Naomi and Ely’s No Kiss List (2015)

Out of all the movies I have recently seen, Naomi and Ely’s No Kiss List comes in number one – #1 in being so ridiculously stupid and awful, that I couldn’t pass the opportunity to write about it. Granted, it is a little tiresome to spend more time on this teen-angst-driven flick but it will be satisfying at the same time.

First of all, I want to address the elephant in the room – me even taking the time to watch a movie like Naomi and Ely’s No Kiss List. Well, I’m not going to lie that I don’t watch chick-flicks because I watch them actually quite a lot. I come home from work, I want to relax, I have to work the next day and therefore I need some light entertaining. More often than not, this entertainment tends to gravitate towards stupid as well but sometimes I’m lucky and I don’t even care. This time, with Naomi and Ely’s No Kiss List, I wasn’t so lucky and everything about the movie annoyed the living hell out of me.

When I read the summary for this movie, I got excited: “bonds are tested when they both fall for the same guy” – talk about an interesting plot twist! Well, the plot twist ended there, with that sentence because in the movie, the falling for the same guy isn’t even remotely what is happening in Naomi and Ely’s No Kiss List. First of all, Naomi (Victoria Justice) is a selfish girl, sort of in love with her gay best friend Ely (Pierson Fode) and dating this random guy, who she seems to be not interested in at all. Second of all, Ely is this cool and carefree character, who deserves the spotlight and actually falls in love with the guy Naomi’s dating. The problem, it’s not the guy who tests their bonds, it’s Naomi’s selfishness and attachment to Ely.

Alright, so the summary is misleading and the actual plot is a bit different from it, so what? Well, it’s a problem because the movie itself feels such as lost as the person behind the summary. Somewhere during the production process, or maybe adapting it from the book?, people involved got a little lost and the result, a messy story with no real emotions and just this annoying teenager having a fit over pretty much nothing. And the saddest part? The actual hero of the story is Ely and his relationship with Bruce (Ryan Ward) which unfortunately gets almost no screen time at all.

Then there’s the acting, which is questionable to say at least. Not just Victoria Justice as Naomi, no, all the cast feels a little raw and not in a good way. There’s just no connection, and no emotional feelings that feel authentic. This all sounds bad and harsh but it’s how I felt during this, so I’m going to be honest. With so many indie teenage-flicks I have gotten attached to the characters, their angst and relationships but with Naomi and Ely’s No Kiss List.. I didn’t even love the Kiss List notebook and I love all kinds of notebooks!

Therefore, because I’m feeling cheated and a little down because I hoped a bit better from this movie, I’m giving Naomi and Ely’s No Kiss List almost no coffee cups. The reason there’s one, is because I really liked Ely and Bruce together and though there wasn’t a lot of them, they at least seemed to have chemistry.