This is so easy. Do you like high school romance movies that remind you of the films from the 90s and early 00s? If yes, consider watching this. If not, run for the hills.

Kissing Is the Easy Part is based on a Wattpad novel of the same name by Christine Duann from 2015 and is part of Tubi’s Chief Content Officer Adam Lewinson’s vision of bringing more young adult content to the streaming service (check out this article for more). In my younger days I could watch movies like this and dream of finding that special person and even have a crush on one of the actors, but now that I’m older and happily married (and most importantly not a teenager anymore) I can just watch these as a quick and easy film that makes me smile but doesn’t quite require me to think too much.

Is this movie good? It would be so easy to rip into all the cliches and how, for the most part, the ending can be predicted from the very beginning, but what’s the fun in that? The kind of person who would rip this movie to shreds because it’s not their kind of film should probably pick something else to watch instead.

Kissing Is the Easy Part, or KITEP if you’re cool like that, is cute. This can be desribed, as I have already said, as a high school romance, but it’s more than that. True, romance plays a big part, but this is also about who you become when no one believes in you and what can happen when someone finally does. Yes there’s a very cute romance here, but the real story of the movie unfolds late in the second act and, by the end, we get a very satisfying conclusion.

It’s a simple story on the surface, but I think the focus should be on a more important place. It should be on the fact that this is based on someone’s original work. Sure it’s familiar, but we’re getting a movie based one someone’s original content. We need to amplify movies like this to show bigger companies that Tubi is on the right path. I may love Marvel movies and whatever big IP is releasing this month, but independent film and movies based on original stories are where the heart of cinema lies.

TLDR? Kissing Is the Easy Part is familiar and fun. It may not be the best movie, but it does at least a little to stand out. The good news is, one look at the trailer, or even the poster, should tell you if this movie is for you or not.

Kissing Is the Easy Part gets a 6.5 out of 11