‘Crush’ (Hulu) Non-Spoiler Review – The Cutest Teen Rom-Com Of The Early-2020s

I got to see Crush over a week and a half ago, and it is by far the neatest teenage romantic-comedy movie I have seen in a good while. This is my third film under Hulu and American High — the first being Natalie Morales’s Plan B last May and the second being Talia Osteen’s Sex APPeal earlier this year. I just got to see it again before writing this review, and I am still in awe. Crush is written by Kirsten King & Casey Rackham and directed by Sammi Cohen.

In this review, I will be discussing Crush. There will be no spoilers here, as the title of this article suggests. Nonetheless, please read ahead at your own discretion to avoid any possible revelations.

Plot Synopsis

According to Hulu Press, here is the synopsis for Crush.

When an aspiring young artist is forced to join her high school track team, she uses it as an opportunity to pursue the girl she’s been harboring a long-time crush on. But she soon finds herself falling for an unexpected teammate and discovers what real love feels like.

Hulu Press

Discussion

While I found that Sex Appeal was trying to embrace the clichés of teen rom-coms, Crush instead makes attempts to circumvent them. We are introduced to Paige (Rowan Blanchard), a queer teenage girl whose best male friend, Dillon (Tyler Alvarez) is not the typical “nerdy straight boy” that falls for him that we see in this specific genre of film; instead, he has a girlfriend of his own named Stacey (Teala Dunn). Aside from the main character chemistry that we have in Crush, Dillon and Stacey are the second-cutest couple we have on-screen.

Anyways, Paige has already developed as a character and is pretty normal for a high school Junior. Her mom is accepting of her sexuality, and Paige does not have any issues in her way… Except for maybe a college application into an art school and the obstacle here is that she is accused of vandalizing school property. It isn’t like she’s at the top of her class, so what next? This is only the first several minutes of the film, so I have only given you a taste of what to expect.

While Crush at least avoids one or two clichés, in its leap of faith — a little pun since the primary characters take part in a track team — the film does run into other obstacles and takes some falls, albeit not hard-hitting ones.

The Writing

From time to time, the film does become a metanarrative. When Paige catches feelings for another girl, you can kind of tell, and this hints at whom she falls for by the end of the film. Her mother, Angie (Megan Mullally), tells her that “[t]rue artists are never afraid to step out of their comfort zones”; and while it’s all too common of an adage, it still rings true.

King and Rackham do a nice job of balancing the essential components of this genre, that is, romance and comedy. I admire much of their screenplay, such as a scene where they reject the very concept of “Seven Minutes in Heaven” and do something that is more with the times of our current era of living. The writing can sometimes get cringeworthy, but that is nothing to complain about since these are teenage characters we are talking about. Meanwhile, at other times, there are other moments where the writing actually had me laughing; such as a scene with two girls in a high school voting booth. When you discover what the shared dialogue is here, you get that feeling that the film itself is poking at the rom-com genre in a special kind of way.

Another aspect of the writing that I appreciated about the film was its proper use of pronouns and how it acknowledges at some points that consent should be a thing for both male and female individuals. I highly respect when narrative pieces tap into current-day ways of living, so I had no problem there.

My only real issue with the writing is that once we confirm that a romance is going on, the conflict reveals itself, and by the time we know it… The narrative wraps up. Frankly, I wish there would be more to this one-hour-and-thirty-three-minute film because there is truly something noteworthy here. In retrospect, the pacing is all too brisk and I wanted time to slow down, but that’s just me. I was not too keen on the final closing scene of the film, but I think you can expect that with a lot of romantic comedies.

Other Cinematic Elements

I noticed some of the set pieces — such as Paige’s bedroom and her upstairs high school floor — are strikingly similar to Sex Appeal. To be frank, I did not mind them, but I felt the need to point them out. Aside from that, a lot of Dishman’s production design was nice and not too complicated for my eyes. It was pretty simple to break apart.

Most especially is the high school’s football field. Wise does great framing much of Crush, but I took note of how well he shot the scenes at this particular location. With the help of Remenarich-Aperlo and the music team, we got a cool montage near the beginning. We do get another montage sequence at the end of the film, but it fell too in line with the clichés of the rom-com genre.

The Crew of Crush

Max A. Butler, Michael Glassman, Dan Balgoyen, Chris Weitz, Paul Weitz, and Matthew Poliquin serve as the executive producers of Crush. Britta Rowings, Katie Newman, Natasha Lyonne, Maya Rudolph, Andrew Miano, Danielle Renfrew Behrens, Mickey Liddell, Pete Shilaimon, Jeremy Garelick, Will Phelps, and Ryan Bennett are the producers; Ben Poppleton serves as the co-producer.

Matthew Wise is the director of photography. Melissa Remenarich-Aperlo serves as the editor.

Scott Campbell serves as the art director, while Jennifer Durban serves as the set decorator. Tracy Dishman serves as the production designer. Laura Barreto is the costume designer; Katharine Tarkulich serves as the assistant costume designer. Gerry Vazquez serves as the sound designer.

