Jennifer Lopez to resurrect her lost music career

Jennifer Lopez is all set to revive her music career through her new Netflix movie.  In the new movie, Lopez portrays as  an airline CEO who has a secret affair with her lawyer, Daniel Blanchflower, played by Ted Lasso’s Brett Goldstein.

The first reviews are now in, but the film isn’t exactly landing with critics. With 24 reviews tabulated so far, Office Romance currently has a 42% score on Rotten Tomatoes. Critics cited issues with the movie’s poor dialogue, predictable story, inconsistent tone given its R-rating, and the stale chemistry between Lopez and Goldstein.

In ScreenRant’s review of Office Romance, Alex Harrison was among the general half that found the movie “delightful,” awarding a 7 out of 10 stars. Although the Netflix film “sports the bones of a more traditional rom-com,” the workplace element and comedy establish some of its own identity, and the pair’s chemistry successfully builds the “buzzing energy” to have viewers feel for the star-crossed lovers.

Nevertheless, this marks Lopez’s first rotten movie after Prime Video’s Unstoppable and Kiss of the Spider Woman were well-received. The Rotten Tomatoes score also continues an unfortunate streak for Netflix and Lopez’s collaboration.  Since 2022, the actor has done four projects with the streamer, but her documantary Halftime (82%) was the only one to get a fresh rating. She then starred in two action movies, The Mother (42%) and Atlas (17%), which received mixed-to-negative reviews.

Despite poor critical reviews, both movies starring Lopez performed very well on streaming. In 2023, The Mother became the sixth most-watched Netflix movie but has since fallen out of the chart. The following year, Atlas was the No. 1 movie in 71 countries. Hence, despite an underwhelming reception, the collaboration has led to streaming success.

While it’s unclear how Office Romance will perform on Netflix since it’s a rom-com, the streaming potential is promising. That’s because Lopez’s presence in the genre holds strong, as evidenced by her recent slate of movies. Shotgun Wedding helped Prime Video’s 9.3% viewership uptick in January 2023. Marry Me, which received a theatrical release in 2022, had a moderate box office of $56.5 million before eventually becoming a major streaming hit on Peacock and Prime Video.

Meanwhile, Lopez and Netflix’s collaboration will persist with a new crime thriller, The Last Mrs. Parrish, based on Liv Constantine’s 2017 novel. It currently doesn’t have a release yet, but the cast includes Game of Thrones‘ Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, Isabel May, and Pierson Fodé.

Alongside the duo, the Office Romance cast features Betty Gilpin, Bradley Whitford, Amy Sedaris, Tony Hale, Rick Hoffman, and Jodie Whittaker. Ol Parker is the director, while Goldstein also wrote the story with Joe Kelly.

While Lopez is known for her singing career, with hits like “Jenny from the Block” and “On the Floor,” she actually gained her fame through acting in shows like In Living Color and leading movies like Selena and Anaconda. While balancing singing and acting in the 2000s, she swooned moviegoers with back-to-back romantic comedies, such as Maid in Manhattan and The Wedding Planner. Although she has since diversified her filmography, she occasionally returns to rom-coms, as with her new Netflix feature, Office Romance.