Halloween vs Valentines Day: Cupid
Cupid (2020)
★★★★☆☆☆☆☆☆ (4 out of 10 stars)
Director: Scott Jeffrey
Producer: Scott Jeffrey
Starring: Georgina Jane, Bao Tieu, Sarah T. Cohen
“Vengeance, when summoned from the wounded heart, seldom returns to its cage unchanged.” – Anonymous
The Review:
For Valentines Day I offer this bonus review, extending 31 Days of Halloween to overlap the holiday of love and cuddles, I reached into the insidious and occasionally insipid world of holiday horror and came up with this tarnished tale of love and loss… well, loss mainly. Cupid (2020) presents the familiar cherub of affection reimagined as something far more nihilistic—a dark inversion of what most people envision around Valentine’s Day. Here, love’s patron saint is less a bringer of romance and more a specter of punishment, swooping down on teens, dances, paternal letdowns, and maternal meltdowns with cruel theatricality.
The film’s pacing shambles with erratic energy, as though stitched together in haste by an unconfident hand. The plot feels forced, the dialogue teeters on improbable and smacks of punchline after punchline to a joke that was sadly on the viewer. The situations are undeniably campy—at times drifting into near-comedy. There is nothing that distinguishes this film beyond its willingness to embrace inappropriate humor over meaningful story.
And yet…
And yet…
Allow me to state a few positive points, for even the darkest, dankest places may occasionally catch the sunlight.
The film does not take itself seriously, and it clearly doesn’t expect you to either. It delights in its own excesses. Black magic simmers at its core, Death drifts about like a bemused spectator, and Cupid—once a symbol of affection—is turned into an irrational weapon of tear‑soaked emotional rage against the protagonist’s unfortunate bullies. What begins as heartbreak transforms into an indiscriminate, and often pointless terror raid fueled by campy catharsis and adolescent fury.
Is it elegant horror? No.
Is it refined? Absolutely not.
But is it fun if you surrender to its tone?
Okay—sure, in the way made for SyFy movies were fun.
If you don’t expect too much and allow yourself to be immersed in its gleefully awkward theatrics, Cupid (2020) becomes far more enjoyable than its modest means suggest. It is the cinematic equivalent of a blood‑spattered Valentine delivered with a wicked grin—imperfect, impulsive, but strangely satisfying.
A flawed film, yes…
But one that embraces its flaws with such gusto that you may just find yourself laughing and cringing despite your better judgment.