Spoiler Review and Analysis: The Kissing Booth (2018)

A very good friend of mine went out of her way to tell me not to watch this film and provided what seemed to be strong, well-considered reasons why I should take her advice. Naturally, this only piqued my interest and I added it to My List on Netflix, where this film is exclusively available.

My friend said that above all else, The Kissing Booth contains every bad lesson you could possibly teach its teenage audience through a film. Was she right? Let's see.

The Kissing Booth (based on the book of the same name by Beth Reekles) follows Elle, played by Joey King. Elle has been best friends with Lee Flynn (Joel Courtney) ever since they were born at the same time, on the same day, in the same hospital. When they were six years old, they created a list of rules in their friendship, which ten years later, they still quote to each other when they feel the need to. One of the main rules is “Rule 9: Relatives Of Your Best Friend Are Totally Off-Limits”. That may sound fine and fair, except this rule is clearly aimed at Elle and excludes Lee because 1: Elle’s only family members are her dad and brother, who appears to be approximately eight years old when Elle and Lee are sixteen, and 2: Lee has an older brother whom Elle finds attractive, named Noah (played by Jacob Elordi). After Noah kisses Elle at the school kissing booth, the pair realise that their feelings for each other may be so strong that the rule has to be broken. How will they tell Lee? Will Lee and Elle’s friendship survive this?

I don’t like this film. I don’t hate it with every fibre of my being, but it did anger and frustrate me at more than one point. I’ll now proceed to dissect the plot in a spoiler-filled way to explain why I feel this way.

The film begins with an odd stylistic choice of having the opening credits put on different signs around L.A., where the film is set. This would be fine, but the problem with this presentation is that names of the people and studios being credited are also tied in with titles and names on real signs. For example, the opening shot is the Los Angeles Memorial Hospital, with its name clearly displayed on the building, but then they shove “A Netflix original film” under this title. That makes it look like Netflix is presenting us with a film called "Los Angeles Memorial Hospital."

The next shot shows a sign giving directions to different wards in the hospital. My eye is naturally drawn to the bright red one with the word “EMERGENCY” written in capitals, but it is actually the centrally framed grey sign that reads “Labor and Delivery” (and yes, “Labor” because it’s American) that we are supposed to be focusing on, which is directly above a similar looking grey sign.

My problem with this opening sequence can be summed up with this example: there is too much going on. The film is trying to establish its location and what's happening in its plot, while also doing its opening credits, which continue to be mixed in with real signs in the hospital. This means that the audience is missing out on potential information they are supposed to be taking in.

It would be fine if these opening credits were presented in the same vein as most films, where we were thrust into the action of the film immediately and the credits popped up on top of the opening sequence scenes. That works because we’re introduced to active characters, and we can begin to figure out who they are. For the opening credits of The Kissing Booth though, this mixed introduction just appears confusing, clunky and rushed, particularly as each shot is only a couple of seconds long and doesn’t feature any characters to intrigue us. I eventually stopped reading things on screen because I got bored and eventually had to rewind when two of our main characters were introduced.

So, not a good start.

Those two main characters, in baby form, are Elle and Lee. The pair are best friends, as Elle tells us during her four minute voiceover narration monologue.

“I don’t remember a lot from before high school,” says Elle. Bearing in mind that she’s approximately sixteen years old, this means high school would only be two years of her life experience so far. How dull must her life before school have been for her to forget most of it? Well, worry not because we get a montage of her few remaining memories of life before high school, with narration!

Most of these memories are things that, as the upbeat music suggests, are quirky but not as original or actually unique as the film wants you to believe. I might be able to forgive this a bit more easily, but there are already some problematic things shown in this montage.

Some of Elle’s memories here include her mother, who was best friends with Lee and Noah’s mother. Elle’s mother is shown to be sick and in the hospital a lot, before she eventually dies when Elle is fourteen. The music dips for these parts, the shots are usually darker, and Elle is shown looking sad or even crying. The film then cuts away to new, uplifting “quirky” memories Elle has, so cue the upbeat music back in play and the bright, cheerful scenes within this montage. Yes, the film gives its audience absolutely no time to consider the weight of the situation, or how Elle might really be feeling. We never see her talk to Lee about her mother, or how her mother’s death made her feel, in this montage or in the film. A crucial part of this montage is seeing how Elle’s friendship with Lee develops. Surely seeing how he helped her through such a difficult time on an emotional level, and not just with distractions of goofy acts, would be a great way to have shown this?

But it’s worse than that. The reason these parts of the montage offend me so much is that it seems to think that its target audience, young females, wouldn’t be able to handle it if the film dared to confront them with a darker subject, such as death. That’s why they cut away and quickly carry on with those w a c k y things Elle and Lee got up to in their childhood, accompanied with irritating light-hearted music on top. It undermines the intelligence of the girls who this film is aimed at, and also keeps them from truly connecting to or understanding Elle as a result, which is an insult to those choosing to give almost two hours of their time to watch this.

To the films credit, it does do a good job of introducing Noah as a character, and by the end of this montage, we have a good idea of who he is without having overly been told it. Additionally, it does a nice job of showing Elle’s feelings for Noah as they develop over time, and how she copes with that. It just would have been good to see how she coped with her mother’s death too. That’s something that would shape a person of any age, but it never really comes up again. When it does, it’s only brief and again, cuts away to something else so that we aren’t given time to think about what we -or Elle- should be feeling about this.

