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Love Jones (stylized as love jones) is a 1997 American romantic comedy-drama film written and directed by Theodore Witcher, in his feature film directing debut. The film stars Larenz Tate, Nia Long, Isaiah Washington, Bill Bellamy, and Lisa Nicole Carson.
In Chicago, Darius Lovehall is a poet who is giving a reading at the Sanctuary, an upscale nightclub presenting jazz and poetry to a bohemian clientele. Shortly before his set, he meets Nina Mosley, a gifted photographer. They exchange small talk, and Darius makes his interest clear when he retitles his love poem "A Blues For Nina". A mutual attraction is sparked between them. Darius runs into Nina for the second time at the record store and asks her out for drinks. Nina tells him it's bad timing, but Darius doesn't want to take no for an answer. He talks his friend Sheila into letting him copy Nina's address from the check she wrote, goes to another record store to get the CD she was looking for and then shows up at her place unexpectedly to deliver the CD and ask her out for a second time. They have sex on the first date, but neither Darius or Nina are sure what to do next. Nina has just gotten out of a relationship and is unsure if she still cares for her old boyfriend; Darius, meanwhile, is unsure about whether or not to admit that he really cares for Nina.
Just as Darius dares to begin believing that Nina could be "the one," Nina's ex-beau Marvin invites her to join him in New York to try to work things out. After a night with Darius, Nina tells him that she is going to New York because of unfinished business. More as a test of Darius' feelings than as an earnest attempt to resolve things with Marvin, Nina leaves, only to return to find that Darius has been fooling around with another woman. At this, Nina steps out with Darius' self-satisfied buddy Hollywood, sparking a blowup between the men and a reconciliation between the lovers, which does not last, requiring yet another separation and subsequent attempt to set things right.
Roger Ebert gave the film a score of three out of four stars, and expressed the view that "There is also a bow to the unconventional in the ending of his film. Many love stories contrive to get their characters together at the end. This one contrives, not to keep them apart, but to bring them to a bittersweet awareness that is above simple love. Some audience members would probably prefer a romantic embrace in the sunset, as the music swells. But Love Jones is too smart for that." He also noted on the acting: "It's hard to believe that Tate--so smooth, literate and attractive here--played the savage killer O-Dog in Menace II Society. Nia Long was Brandi, one of the girl friends, in Boyz n the Hood. Love Jones extends their range, to put it mildly".[11]
James Berardinelli, writing for ReelReviews, also awarded the film three out of four stars, writing that "There are several reasons why this film works better than the common, garden-variety love story. To begin with, the setting and texture are much different than that of most mainstream romances. The culture, in which post-college African Americans mingle while pursuing careers and relationships, represents a significant change from what we're used to. The Sanctuary, the intimate Chicago nightclub where Darius and Nina meet, is rich in its eclectic, bluesy atmosphere. And Love Jones's dialogue is rarely trite. When the characters open their mouths, it usually is because they have something intelligent to say, not because they're trying to fill up dead air with meaningless words".[12][13]
Darius Lovehall: Say, baby... can I be Your slave? I've got to admit girl you're the shit girl... and I'm digging you like a grave. Now, do they call you Daughter to the Spinning Pulsar... or maybe Queen of 10,000 moons? Sister to the Distant yet Rising Star? Is your name Yemaya? Oh, hell no. Its got to be Oshun. Oooh, is that a smile me put on your face, child... wide as a field of jasmine and clover? Talk that talk, honey. Walk that walk, money. High on legs that'll spite Jehovah. Shit. Who am I? It's not important. But me they call me brother to the night. And right now... I'm the blues in yourleft thigh... trying to become the funk in your right. Who am I? I'll be whoever you say? But right now I'm the sight-raped hunter... blindly pursuing you as my prey. And I just want to give you injections... of sublime erections... and get you to dance to my rhythm... make you dream archetypes... of black angels in flight... upon wings of distorted, contorted... metaphoric jizm. Come on slim. Fuck your man. I ain't worried about him. It's you who I want to step to my scene. 'cause rather the deal with the fallacy... of this dry-ass reality... I'd rather dance and romance your sweet ass in a wet dream. Who am I? Well, they call me Brother to the night. And right now I'm the blues in your left thigh... trying to become the funk in your right. Is that all right?
