Teen Love Movies!

I love teen love movies. This weekend was movie weekend and we searched on Netflix streaming for teen romance. Jackpot!

16-Love. This fun teen film is about a driven champion teen tennis player girl and the mediocre boy tennis player who pursues her and distracts her from her career. Good clean fun! I found the acting engaging, and while the story isn't deep, it's diverting and nice escapism.

Geek Charming. This is a Disney Channel Original Movie from last year. I'd seen the ads for it and thought, meh, but on teen love weekend, it popped back up. And I'm so glad it did! Honestly, I could watch this again. The love interests (as well as some supporting parts) had these great character arcs, and even though it should have been predictable, I was just along for the ride. Story is: vapid popular girl is dying to be the Blossom Queen and needs to be elected. Film Club guy needs a subject for the regional film festival and wants to do a hard-hitting expose on popularity. He chooses vapid girl. His teachers and mother all tell him to "seek for the truth and tell it," even if it isn't what he expects the truth to be. Charming.

The Book and the Rose. This was a short film and it was nominated for an Oscar, from what I read. It was absolutely lovely. Man and woman fall in love through letters during wartime. Finally they meet. The twist at the end gave me chills and made me get in touch with my inner romantic.

The Jerk Theory. This movie had to be muted roughly 1/3 of the time. The portions of the story with the two love interests were very fun. Every time the sidekicks (or the disgusting Danny Bonaduce cameo) or the priest (Tom Arnold) appeared, it was offensive (i.e., explicit sex talk, very rude references to Catholic Church beliefs.) We muted. Others may choose to avoid it altogether. Which was a shame, because the concept has possibilities: a guy is sick of being dumped for being the nice guy, so he takes on a jerk persona and becomes super popular with girls. Then, a girl he's sincerely interested in won't give him the time of day because she doesn't like jerks. Truthfully, I wish I'd written this story instead. I'd have made it waaaaay more fun and less...gross. Too bad.