Also, that montage showed Elle’s “almost” first kiss with a boy, in which he sneezed thick green mucus all over her and it is one of the most disgusting things I have ever had to witness onscreen. This might be a nit-pick because I personally don’t like gross-out humour, but I think that it was vile and I deeply wish I could un-see it.

When the montage eventually ends, we see Elle at Lee’s house, which is the fanciest, most expensive house I think I have ever seen, at least in a teen movie. Lee and Noah’s apparent wealth is never referenced though. Instead, we are greeted with Lee jumping off what looks like the roof of his house, into the pool. After landing successfully, he gets out of the pool, only to be pushed back in by Noah, and when he's out again, gets pushed in again, now by Elle. I wonder how Lee didn't get any injuries?

As the pair talk, and Noah pops into the scene, something very troubling occurred to me: none of these characters are likeable, and all three of them are the main characters. I was willing to forgive Noah initially, and assume he's the douchebag who is later revealed to be a secret sweetheart, a common cliché of the genre. He didn’t come across very well in this scene though, appearing smug as he comments on Elle's breasts while she wears a bikini.

Then there’s Elle and Lee. It’s not just that I don’t like watching them as an adult viewing this film, and wouldn't have liked watching them as a teen, but I’m quite positive I would have hated them if I had gone to school with them. They’re so obnoxious and overly confident in themselves, yet this fascinates me somewhat. These are the only two characters in a high school film that I’ve ever seen who plan to throw a birthday party and don’t have any worries about who, or even if anyone, will show up for it. Yet they aren’t popular. Lee is a nerd whom no one really seems to like, and Elle isn’t shown socialising with anyone except for Lee in terms of friendships. So, how does this work?

A couple of days later, it is the first day of the new school year. Elle changes into her school uniform, and as she tries to walk in it, her trousers rip. The only thing she has left to wear instead is a skirt, which is ridiculously short. This is supposedly because Elle has grown so much since she last wore it, but I don’t think there’s a height that would make that skirt look an appropriate length, definitely not for school at least. I’m sure that Joey King is a lovely person, but I did not appreciate the close up of her exposed butt-cheek as part of my film-viewing experience.

The fact that Elle and the other “kids” (i.e. actors in their twenties pretending to be teenagers) in this school have to wear school uniforms suggests that this is a private school, which further shows Elle, Lee and Noah’s privilege. I understand that not every teenager is an underdog, and that the teen years in a person’s aren’t some of the roughest in everyone’s life, but it adds to the difficulty in being able see how we’re supposed to empathise with Elle. She has this life with a good education, a wealthy, loving family, a close friend, and is attractive, which only serves to make her look like a brat when her main conflict in the film proves to be so juvenile and un-relatable later on.

Don't worry, I'll get to what that conflict is when it comes.

Lee drives Elle to school, where everyone starts staring at her because she is basically flashing the entire school with her miniskirt. One boy named Tuppen even smacks Elle’s bottom, which angers Lee and he tries to punch Tuppen. Of course, Lee is a pathetic human being and ends up being almost beaten instead, until Noah flies in to attack Tuppen instead. The headteacher intervenes, and Noah, Elle and Tuppen get sent to his office. Lee, now alone, calls Noah a douchebag and gets angry that he “even gets credit for my fights”.

Yeah, you worry about the fight you just lost Lee, never mind your best friend who was just sexually assaulted.

We see Noah and Elle waiting to see the headteacher, and I’m alarmed by the school uniforms. Firstly, it has become apparent to me that these kids don’t wear matching ties, just ties with similar colours on. Also, Noah is wearing converse and Elle is wearing high heeled ankle boots. How are these allowed? Perhaps it's different with American schools than it is to English schools, but I don't see why a school would put a uniform in place only to have it be so flexible.

Elle, in her panic after the incident, asks Noah why he intervened. Noah says it’s because no girl deserves to be treated the way Tuppen treated her, particularly because Noah views Elle as his little sister. Okay, that seems kind of sweet.

...Until he immediately comments that Elle has no experience with guys, and that by her short skirt, she’s “asking for it”. It’s pretty bad and uncomfortable to hear.

Luckily, in one of her few respectable moments in this film, Elle calls Noah out on this and he admits he was wrong to say this. Elle is then sent to the head-teacher’s office, and after a quick warning with the agreement she’ll attend detention, we cut to lunch time that day.

As she sits alone to eat, the cliché group of three attractive, popular girls have lunch with her. This trio of girls are referred to by the already dated name of “The O.M.G. Girls”, because each of the girl’s first names combined spells out “O.M.G.” I don’t think I’ve heard anyone actually say “O.M.G.” since 2010. Also, if people these days want to shorten “Oh My God”, they usually just rush through it and say something that sounds like “Errmehgad”.

The girls only join Elle to ask if she’s dating Noah, but when they find out she isn’t, they lose interest and leave. For some reason, this leaves Elle wondering why the girls were so nice to her. If she is already aware of Noah’s popularity, both with girls and in the school in general, why wouldn’t she be able to deduce their behaviour and intentions for herself?

