Zoey Deutch you are single handedly saving rom coms! First Set it up, then Something from Tiffany’s, and now Voicemails for Isabelle. I am convinced that she just embodies the perfect female lead for any coming of age rom com. If you are anything like me (an absolute sucker for a love story with a punchy female lead), then I think you will love this movie.

I am convinced that Zoey Deutch could have chemistry with a cardboard box, but thank goodness she gets to have on screen chemistry with Nick Robinson. In an interview, Zoey said that she is high school buddies with Nick and I feel like their life long friendship just adds to their on screen connection. Now before we even get to the romantic connection with Nick Robinson’s character, we are introduced to Jill (Zoey Deutch) and her younger sister Isabelle (Ciara Bravo). The movie details the bond of two sisters as they grow up; one gets to experience the world while the other has to stay home due to a Cystic Fibrosis diagnosis. I didn’t give a spoiler warning, because I feel like a simple Google search could reveal what I am about to say next. Isabelle dies pretty early on in the film and Zoey now has to navigate her adult life as a struggling chef in San Francisco on her own. It is important to note that if you abhor any hint of sadness in movies (I’m talking to you, Mom…) that the scene with Isabelle’s death is really emotional and had me balling my eyes out. After her sister’s funeral, Jill is back in San Francisco once again hating her job, her dating life, and trying to cope with the grief of her sister. This is where she gets drunk on a park bench and decides to call Isabelle’s phone to leave a voicemail.

Across the country, conveniently in the state of Texas where Jill and Isabelle grew up, Wes (Nick Robinson) is woken up in the middle of the night by a call from an unknown number. Again, this is not a spoiler if you watched the trailer. It turns out that Wes’s new work phone picked up the line that Isabelle used to have. As the movie progresses, Jill continues to call her sister and leave her voicemails about anything and everything. And Wes continues to listen to every voicemail, slowly learning all about Jill’s terrible job and the horrendous guys she meets on Hinge.

Obviously I don’t have to spell out the ending for you, and I’m not going to because I didn’t want to spoil everything. But Wes finds out why Jill is calling his particular number, they somehow meet and fall in love, he messes up— it’s always the guy’s fault in these movies, and they reconcile and everyone’s happy in the end. But the road to get there is actually one of my favorite plots in a rom com in recent years. Yes, there are some cliches, but I think they are well done and not entirely cheesy. I absolutely love that this feels like an early 2000s love story but uses technology, terrible job situations, and scary Hinge men to make it feel modern. And if you’re in your early 20s and have navigated the modern dating world in any capacity, you will relate to Jill so much.

However, it’s not her atrocious love life or her witty humor that I love the most about this film. It’s the bond with her sister and how she learns to cope with Isabelle’s death. I don’t have a sister — I was blessed with two older brothers, so I can’t relate to the bond that sisters share. But I think this movie truly shows the importance of having someone in your corner to help you navigate life, whether that’s a sibling, a parent, a partner, or a friend. And even though Isabelle couldn’t talk back, she was still listening and helping Jill make decisions and follow her dreams. Jill would constantly be in a situation, think about what Isabelle would tell her to do, and do it.

To be quite honest, I saw myself in Jill a lot. Thank the Lord my dating life is figured out because, like Jill, my professional life is a mess. Jill is stuck in a thankless job surrounded by idiots who get promoted when they don’t deserve it. I do have to say that I really enjoy my jobs, I’m just not where I want to be professionally quite yet. There’s one professional dream, again not spoiling, that Jill always had with her sister and towards the end of the movie she finally takes the first step toward achieving it. I think this movie demonstrated what life in your early 20s really looks like; you have career goals, dating goals, and life goals that sometimes get flipped around. Many of us have had dreams since we were little kids and as time passed, have slowly forgotten about them or just pivoted in different directions. But I really like how Jill doesn’t let her sad dating stories, her sister’s death, or anything else get in the way of her chasing her dream. And obviously in the end her dream turns out perfectly and she’s in love and just happy as a clam.

I feel like I could write a lot more about this film because it felt like more than just a silly rom com. There was tragedy, grief, comedy, and romance all in one. I think if you are in your early 20s and 30s, you can relate to this movie a lot. You may feel like your love life is a total bust and that life is constantly switching things up on you, but we’re all facing the same things. Even though my dating life is figured out, so many things in my life aren’t. Some people got their perfect dream job right out of college, but struggle in other ways. I know you’re probably thinking, “Wow, this girl is really trying to make a rom com so much deeper than it is,” but I do think this movie in particular goes deeper. It does such a good job of tapping into the feel of the 2000s romance movies we grew up watching. Only now, instead of over romanticizing the life of those main characters, we realize they’re kind of just like us and if everything works out in the end for them, it might just work out for us too.

Rating: 8/10

Where to watch: Netflix

Should you watch: Yes!