To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before (A Movie Review)

Crissa Mae D. Aguda

12 - St. Michael

In the late '90s and early 2000s, teen movies dominated the film
world. The popularity of the teen movie has diminished in much the
same way the romantic comedy, a thematic cousin of the teen movie
genre, has also struggled. But now Netflix is keen on filling the void, and
it is doing a rather remarkable job feeding an audience, both young and
old, that's been starved for proper teen comedy and romance for more than a decade.

This time, Susan Johnson’s new Netflix teenage high school romantic drama film To All The
Boys I've Loved Before is based on Jenny Han’s 2014 young adult novel of the same name, and
while the plot is nicely set up on an evidence that fans of the genre will find sufficiently exciting,
the film does seem to spend the potential of that very premise. In a sense, the film cheats us into
believing that it has more content than it actually does, and had it not been for this feeling of
being let down, I would have perhaps enjoyed the film a bit more than I did, because all said and
done, it works – in parts.

In case you haven’t been paying attention about this movie, to recap, To All the Boys
I’ve Loved Before is about a teenage girl (Lara Jean) who writes letters to her crushes and her
world blows up when those deeply personal and detailed professions of love get sent to said
crushes. It then turns into a classic rom-com fake relationship plot that is predictable but still
satisfying – SO SATISFYING. Predictability is expected in any rom-com but a good one doesn’t
sacrifice its pleasure. A good one has you swooning the whole way to its expected happy ending.
A good one rests heavily on the shoulders of its star.

Lana Condor plays Lara Jean with enough understanding of her character to keep you
hooked to her performance. There is a certain ‘every-girl’ sort of presence in her, and along with
her sisters in the movie, she forges a perfect bond of soul-sisterhood that comes across as far
more precious than any crush on the face of earth. It is this vibe – that she is good enough with
whatever little she has, without all the usual attentions a girl of her age seeks and aspires for –
that Condor beautifully brings forth through her performance.

What I did not like about the film is the fact that the sole focus of the story seemed to be
on one boy – and not five, as the films promos promised. You can appreciate the feeling of
discontent I must have felt, because the plot was thus stripped of all its glorious possibilities and
complexities.

After all, what is the point of this film and other teen movies? We watch movies not
because we want to know if they're good or bad but because we know there will be a happy
ending. Sure, we all hope the movies are more like the story of Lara Jean and Peter and not a
cliché-driven trash fest that makes a root canal look like a good time.