Once they’ve left, Lee arrives to gush about Mia, the “M” in the O.M.G. girls. This continues into the next scene where he is trying on an array of hideous shirts for comic relief. I had a hard time believing that Lee would lust after Mia. We barely see them together, but also Lee reminds me of characters like Jesse in She’s All That and Carter in A Cinderella Story: he’s so caught up in being the flamboyant side character, and otherwise invested in the female lead's life, that it’s hard to believe he would be actively interested in another female character. Elle makes a joke about how the only way Mia would kiss Lee would be if he paid her (wow, what a supportive friend Elle isn't: at least gently break the news of his delusion to him). It’s because of this the pair decide a kissing booth would be a great addition for the upcoming school carnival. Lee then teases Elle about how it’s ironic that she, who has never been kissed, is going to run the kissing booth. However, there is no mention of Lee ever getting his first kiss, and Elle seems to be more liked than him, so… what’s missing here?

Later, in detention, Tuppen sends Elle notes, apologising to her for harassing her and asks how he can get her phone number. Elle is charmed by this (not really sure why) but in exchange for her number, gets Tuppen to stroll into the detention room wearing her tiny skirt instead of his school trousers. This impresses Elle, and she gives him the number. She later arrives at the location for where they’re supposed to meet for their first date, but Tuppen doesn’t show up. It isn’t revealed how long Elle chose to wait for him exactly, but she goes to the arcade to play on the dance machine with Lee that they love to cheer herself up.

Tuppen arrives at the arcade, and apologises to Elle for standing her up. He reveals that for a long time, Noah has been warning guys away from Elle and telling them not to ask her out. Knowing how violent Noah could be towards them, all the guys agree to this, as Tuppen beautifully states:

Elle declares in retaliation that her breasts are fantastic, and the arcade falls silent as she states this. This had potential to be funny, it just comes off as a bit too awkward, as a lot of the films humour relies on uncomfortable situations. Speaking of:

In the next scene, Elle angrily phones Noah and tells him that he cannot control her life anymore. “We’ll see about that.” Noah replies.

Creep. That’s such a possessive, controlling thing to say. We’re supposed to be supportive of these two as a couple later on, but before they’re even together, I want to tell Elle to run for the hills. Instead, Elle’s reaction is to groan like a child and sulk. This isn’t okay.

It additionally doesn’t help Noah that he’s sitting in the dark, alone, and appears to be naked in this scene either.

Really wish there had been at least a hint of Noah's boxers here.

We then see Elle and Lee convincing the school council to accept their idea of a kissing booth at the carnival. One kid does point out all the horrible germs that could exchanged through this, but he’s made to look like an uptight snob and not the only rational teenager in this film so far, which I don’t appreciate. The kissing booth idea is accepted. The line “I’m British, you wanker,” came from this scene, so at least some good came out of it. Then again, it was delivered by a girl whose English accent wasn’t entirely convincing, so you win some, you lose some, I suppose.

A few inconsequential scenes occur that are designed to build some kind of chemistry between Noah and Elle. Noah chooses not to tell his parents and Elle’s dad the real reason he got into a fight at school, which Elle thinks it means he’s protecting her. Surely informing the adults that a boy made an inappropriate sexual action against Elle would be the right thing for Noah to do? Apparently not.

She later goes to a party Noah is hosting at his and Lee’s house while their parents are away. It looks like there are around a hundred teenagers there, and I have no idea how they are getting away with this loud rave with a ton of underage drinking, but eh, logic isn’t a strong point for this film.

Or any kind of feature in it at all.

Elle finally asks Noah if he’ll work at the kissing booth, he says no. However, Elle reports back to the O.M.G. girls that he said yes, and this subsequently leads to them agreeing to work at the booth too. With encouragement from the O.M.G. girls, Elle gets incredibly drunk and then strips in a rather embarrassing to watch scene. Noah carries her away before she completely bares all, and she wakes up in his bed, and in his shirt. An awkward struggle for a pair of Noah’s shorts ends with Elle accidentally groping Noah’s penis, which as two shots of his sports cup showed us, is apparently XL in size. I don’t really know why this is included. I think it's supposed to be comedy, but is also potentially designed to make Noah seem more attractive, which is uncomfortable, as they're teenagers, as is the target audience for this film.

Later at school, Lee and Elle get into a paint fight that no one tells them off for. Elle goes into the toilets to wash the paint from her eyes, but it wouldn’t be a teen comedy if she didn’t stumble into the boy’s changing room instead. She realises this too late, as she has already taken off her shirt. A horrified Noah tries to drag her out as the other boys get excited at how hot Elle is. Elle then becomes a brat and says she isn’t ready to leave yet and proceeds to run around the changing room in her bra.

This is where a major flaw in the film is relevant for me to mention: with the previous drunk strip scene, this paint strip scene and a later scene where she strips at the beach, plus other scenes with Elle in her underwear, Elle is uncomfortably sexualised throughout this entire film. She is a sixteen year old character, so even if her actress is a legal adult, this isn’t okay. The film also seems to have no clue with it’s intentions when it comes to these scenes. Is it empowering that she’s confident enough to bare all? Are we supposed to feel uncomfortable that she’s making herself vulnerable, as these scenes almost always involve large crowds of male peers around her? Are we just supposed to sit back and be glad that Elle has made another opportunity for herself to be saved by Noah?

I made the decision to follow a strong instinct I had about who the director of this film might be and Googled it to confirm if I was right. As I predicted, The Kissing Booth was indeed directed by a middle aged man, Vince Marcello, who also wrote the screenplay. Sadly, this really shows. Granted, Noah gets his shirt off a fair few times too, but with Elle, it feels dirty, and it confuses her character. I found myself worrying if Joey King ever felt uneasy while she was directed in these scenes. In terms of the script, it’s clear that this man has no real idea of how teenagers act or talk to each other (“O.M.G. girls”!) or even how they should. However, to mildly defend Marcello, he isn’t the only culprit here.

The Kissing Booth was originally written and published as a novel on Wattpad by the then fifteen year old author Beth Reekles. I haven’t read the entire book, but in my research for this review, I read a couple of excerpts. As far as self-published books by young girls go, this isn’t the worst, but it does have some awkward dialogue that desperately wants to replicate how young people speak, such as this exchange between Lee and Elle on page ten:

“Our booth is going to kill.”

“I know. We are scary good sometimes.” There’s also an inconsistency where Elle hates being called Shelly, but only Noah calls her this, and no one else ever dares to call her Shelly, as they know the scolding Elle will give them for it. After this fascinating information is given to us on page five, Lee then proceeds to call Elle “Shelly” on page nine with no repercussions or acknowledgement of it. This fact isn’t relevant to the overall point I’m trying to make here, I just wanted to share it because it annoyed me.

My point is, no matter how intelligent a teenager might be, they do not have the life experience yet to write realistic characters. I’m a writer, who at ages fourteen to sixteen wrote two books that will never see the light of day about two different teenage girls. They were horrible. I knew this as I was writing them. Being a teenager is an awkward, awful time for the most part, and because of this, it’s probably one of the most emotionally complex times of your life, although there may not always be a lot of serious depth behind those emotions. I personally believe you need to be an adult, by which I mean at least twenty years old, when you’ve been out of a school environment for a couple of years. This is so you can reflect on how you were in your youth, with being so emotionally caught up in those feelings, thereby dramatising everything you may think, feel or write if you still are one. Many teenagers are intellectually smart, but that does not mean they have the experience yet to know the difference between first infatuation and genuine romantic love where both people involved feel safe and happy with their person. That means that what they do choose to write probably sets unrealistic or unhealthy ideas and standards.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. The language in Reekles’ book, even if it was suitable for the time, is not timeless language. By putting it into a film, this will age the film too, and already makes me wince at some of the language that fails to depict how people really speak, ("O.M.G. girls"!).

Back to the film, the day of the festival arrives and Elle once again pleads with Noah to make him work at her stall. She tries to emotionally blackmail him into doing it, but he still refuses. Nonetheless, Elle doesn't back down on her promise to customers at the booth that Noah Flynn will work at the booth sometime that night. Elle and Lee welcome a large crowd of horny teens to their stall and it seems to be successful, as they have one blindfolded guy working to kiss all the girl customers, and a blindfolded girl working to kiss all the boy customers.

As for the gay boys and girls who want to join in with this? Sorry, I suppose you can’t visit this stall. Sure, you didn’t get to be a part of something that apparently “matters” and is fun for everyone else, but hey, at least you won’t look back at this with feelings of regret.

Maybe just feelings of exclusion.

Actually, they do show a guy being winked at by another guy, who is flattered by this but nothing comes of it. I have no idea what I’m supposed to make of that, apart from it’s a cheap attempt to be inclusive. It actually would have been interesting to see Lee and Elle try to tackle how to make the both LGBTQ+ friendly, but of course the film doesn’t have time for thoughtful ideas like that, because that would mean they would have another strong reason to consider why this whole booth idea is dumb.

Anyway, the booth is surprisingly a success. That is, until Lee is revealed to be the Flynn brother promised to work at the booth, and not Noah, who is referred to by his surname to everyone except Elle. Most of the girls feel cheated by this and leave, but one random girl we’ve never seen before steps onstage and kisses Lee. Lee takes off his blindfold, sees the girl is beautiful, and proceeds to kiss her again in front of everyone. He then announces to Elle that he and the girl are going to hang out right there and then, leaving Elle to handle the booth on her own. No, we don’t know what this girl's name is, and it isn’t revealed until half an hour after we first see her. Spoiler alert: she’s called Rachel.

The O.M.G. girls trick Elle into working at the kissing booth because one of them doesn’t want to kiss a nerdy boy who is next in line. They tell Elle that the guy (who she won’t see, as she’ll be blindfolded) is one of the O.M.G.’s ex-boyfriends, and they need Elle to face it for them. This might be understandable logic from these rip-offs of The Plastics in Mean Girls, except one of the girls was already shown kissing him?

Noah actually buys a ticket for the booth and the nerdy boy who Elle was supposed to kiss lets him cut in front. I think it’s supposed to be because he was nervous, but again, we just saw him kissing one of the girls, why would he be nervous?

The nerdy guy kissing one of the O.M.G. girls at approximately 41:08 minutes into the film

The exact same guy letting Noah cut in front of him approximately three minutes later in the running time, because of... nerves?

Noah gets on stage with a blindfolded Elle, who starts awkwardly gushing in front of everyone about how she’s never been kissed before. Noah kisses her to shut her up. It doesn’t work though, because voiceover Elle narrates it, and shares her realisation that she’s kissing Noah. She takes off the blindfold to confirm this and they kiss again. Lights explode, a romantic song plays and the camera spins around them making out, which is actually a good visual to depict a first kiss with someone you really like. The film cuts back to reality and the pair realises a whole crowd of people just saw them. The crowd cheers and chants for Noah. It makes no sense why they would do this.

Anyway, Elle panics that Lee will find out, and she rushes to tell him. She manages to convince him it didn’t mean anything. Lee appears upset, and responds with this well-thought out dialogue:

"Grinding coochies." Did my hard-driving point about the language in this film hit home yet?

