Review: ‘Breaking & Exiting’ is the kind of unlikely romance that can only happen in the movies

As far as meet-cutes go, “Breaking & Exiting” might introduce a new one to the catalog. However, it also demonstrates that there may be a reason why rom-coms don’t normally introduce lovers with burglar-interrupted suicide attempts.

Harry (Milo Gibson) sure loves his work, even though that work is stealing from unsuspecting Los Angeles homeowners while they’re on vacation, with peeing in their toilets as his calling card. His latest job offers a new challenge: instead of finding his targeted house empty, he discovers Daisy (screenwriter Jordan Hinson) in the midst of a suicide attempt in the bathtub. Against his own selfish impulses, he rescues her, but to keep her from another attempt — or calling the police — he stays, and the two begin an unlikely romance.

“Breaking & Exiting” is as absent of emotional honesty as Harry is of integrity with a plot that would only happen in a movie, and not a particularly good one. Hinson’s script also doesn’t develop these characters in a believable way, while committing the cardinal sin of introducing voice-over narration from Peter only to abandon it and then bring it back in the film’s final moments.

Actor-turned-director Peter Facinelli makes his behind-the-camera debut, and beyond the film’s many script issues, it’s not entirely without its charms. Peter and Daisy might not make sense, but Gibson and Hinson almost sell it with strong chemistry.

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‘Breaking & Exiting’

Not rated

Running time: 1 hour, 18 minutes

Playing: Laemmle NoHo 7, North Hollywood