Satan Reviews- Films: Kissing Jessica Stein

Kissing Jessica Stein (2001)

Drama film/Romance

1h 38m

Spoilers

Kissing Jessica Stein is a guilty pleasure type of rom-com sans the guilt. I could happily watch this repeatedly and the only guilt I'd feel is if I was procrastinating.

The films centres around Jessica Stein, a journalist who's love life is lacking and is being made worse by her nagging concerned mother. It also probably doesn't help that her boss is her ex-boyfriend who tells her that she's too picky when it comes to men. And then you automatically think, "oh dear god, she's going to end up with this dick at the end". And I guess I wasn't entirely wrong.

Then we bring in the person who actually kisses Jessica, Helen Cooper. I think Helen is bisexual. Considering this is a film from the early 200's, it's the most likely option.
She's confident, cool, works in an art gallery and I'm pretty sure that she had a sugar daddy or something that the beginning of this film. She is also friends with a gay couple and one of them was totes not a little biphobic towards Helen at one point.

 They meet when Helen places a lonely hearts kind of ad in the newspaper and uses a quote, as advised by her friends, that Jessica lowkey thirsts over. They meet at a bar, it's cute and then they go to an Indian restaurant that I swear is the same one Matt and Karen went to in Daredevil. And at some point, Helen kisses Jessica to prove a point or something. Idek. She must have liked it though, because they date for most of the film.

The couple have relationship trouble later in the film when Helen wants Jessica to tell her family about their relationship and bring her to Jess' brother's wedding. Jess' hesitance to do this upsets Helen as it the whole "are you embarrassed of me?!?" thing. After the guilt trip, Jess eventually tells her family about Helen. And let's just say that at the wedding, Jess' family were a little too enthusiastic about their relationship. It's somehow made more awkward by Josh (Jess' boss/ ex-boyfriend) admitting that he's in love with Jessica. Ew.

Flash forward to a few months later and Jess and Helen are living together and it's really cute and the whole montage is one of my favourite parts of the film. The main problem with the relationship is that Jessica is definitely straight and loves Helen as a friend. Which puts a little dampener on the relationship.
Helen leaves and gets a new girlfriend. They remain friends, which I'm happy about. But the part of the film that just makes me go uuugggghhhhh, is when Jessica and Josh bump into each other at the end, a few months after Jess and Helen's breakup, and it's heavily suggested that they'll get back together.
I mean, I know Jess is straight and would probably end up with a man anyway but it's just the way it's done. It just says that Jess needs a man and would be better off without a man. Why can't she be single and still looking for Mr Right? Being single isn't the worst thing you can be.

Would I recommend this film? Yes. It's heartfelt and doesn't have some of the creepy "love me or you're a bitch" thing that I feel some hetero rom coms do.
Would I watch this film again? Yes! It's sweet and not weirdly sexualised like you'd expect from the 2000's.

Edit: From my research, I believe that it's the same restaurant.