Elle’s narration tells us that she is running home, but the Elle we see on screen is barely jogging. Most people could easily overtake her by walking. Noah comes by and offers her a lift on his motorbike, which she accepts. Heavy rain comes down on them after a little while, and he has to pull over. They hide in what I believe is a greenhouse. As Noah watches the rain, Elle stares at him, heavy breathing and decides that, although she doesn’t know if Noah wants to kiss her again, she sure as heck wants to kiss him, and so she pounces on him.

A couple of notes here. Firstly, if the roles were reversed, and it was a guy staring at a girl, breathing heavily and salivating slightly before grabbing her and kissing her in a place where they are potentially trapped in isolation due to bad weather, would this be okay? Despite some lingering looks from Noah at Elle when she doesn’t know he’s looking, Elle is unsure what Noah thinks of her in the romantic sense at this point.

Secondly… I rarely comment on actors appearances and usually think it is unneeded. In chick-flicks, actors and actresses rarely undergo any great lengths of makeup or styling, as they are supposed to portray real, every day people. Yet, I have to say something here. I understand that it’s a major nit-pick, but here goes:

The height difference between Elle and Noah is ridiculous.

I know this is silly. I’m sorry, and I feel particularly bad because I know these two are dating or did date in real life, but it’s remarkably distracting. I even Googled it. There is exactly one foot between them. They don’t even fit in the same frame for a lot of the time. When you think how fussy Hollywood is about more minor things than this when it comes to casting actors, you would think getting two people who at least fit in the frame together. Poor Noah has to be practically horizontal to kiss Elle, he’s bending that far down. It takes me out of the film at times.

After the kiss, Elle admits she’s worried that she’ll be just another conquest of Noah’s. He tells her that she is the only girl who won’t fall at his feet, and it drives him crazy. Not the most romantic, or even healthy reasons for liking a girl, but he does proceed to add a couple of niceties about enjoying her company and that she’s sweet. This seems to woo Elle and they proceed to make-out. A security guard called Andrew walks in on them, and scolds Noah for bringing yet another girl here. Elle’s reactions to both of these things are quite funny and well-played by Joey King. She makes Noah drive her home, as the rain has miraculously cleared.

Elle lies on her bed, making a pro and con list for dating Noah on her laptop, while only wearing a white top and her underwear with the curtains in her bedroom wide open, which is concerning. She remembers Rule #6 from the stupid list she and Lee made when they were six. Why do they still hold onto this list of rules for their friendship so tightly? They wrote that thing about ten years ago. Surely they would look at it and laugh at the silly things they made up for themselves by this point?

During what appears to be the next day, Elle, Lee and Noah are at a beach party, and yes, Elle is once again in bikini.

The fact that this beach party appears to go on for an entire day in a public place, with a lot of underage drinking, and no adults ever showing up to report them to the police or even express concern, must be put to one side. People in L.A. must just be terrible parents.

At night, a fully clothed boy approaches bikini-clad Elle and forcefully tries to drag her into a hot tub with him. Because why have the ocean on this beach, when it apparently has hot tubs?

Noah stops him, and proceeds to tackle him forcefully when he refers to Elle as Noah’s little brother’s sloppy seconds. Noah looks around him to see everyone is horrified at his violent reaction. I’m not really sure why they feel this way, as Noah has a reputation for being in fights, in fact, it is almost expected of him. Although Lee is shown to be at the beach with Rachel, he is oddly missing from this scene. Elle, on the other hand, storms away and ignores Noah angrily calling after her. This was good, and healthy of Elle, recognising that she needed to be away from Noah while he was in a violent, angry mood as she might not be safe with him.

Then he slams his hand down on the bonnet of his car, demands that she get in the car with him one more time and quietly adds "please". Elle gets in the car with him. Damn it Elle. They both needed time to cool down and be away from each other. They could have talked in the morning.

Instead, they go to the Hollywood sign and talk. Elle proceeds to give him three rules: no more fighting, no more telling her what to do, and if they continue their romance, no one can know until she’s told Lee. Noah agrees to all of these terms, and instead of waiting to see if he will comply with them, they have sex, which is Elle’s first time. To be fair on Noah, he did make sure it was fully consensual, which not every film with a romantic sex scene takes the time to do.

So, how was Elle’s first time? Bearing in mind it took place in front of a seemingly unguarded, iconic landmark, it was apparently painless and not at all uncomfortable for her, despite Noah’s earlier implied XL sized penis.

The next ten minutes is Elle and Noah sneaking around, secretly dating. During this time, something amazing and mind-blowingly hilarious is revealed: Noah got accepted into Harvard.

Noah, who is notorious for fights, gets into detention, and has no extra-curricular activities that we see, except for riding a motorbike and being a floozy with girls, got accepted into Harvard, one of the top universities in the world. He is never even shown to be studying, and the two times we see him in a classroom are when he's in detention, and when he has sex with Elle in a empty science lab. I am stunned by the stupidity of this development. How on earth did Noah get into Harvard?! It makes no sense at all and is entirely out of character for him. Elle somehow isn’t surprised by this though, and is just sad that he will be leaving her soon.

Also during these ten minutes, Lee stands outside of Elle’s door and listens to the sexual noises he can hear coming from her room. When he finally reveals his presence, Elle rushes to answer her door and explains that the noises were just her watching porn, while she was really with Noah. Lee asks if he can watch it with her.

