More On: Jacob Elordi
Meet Taylor Zakhar Perez: Marco from ‘The Kissing Booth 2’
‘Kissing Booth 2’ review: More of the same YA drivel
You probably don’t know what “The Kissing Booth 2” is, but trust me — it’s bigger than Jesus. It is a Netflix teen phenomenon: the rare sequel of a film that holds a dismal 17% score on Rotten Tomatoes and then sets up yet another sequel. It’s long, dumb and there’s nothing below these high-school …
You probably don’t know what “The Kissing Booth 2” is, but trust me — it’s bigger than Jesus. It is a Netflix teen phenomenon: the rare sequel of a film that holds a dismal 17% score on Rotten Tomatoes and then sets up yet another sequel.
It’s long, dumb and there’s nothing below these high-school students’ conspicuously perfect complexions. But, hey, teens love this crap!
After a romantic summer on the beach, Elle (Joey King) and Noah (Jacob Elordi) are still dating, only he has gone off to Harvard and she is considering UC Berkeley. Nobody demonstrates the sort of intellectual prowess that would convince me that this pair could realistically get into those schools.
Elle’s male bestie, Lee (Joel Courtney, the most charming part of this), wants her to join him at Berkeley, but she is determined to stand by her man and go East. That plot is kind of like Elle Woods heading to Harvard Law in “Legally Blonde,” but absent the basic feminism of that iconic 19-year-old comedy.
In Noah’s absence — as often happens — Elle meets an ever hotter new student named Marco (Taylor Zakhar Perez), who plays sports, rocks the guitar and is a smooth dancer. They enter a “Dance Dance Revolution”-like competition together. It gets messy.
At Harvard, Noah does not invent Facebook, but he does become close friends with a savvy and beautiful British woman named Chloe (Maisie Richardson-Sellers). A jealous Elle decides he’s cheating on her.
Both of the “Kissing Booth” films, which are based on Beth Reekles’ young-adult book series, are about how impossibly difficult it is for guys and girls to just be friends. Duh. That one theme is then propped up by tedious filler, such as the returning plot from the original of setting up a charity kissing booth.
It’s terrible, but teens will eat it up anyway.
Quoth “Bye Bye Birdie”: “Kids! You can talk and talk till your face is blue. Kids! But they still do just what they want to do.”
