Common Sense Media Review
By Barbara Shulgasser-Parker
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based on child development research. How do we rate?
A predatory man charms a nice woman; language, nudity.
Parents Need to Know
Why Age 15+?
Any Positive Content?
Where to Watch
Videos and Photos
Kiss, Kiss!
What's the Story?
When we meet Tomek (Mateusz Kosciukiewicz) as KISS, KISS! begins, he's a high-flying, fast-talking corporate type who recklessly drives his co-worker girlfriend's Maserati to the office for what he believes will be a multimillion-dollar deal of a lifetime. He chooses this moment to tell her he only likes her for the sex. Instead of running to seal the deal with the waiting Japanese executives, he chases a pretty blonde woman onto a bus and nearly follows her home. He misses the meeting and loses his job, the Maserati's lovely owner, and income and a place to live. Still creepily undaunted, he crashes at his brother Janek's place. Janek (Rafal Zawierucha), who recognizes Tomek as a "pathetic, heartless Casanova," is unable to boot him out. They take a job recording the fancy wedding of a high-profile family-values politician's son, and the bride turns out to be Ola (Zofia Domalik), the blonde woman he chased. Somehow, although she appropriately finds him smarmy, she never fully pushes him away even though he embraces and kisses her repeatedly without her permission. Tomek blatantly woos Ola in front of the wedding party, her soon-to-be mother-in-law, and the watchful and disapproving eye of Poland's most notorious gangster, who happens to be Ola's dad. A blackmail scheme over someone's gayness plays a role. Love, lust, politics, and crime mix to produce an implausible outcome.
Is It Any Good?
Kiss, Kiss! is a complete waste of time, a 107-minute, unfunny comedy about a man with a high reading on the ick scale. The movie doesn't provide a single original moment. Even the ending is taken directly from the far superior Mike Nichols film The Graduate. The filmmakers can't seem to get their messages straight. Tomek, a character who finishes the movie no wiser than when he started, is first presented as a corporate whiz and later seems an incompetent boob whose only skill in life is the gift of gab. When someone finally tells him that he knows nothing of love, that his pursuit of women is selfish, and that he must let his currently targeted woman go so that she can go off and have the far better life she would have without him, he can't even let her go have that better life.
The movie's own message is upended. One clueless character refers to Tomek as a "rascal," suggesting there's something adorable and forgivable about his actions. But he's not a rascal. He's an odious and irritating example of "manliness" gone wrong.
Talk to Your Kids About ...
Families can talk about making a predatory man who kisses women who don't want to be kissed the lead character. The movie seems to want to persuade us that a terrible person is actually a wonderful person. Does it succeed? Why, or why not?
Ola is supposed to be a smart woman, yet she allows the creepy Tomek into her life. Is this believable? Why, or why not?
The movie presents a corrupt politician and a jailed gangster as pivotal characters. Do you think their presence makes Tomek, a man who proudly proclaims that "being an a--hole" is his "specialty," seem less terrible?
Movie Details
- On DVD or streaming : April 26, 2023
- Cast : Mateusz Kosciukiewicz , Rafal Zawierucha , Zofia Domalik
- Director : Tomasz Konecki
- Studio : Netflix
- Genre : Comedy
- Run time : 107 minutes
- MPAA rating :
- Last updated : May 9, 2023
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