"Love Jones'' is a love story set in the world of Chicago's middle-class black artists and professionals--which is to say, it shows a world more unfamiliar to moviegoers than the far side of the moon. It is also frankly romantic and erotic and smart. This is the first movie in a while where the guy quotes Mozart, and the girl tells him he's really thinking of Shaw.
The movie stars Nia Long as Nina, a professional photographer, and Larenz Tate as Darius, a novelist. After an opening montage of great black and white Chicago scenes (Nina's photographs, we learn), they Meet Cute at the Sanctuary, a club inspired by the various venues around town for poetry slams, cool jazz and upscale dating. His moves are smooth: He meets her, walks to the mike, and retitles his poem "A Blues for Nina,'' reading it to her across the smoky room. She likes that. "Maybe next week you'll write something for me,'' he says. They engage in flirt-talk. "There are other things than sex,'' she tells him. Like what? he wants to know. She takes a pen and writes "love'' on his wrist.
The relationship between Darius and Nina proceeds, but not smoothly. Is it just a sex thing? They talk about that. She's on the rebound from her last man, and tells Darius "the timing is bad,'' but it starts looking pretty good. And their chemistry, as characters and actors, is hot. There's a sensuous scene where they go to her place, and she loads her camera and tells him to strip, and shoots him while he's teasing her. This nicely turns the gender tables on the famous "Blow Up" scene where the photographer made love through his camera.
Witcher's screenplay is not content to move from A to B to love. There are hurt feelings and misunderstandings, and Nina goes to New York at one point to see her former finance and find out if there's still life in their relationship. I didn't buy that New York trip; it seemed clear to me that Darius was her love, and if she was merely testing him, why take a chance of losing a good thing? Darius starts seeing another woman, she starts dating his best friend, and a completely avoidable misunderstanding develops.
Witcher has a good eye for locations. You can see Loop skyscrapers in the backgrounds of a lot of shots, so you know this is Chicago, but movies haven't shown us these neighborhoods before. Scenes are set in Hyde Park, on the near North Side, and in between. As the characters move from coffee bars to record stores to restaurants to the Sanctuary, we realize how painfully limited the media vision of urban black life is. Why do the movies give us so many homeboys and gangstas and druggies and so few photographers, poets and teachers? The title is spelled all lower-case. That kind of typography was popular in avant garde circles from the 1920s through the 1950s, on everything from book covers to record album jackets. I think Witcher is trying to evoke the tone of that period when bohemia was still somewhat secret, when success was not measured only by sales, when fictional characters wrote novels instead of computer programs and futures contracts. There is also a bow to the unconventional in the ending of his film. Many love stories contrive to get their characters together at the end. This one contrives, not to keep them apart, but to bring them to a bittersweet awareness that is above simple love. Some audience members would probably prefer a romantic embrace in the sunset, as the music swells. But "Love Jones'' is too smart for that.
Nia Long (Nina Mosley): I honestly felt like our chemistry was the best. It felt amazing and it felt right, and we looked good together and it looked believable. Ted just really wanted two black people that were identified as being black and beautiful in this movie. It wasn't meant to be any more than a story about two black people falling in love.
Long: I definitely didn't anticipate this much time to go by where the film is still regarded as a classic and a film that people can really relate to. I appreciate that so much, because you want your body of work to represent all sorts of stories and characters and to see that black love is powerful and people want to see more of it is a wonderful thing.
But it should be said that Love Jones was not a fairy tale or romanticized story of artistic life. Both Nina and Darius were careworn artists, one unemployed and the other struggling to finish a book manuscript. This makes Loves Jones as much a story of artistic persistence as it is a story of romantic love.
But fans should be clear that this is no substitute for a sequel nor is it a musical retelling of the 1997 film. Many of the characters and storyline are different. And almost none of the classic quotes of the film are included. Mostly the production is a high quality musical tribute to Love Jones made for those who still love the film and good soul singing.
Something else mundane but unique about Love Jones is that like many other Black films from the 90s it takes place in a Black world. I mean that in the sense that the focus is not on Black people trying to love, live, and survive in the mainstream world. Instead, its Black people immersed in a community of people much like themselves. There is one scene where Nina meets with a potential employer who is not digging her creative style. But aside from that, the focus is not on problems or struggles based on race or culture. Removing the issue of race allows the characters to just be people. They live lives that are completely normal but still uniquely immersed in the Black experience.
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