Christina Samuels serves as the head of the make-up department, while Etzel Ecleston and Cynthia O’Rourke serve as heads of the additional make-up department. Amani Saleh serves as the key make-up artist, while Mary Chipman and Liz Gleasman serve as additional key make-up artists.

Elvira Gonzalez serves as the head of the hair department, while Felicia Nelson serves as both the head of the additional hair department as well as the key hairstylist. Danielle Barber is the hairstylist.

Seth Yanklewitz and Ben Pollack serve as the casting directors of the film. Emily Cook is the casting associate, while Annie Delano is the extras casting director.

Andrew Brady is the music supervisor, while St. Panther composes the original music. Brad Hamilton serves as the music editor.

The Cast of Crush

Rowan Blanchard plays the protagonist, Paige Evans. Opposite her is Auli’i Cravalho, who portrays AJ Campos. Isabella Ferreira plays Gabriela Campos, AJ’s twin sister. Teala Dunn plays Stacey Clark, while Tyler Alvarez plays her boyfriend and Paige’s best friend, Dillon.

Rico Paris plays Tim, a peer of the teens who accuses Paige of vandalizing school property. Aasif Mandvi plays Coach Murray, while Michelle Buteau plays Principal Collins. Megan Mullally plays Angie Evans, Paige’s mother.

Addie Weyrich, plays Chantal, a strange peer of Paige and AJ; Catherine McCafferty appears as Erin Billings, another peer of theirs in the LGBTQIA+ spectrum. Jes Tom appears as Aya, Gabriela’s former partner.

Addyson Tabankin portrays a young Paige, while Ty Demoya plays a young Dillon. Zoe Dandolfo appears as a young AJ, while Samsara yett plays a young Gabriela. Ryan Drake Wilson appears as a voting booth attendant. Sam Rogers appears as a stoner, while Kristin Bauer-Gross plays a teacher. Jess Rona and Eric Edelstein appear as announcers for the track regionals.

Performances and Character Developments

Blanchard’s Paige can truly get awkward around her crushes. She does an acceptable job at playing this role of the protagonist. The character is not the brightest one on the roster, but she sure knows how to get along with others. She is not necessarily one to handle her liquor; this is just a minor spoiler that I noticed because her extreme usage of alcohol in one scene of the film impedes her performance on the field, while refraining from alcohol in a later scene helps her succeed in a competition (but that’s just health and science class for you!).

Cravalho’s AJ is outstanding as one of Paige’s two crushes. The actor puts down her singing voice and dons the athletic outfit, something that she told me in my interview with her last week was new for her. (We’ll get to this interview soon.) Cravalho exhibits so much ethos and pathos in the role of AJ and I found that she definitely prepared well for it. Oftentimes, the delivery of her performance is intriguing, but it’s just a shame we don’t get much of her in Crush.

As I mentioned before Alvarez’s Dillon and Dunn’s Stacey are such a cute couple. They fare well together as a “two heads are better than one” type of duo, especially when helping Paige with her personal matters. Dillon and Paige are terrific as best friends in a lot of scenes, namely, in the and I only wished we could see a little more of that but with Stacey and Gabriela (Isabella Ferreira).

It was nice to see Ferreira’s character, but for some reason, I did not perceive her as a focal character. She and Cravalho do have a couple of meaningful scenes together as sisters, but I think those are as much as we will see them alone together…

Final Thoughts on Crush

I would say that Crush is Hulu and American High’s big improvement after having seen Sex Appeal. Is it any better than Plan B? That might be a tough answer to give as I am actually left ambivalent with Crush. On one hand, Plan B was heavy on some nudity (e.g. showing pierced penises and other heavy adult themes). On the other hand, Crush is a tone down from that. Although, it does have some vulgar language spread out through the film. Not to mention some talk of some sex toys along with adults openly expressing (with teenagers present in the room) wanting to have sex with each other — that is, adults having sex with adults.

Now, is Crush a bad film in the romantic-comedy genre? No, it is far from it. However, I did feel too invested in the story to a point that it came off as rushed; and by the end of my second watch, I could not love it as much as I could. To contradict myself even further, teen rom-com movies usually run for an hour and a half, so that’s normal. With that said, I did feel like we could have gotten over 15 minutes of narrative to really get into the mood of it.

Overall, this film does have its issues but that does not mean it is horrendous. I just believe that this end-product did not come off as an end-product but the result of a project that still required fixing. When you have a cast and crew such as this, I could sense that that was very much needed. In my final analysis, there is more good than bad, and for that, I enjoyed the film.

4/5

Sammi Cohen’s Crush streams via Hulu tomorrow!

Also, stay tuned for my interview with Auli’i Cravalho in promotion of the film!

Have you seen any of the American High movies? If so, then what are your thoughts on their latest releases so far? Let us know! For more comedy and romance-related news and reviews visit and follow The Cinema Spot on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram!