‘To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before’ Is the Teen Movie of a Generation

Netflix’s latest hit is a teenage romantic comedy, and it’s going to be a big one. Produced by Awesomeness Films and Overbrook Entertainment, To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before stars Lara Jean (played by breakout star actress Lana Condor) as our head-in-the-clouds teen girl protagonist of Junior year, and at first blush this film feels like any – or every – teen movie with the invisible girl who became beautiful after removing her ponytail, glasses, and paint-covered overalls (remember Not Another Teen Movie, anyone?). And in many ways that description fits the bill, but while that description is almost perfectly fitting to Lara Jean it’s not all-encompassing, as To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before pays homage to romance films of the past while modernizing them for present-day, like Jane the Virgin does with telenovelas, complete with deeper characters, modernized parental and gender commentary, and genuine diversity. And all of those features are worth discussing. Partly a slight on the trailer but more in praise to the movie itself, the trailer fails to do the plot justice: Lara Jean writes loves letters to the five boys she’s ever loved with no intention of ever sending them, but rather writes them as an exploration of her emotions and mementos to the depths that she can feel. When the letters get out and are shared with the subjects of the letters, her world as the invisible, shy Korean-American girl is turned upside down. While the premise suggests complications with all 5 …