how confusing their emotions are, but I felt like they could have been trimmed down some.
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Another weakness was how quickly some characters changed their feelings. There, I thought the film was attempting to change up the emotional gears whiplash-wildly, as a last resort to prod the narrative along in a few of the scenes. When Joy finds some of the bitterness of her history, her reaction falls flat. I wish the filmmakers had allowed more time to show her emotional journey instead of rushing into the rest of the film.
And I felt like the movie sort of took Ced’s side to an extent, even though it was showing us Ced’s problems, and it could have also shown the harm that Ced was creating. Sure, his life had not been a walk in the park, but cutting back on their family and all that? I just wish that the movie took that more seriously.
One thing I appreciated about this Filipino film Ex Ex Lovers, is that it’s not a romcom about falling in love again. It is a movie about knowing when to walk away. That’s not something you tend to hear in romantic comedies. I love that the movie opted for emotional truth and not a happy ending. Joy’s journey is less about winning her ex back and more about winning back herself. To see her grow stronger and choose peace over chaos was powerful.
Not to mention the sub-plot with Joy’s daughter adds a lot to the film as well. It’s an up-close aside to Joy’s own past, a lesson in how our choices echo in the next generation. I won’t spoil the specifics of what the fallout is from that, but it kind of added an extra kind of emotional level to the movie, and something to tie everything together.
Summing Up
Overall, Ex Ex Lovers movie is a tear-jerking, but slow film that shows you how complicated love and relationships really are. It’s not the happy romance-comedy type of movie. Instead, it shows you something a bit more honest and emotional. It is not perfect, but it does have the right intentions. It’s a film about the power of forgiveness and the acceptance and understanding that not all love stories have to have a romantic ending; they can all still end happily!
Ex Ex Lovers 2025 is now streaming on Netflix.
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