Lee. Why are you so weird and creepy?! What straight guy, with a girlfriend, asks to watch porn with their female best friend, who he believes was previously watching it alone? That would suggest she was masturbating to it, further implied when she tells him to wait downstairs while she finishes it. At least he leaves, but this is still weird and dodgy.

Also, despite this montage of much time being spent with Noah, Elle still hasn’t told Lee that she’s dating Noah. This just makes the secret more toxic for when he does find out.

Elle accidentally has a fall while with Noah at his house, and gets a cut on her face, which Noah tends to. They talk a little bit about Noah getting into fights so often. He worries he is wired just to get angry and fight, but Elle thinks he can change. A major red flag. If there is one thing that every mother should sit down and tell their daughters who like guys, it’s that we cannot change them. The idea that we can is incredibly toxic for both people involved, and creates false hope and misery. If you want to change things about a guy because those parts of him are making you miserable, leave. He isn't right for you. There will be someone out there with those qualities you seek, and they will be compatible for you. Just give it time, don't stick around on the basis of denying who someone really is.

Rant aside, Lee walks in on Noah tending Elle's wound and angrily accuses Noah of hurting Elle, which Noah nearly starts fighting with him for. So much for change.

Elle drags Lee outside and when he asks if she and Noah are dating, she denies it. Why would she do this? That was a perfect time to stop the lie. Lee’s emotions were heightened, so it might not have been a good time to do it, but knowing that he won’t react well to it, surely there was never going to be a good time?

Instead, she tells Lee to go and start his car while she gets her things, and they can go for a drive to get away for a little bit. Elle actually uses this time to tell Noah that she’s going to tell Lee about them that day. Noah agrees this is for the best and they kiss, which Lee walks in on.

Damn it Lee, don’t you ever knock? Maybe he should have just walked into Elle’s room when he thought she was watching porn, that would have saved us on the running time a little bit at least.

Unfortunately, Lee's reaction is nasty and toxic, which suggests the dangerous idea that Noah and Elle were right to keep this relationship a secret from him. Lee insults both of them, notably calling Elle a slut. Noah calls Lee a hurt little bitch, and when Lee punches him, Noah pins him to the ground and yells at Lee to chill out.

Needless to say, having his massive brother pinning him to the ground doesn’t help Lee to “chill out”. Instead, he runs off, and Elle runs after him, crying and yelling hysterically, which feels awkward, over-the-top and unnecessary.

As Lee gets in his car, he tells Elle that Noah has gotten everything he wanted in his life, and that Elle was the only thing that Lee had and Noah didn’t. I’m sorry if you’re tired of seeing this word, dear reader, but this is TOXIC. Elle is a human being. A rather one-dimensional one, certainly, but still a human being with feelings to consider, your supposed “best friend”, and not an object for you to possess, Lee. It would make a little bit more sense if Lee had feelings for Elle, but the film never even considers this as an option, and besides, he has a girlfriend. Why would he remain this consistently possessive of his single, female friend? The fact that they have been lifelong friends is not a good justification in this argument. Lee doesn't care about Elle's feelings here, which he really should do. He only cares about the fact that Elle broke a rule they made up when they were children, and that he wasn't told about it. His reasons for being upset are entirely selfish.

Once Lee drives off, Noah walks up to Elle and tries to comfort her, though he is clearly upset by the whole ordeal too. Elle then hits Noah in the stomach, which is all she can reach on him I suppose, and yells at him. He rightfully tells her that this mess isn’t all on him, and she tells him to leave her alone.

Elle, Noah and Lee are shown to be miserable for a few days –weeks? It’s unclear- and all by themselves (though Lee still has the girlfriend?).

Lee and Noah’s mother, played by Molly Ringwald (oh Molly, with Jem and the Holograms, now this, are you cursed to be in dreadful teenage films for the rest of your days?) visits Elle and offers her the reassurance that true best friends will make up in the end, and forget what they were fighting about. This scene is fine, but to be honest, I think it was mostly written to show off that Molly Ringwald from Sixteen Candles and The Breakfast Club (people don’t talk about Jem and the Holograms)

was in this film.

In a bizarre eureka moment, Elle remembers rule number seven from the friendship rules she and Lee had made, which is to forgive a friend who gives you ice-cream. Lee unfortunately throws the ice-cream Elle offers into the bin instead of her face, but it brings up a point that I think is rather valid: Lee just broke one of their rules too.

By not forgiving Elle and accepting her apology with ice-cream, Lee is breaking the rule that he has to forgive Elle in this situation. Elle should have called him out on this, and they could have discussed how the list is a dumb thing they created when they were kids, and that it’s silly that they still follow it. They could agree to stop following the rules, and Elle could help make Lee realise that she has genuine feelings for Noah. Once Lee learned that Noah’s feelings for Elle were equal to hers for him and that Noah didn’t want to hurt Elle, he could probably begin to accept and be okay with them as a couple. Happy, well-resolved ending!

Except that doesn’t happen because Lee just throws away the ice-cream and Elle despairs for the next four minutes of screen time until they make up again.

Until then, Noah visits Elle’s dad to apologise for keeping their dating a secret, but reveals he isn’t sorry for dating Elle overall, as he has genuine feelings for her. Elle’s dad says he doesn’t approve, which is interesting, because Noah is the son of his late wife’s best friend, and their families meet every Sunday.

