

The second half struggles to make it dramatic when it doesn't need it. The first half works somewhat as a light teen rom-com geared for girls.
The kissing booth review movie#
As for Lee, the movie deliberately gives him a girlfriend before the reveal so that there is no chance for romance. He's going to college and that's enough for emotional drama. It could have done some smaller emotional arcs to maintain its poignancy. There is no real drama to be had but the movie insists on injecting some big emotional conflicts. All of that is fine until it tries to be overly dramatic. It threatens to try early on and quickly draws back.

The plot is so simplistic that the movie refused to develop a love triangle. He wouldn't be waiting around at the kissing booth. Leaving that aside, their kiss makes no sense.

This stuff hasn't been done since Revenge of the Nerds. I don't think it would work for any fundraiser. In the modern era, a kissing booth is impossible for a high school fundraiser. They're passing notes in class for heaven's sake. There are a lot of referencing 80's and 90's especially the music. This seems to be a simple cheery teen rom-com. Even the mean girls are not complete ditches. Courtney has limited character work in his role. King is an adorable child actress trying to grow up on screen. This may not be one of those good things although it's not irredeemable. I hope for nothing but good things for these adorable actors.

The main problem is that Elle and Lee have set up these rules and dating the other's family is definitely one of them. Elle discovers that she has developed a crush on Lee's older hunky brother Noel (Jacob Elordi). In this film, we see Chloe get her own backstory and struggles, but it goes nowhere.In L.A., Elle Evans (Joey King) and Lee Flynn (Joel Courtney) have been best dancing friends since the day they were born at the same time to two best friends. In that film, Marco was better fleshed out (albeit sexualised) and Chloe was written as an apparent temptress, who turns out to be just misunderstood. In the second film, the only characters of Colour were Marco and Chloe. The lack of diversity in The Kissing Booth 3 is a problem. Elle’s identity, on the other hand, is intrinsically linked to the men in her life (her best friend, boyfriend, father and brother) making her feel like a pick-me girl at times. However, Lara Jean is a better fleshed-out character with her identity bringing a fresh flavour to the franchise. Lara Jean Covey and Elle Evans have a lot in common in their journeys (dead moms included). It also made a lot of Asian-American women feel seen. To All The Boys franchise was released with a lot of acclaim for telling the story of an American-Korean teen. Both Netflix productions that released at the same time, the major storyline of the two franchises are almost interchangeable. In fact, it’s a little worrisome how closely the storylines of The Kissing Booth 2 and 3 have mirrored To All The Boys 2 and 3. There are many, many moments in The Kissing Booth 3 that feel borrowed and inspired from things we have watched before. We also have the “teenagers trying to navigate long-distance relationship" trope. We have the “overprotective boyfriend who gets aggressive to assert his love" trope. We have the “second lead still has feelings for the heroine but is acting as her friend" trope. It shows the life of rich white teenagers who party and drink in high school.
The kissing booth review full#
The Kissing Booth 3, as a standalone film, is full of cliched teen-drama tropes. The last two characters were introduced in the second film to cause friction between Elle and Noah. Elle’s intrinsic journey also intersects with her love story with Noah, her growing distance with Lee and the presence of Marco Pena (Taylor Zakhar Perez) and Chloe Winthrop (Maisie Richardson-Sellers). Then she realises that she needs to make decisions for herself. She takes on a mammoth task and soon burns out. With this film, we see Elle come to terms with the fact that she cannot make all the people happy in her life. The rules are pretty unbreakable for them, as seen in the first film where Lee forbade Elle from dating his brother Noah. Throughout the first two films, it is established that Elle and Lee function through a set of best-friend rules and one of them is to go to the same college. On the other hand is Berkeley, where her best friend Lee (Courtney) wants to go. On one hand is Harvard, where her boyfriend Noah (Elordi) goes to. In the third part of the franchise, we see Elle Evans (King) make a decision about which college she is going to.
