TUBI EXCLUSIVE: Crushed (2022)

Kate (Bebe Wood) is a romantic high schooler not above wishing that she could have sex immediately. She also has a huge crush on Jason (Nicholas Alexander Chavez), who may not be worth it, and is losing her friendship with her best friend who now has a boyfriend. It’s their last trip before graduating and if you’ve been on one of those bus trips, you know exactly what’s going to happen.

This is a post-American Pie teen movie and doesn’t spare the grossness, with a shocking vomit scene and anally-induced drugs, including someone shotgunning weed smoke into another person’s mouth by farting. So, you know, when you think you’ve seen it all…you haven’t.

The morals of the film are obvious and I liked how Kate reflected on high school closure at the end, just as much as how much I didn’t like the coda that basically had her surrounded by vapid club girls and acting just as dumb as them, showing if anything she regressed from the strength and intelligence that she showed throughout the movie. It feels incredibly hollow.

Director Niki Koss started as an actress and has made this movie and Night Night. This was written by Heidi Lux, who also acts and this was her first full-length movie.

There are some genuine laughs in it and I loved the very brief time that Bailey Stender was in this movie. Outside of my very major issue with the film’s bookend, it’s nice to see teen movies with kids who look like kids and not twentysomething teenagers. There’s a fun heart in this and I look forward to what Koss and Lux do next.

You can watch this on Tubi.

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