Hang on. They meet every Sunday, both of their families coming together. How the heck did Noah and Elle keep their feelings for each other while at this family/friend gathering? It does also bring up the interesting question of how long did Noah and Elle actually date for? It's unclear. It could have just been for a week for all we know.

Anyway, Elle’s dad says although he may not approve, overall, it is Elle’s choice whether or not they date. Wow. A man in Elle’s life not trying to control her. Elle, just stay with your dad. He seems like a decent man, and they’re apparently rare in your world, particularly when it comes to ones your age.

Elle and Lee are both at the arcade. Lee puts in money for himself to go on the dance machine, then puts in money for a second player. He gestures for Elle to come over and they dance together on it, making up at last.

Why isn’t this film named after the dance machine? The kissing booth only shows up in two scenes, the dance machine comes up in far more scenes and is a prominent part of Lee and Elle’s friendship, something that they share. They grew up with it, they danced on it to comfort Elle after Tuppen stood her up, and Lee danced on it with Rachel, which made Elle realise how distant she felt from him as they were both exploring their new romantic relationships. Now they repair their friendship on it. Elle kissed Noah at the kissing booth, and yes, a first kiss is a big event you’ll always remember, but the reason Elle keeps her relationship with Noah a secret is because of how much she loves and values Lee. So surely the friendship is the real focus of this film? Even on the poster, Lee is standing closer to Elle than Noah is. Therefore, the dance machine should be the icon of this film, although I suppose that would come off as more dated than having it as a charming little side-piece suggests. Then again, the film hasn't worried about how it will age in the future before.

Elle joins Lee and Rachel in going to prom. They play ‘Don’t You Forget About Me’ from The Breakfast Club as they enter an exhibition of photos (who has an exhibition at a prom?) to show off memories of the school year.

They really want to make those Molly Ringwald connections, don’t they?

It turns out that the kissing booth has been replicated, and people clap for Elle and Lee, because they ran it. Lee rushes onto it, puts his blindfold on and gets Rachel to join him to kiss him, which is how they met. This is kind of sweet, but a little frustrating that we never learn anything about Rachel, and Lee has been a bit of a brat in this film, so it’s hard to feel any sentiment for these characters in this moment.

Elle doesn’t feel this way though, as she watches the pair at the kissing booth and proceeds to reflect in narration:

“I was a small part of something that mattered.”

Oh, were you now, Elle?

“Kissing Booth meant something to people.”

No it didn’t.

“It was going to be remembered by everybody.”

No it wasn’t.

“And that made me happy.”

Well, ignorance is bliss, kiddo. Knowing how things are in your school, half the students are drunk already and don’t even remember their names, let alone your kissing booth. If people do remember it, it’ll just be something that pops into their heads ten years later, when they turn to an old school friend and say “Hey, remember that kissing booth that was at school that time? That was weird. Also, kind of inappropriate for teenagers, if you stop and think about it.”

Noah emerges from the kissing booth, and invites her to kiss him. Elle rejects him, but Noah tells Elle he loves her as Lee, Rachel and a lot of their classmates watch. Elle says they can’t be together, as too many people don’t want them to be. Noah asks Elle what she wants, and she runs away. Oddly, Rachel is the first person to run after Elle, not Lee. Instead, Lee gives Noah a long, piercing look before going after Elle and his girlfriend. Elle gets away, leaving Rachel all alone. Poor Rachel. She may come across as a complete Mary Sue in this film, but darn it, this Mary Sue deserved better.

Elle goes home to find a present, which is a picture of her mum holding her as a baby, which her mum signed. It's frustrating how Elle's mum comes up so rarely, and this photograph isn't referenced again, or discussed with her dad and brother. What was this photograph supposed to mean to Elle in this moment exactly?

Lee also goes home, where Noah tells him he truly never wanted to hurt Elle, and that he’s leaving to go to Boston, so he can settle there before he starts at Harvard. He’s still going there apparently, despite it being revealed that he was at risk of not graduating because he missed so much school after things ended between him and Elle. Noah wishes Lee a happy birthday, and it cuts to Elle and Lee having a birthday party at his and Noah’s house.

There’s a whole crowd of people at this people, which again, intrigues me. You would assume that their popularity may have grown ever since they ran the kissing booth, but as I said before, they never mentioned any worry about who or if anyone might show up to their party. Also, most of the people are students from their school, but they all watch as Elle and Lee sit opposite their parents to blow out candles on their birthday cakes at this fancy dress party. It’s rather mixed for a teen party. I would say from the ages fourteen to twenty-five, people would prefer that their friends and parents weren’t at the same birthday celebration for them. Also, there are teenagers making out everywhere at this party, so I suppose the responsible adults who are around aren’t that responsible after all.

Anyway, Elle is overwhelmed at being at Noah’s house, without being with Noah. She finally confronts Lee alone, saying that although she loves him and they’re best friends, it doesn’t give him the right to tell her who else she is allowed to love. Elle tries to use Rachel as an example, asking Lee what he would do if Elle didn’t like Rachel. “I guess I’d break up with her.” Lee says casually, not seeming flustered by this thought in any way.

Well then. Fuck Rachel, I suppose. Poor side character, uh, I mean, girl.

Elle FINALLY points out that they made their rules when they were six. Lee still doesn’t seem to grasp her point until she breaks down saying she loves Noah and is willing to end their friendship if he can’t accept that. Lee says he doesn’t think it’s right, but agrees it’s Elle’s mistake to make, and so as long as she’s happy, he’s happy, because he loves her. Some mixed signals there, but yay, a resolution!

They team up to find Noah, then Elle gets into Lee’s car to drive around and find Noah. I never said that Elle got into Lee’s car with Lee though.

Yep, in an ol’ switcharoo, Noah dressed up in Lee’s Batman costume and didn’t reveal his true identity until Elle had spoken about having feelings for Noah. Elle is completely surprised, and- why? Lee and Noah are completely different builds, heights and you can see Noah’s eyes and the lower half of his face in that mask. It’s nighttime and the car is dark, but surely they would have looked at each other before Elle’s eyes were on the road? Also, why was Elle the one who got to drive Lee’s car, when she thought Lee was her passenger? Worst of all, they even exchanged dialogue, and she never picked up on the fact that it was Noah’s voice?

It's pretty obvious to anyone watching this film that this is Noah. Also, what's happening with the nose on this Batman mask? Makes him look like a duck.

Noah reveals he stayed because he wanted to see Elle again before he left. He says Lee told Noah about the conversation he and Elle had just had where Lee accepted Elle’s feelings for Noah. It was Lee who suggested that they switch places, which they both agree it’s a classic Lee thing to do.

I wouldn’t know. The only thing that seems “classic Lee” to me is asking if you can join your best friend in watching pornography together.

Noah tells Elle that Lee mentioned rule number eighteen, which Elle remembers as meaning “be happy for your besties successes”.

How funny would it have been if Noah had said the wrong number, and Elle was left thinking of a rule about farts, or whatever other random things six year old's talk about?

Elle and Noah confess their feelings and return to the greenhouse where Elle jumped on Noah to kiss him that time. Andrew the security guard/caretaker is there and watches the two teenagers kiss, grinning widely to himself. I’m sure this is supposed to be endearing, but seeing as we only saw this character once and only briefly, I can’t help but imagine he’s only grinning because unlike Lee, he will not be needing porn to work with when he’s feeling lonely later that night: now he has a fresh image of these two teens to work with.

Elle and Noah spend time together happily in the days leading up to Noah leaving, but we still never get to see them interacting with other people, as they are now an open couple, which makes it a little harder to understand how they are happy together, or good for each other. Elle accompanies to the airport to say goodbye, as he goes to Harvard. I would genuinely find it more believable if he said he was going to Narnia.

Also, while it’s nice that they get to say goodbye, I do find it a little odd that Noah’s family don’t drop him off at the airport – it’s quite a big journey he’s making, and leaving home for the first time matters a lot. Surely his parents would want to see him off at least, even if Lee wouldn't?

But no, instead we see them kiss goodbye and Elle riding off on Noah’s motorbike in the final scene, because it looks like she learned how to do that now.

The end credits present what at first appears to be bloopers, but after three seconds into it, becomes clear that these are scripted bloopers, presented as deleted scenes in correlation to the film’s chronological order. I hated this, it felt so fake, especially when they would all start falling about laughing. The bloopers in the credits of Toy Story 2 felt far more real, for goodness sake, and that’s an animated film where people would have literally had to draw out the frames, animate, voice act, etc.

I was originally going to give The Kissing Booth a slightly higher rating, because although there is a lot unintentional manipulation, awkward female nudity and emotional abuse going on here, I have seen films, notably the Fifty Shades of Grey trilogy, which are much more misguided and toxic than this. However, the reason I chose to score it even lower than originally planned is because this is aimed at teenagers, and possibly tweens. If this is a young person’s introduction to how ‘romantic’ behaviour should be, then relationships where the men are possessive and demanding, like in Fifty Shades, might almost become normalised when the audience eventually reaches those films, and that bothers me. This film sends out horrible messages about friendship, romantic relationships, and who you should be as a teenage girl. We never see Elle study, aim to better herself or widen her friendship group, she's just obsessed with Noah, and the film paints this as a good thing because romance is nice.

This film is deeply troubled, and I wouldn't show it to any teenagers I know. Aside from the bad messages it puts out, its overall plot is bland and unfunny. The cinematography is very basic shot-reverse-shot most of the time, (apart from one absolutely awful scene of Elle on a trampoline against a highly obvious greenscreen background) and the music isn't very good. In case I needed to say it one more time, the characters are the worst part of this film and are unlikable as well as underdeveloped, yet confusing. Noah and Lee are both controlling and manipulative, Noah physically and Lee emotionally. Elle, our protagonist has poor logic or real depth of character, just a dangerous consuming idea about how much infatuation means to her.

I didn't want to do a scene-by-scene study of it originally, but I found it impossible to compose my opinions without referencing specific scenes. The fact that I had to examine the entire film to make all of my points should be rather telling. Now I've watched it twice, so hopefully you won't have to watch it even once.

THE SCOREBOARD

Chick Flick Cliche Check List Elements: 1, 3, 4, 5, 7, 13, 17, 21, 26, 27, 33, 34, 37, 42 (+10), 46, 47, 51, 53, 56, 57, 58, 60, 63 (+ 5),

Total: 39

Is this really a chick flick or will men like it too? Sadly, this is undoubtedly a female-aimed film. That doesn't mean it's good for us. Men will probably be bored, unless they choose to either laugh or cringe at some of the films attempts to use “modern” slang.

Would I recommend this film? No.

Quote of the film: "No boobs are worth a broken nose." – Tuppen

Score: 2/10