Cinema audiences are embracing Hayley Kiyoko's Girls Like Girls, a tender queer coming-of-age film about first love, self-discovery and the messy thrill of being seen. With its summer setting, intimate visual style and hopeful emotional payoff, it offers LGBTQ+ viewers a rare big-screen experience that feels both personal and warmly communal.

Essential Takeaways

  • A long-awaited adaptation: The film expands Kiyoko's beloved 2015 music video into a feature-length story.
  • A tender central romance: Seventeen-year-old Coley develops feelings for Sonya after moving to a small Oregon town.
  • An intimate visual style: Close-ups and tactile details make the characters' attraction feel immediate and personal.
  • A hopeful queer story: The film acknowledges shame, anxiety and heartbreak without losing sight of joy.
  • A strong cinema experience: Its emotional impact is amplified when watched alongside an LGBTQ+ audience.

A music video becomes a full queer love story

The original Girls Like Girls music video became a touchstone for many queer viewers in the mid-2010s. Now, Hayley Kiyoko has turned that compact, emotionally charged story into a feature film, giving its characters room to breathe and its romance space to unfold.

The result is a sunlit coming-of-age drama with a soft, summery atmosphere. It follows 17-year-old Coley, who moves in with her father in a small Oregon town and quickly becomes fascinated by Sonya, a confident girl whose friendship begins to feel like something more.

Reviews collected by Rotten Tomatoes and other film outlets position the film as a major expansion of Kiyoko's original concept, rather than a simple music-video retread. That's important, because the story's appeal lies in the feelings around the romance as much as the romance itself.

Why the film feels so personal

Girls Like Girls understands that first queer love can feel enormous. A glance can become an event, a delayed text can ruin an afternoon and one awkward conversation can send someone straight to their bedroom floor.

The film leans into those sensations through close, observant camerawork. Hands, shoulders, hair and tiny changes in expression become emotional landmarks, allowing Coley's attraction to register physically before she can fully articulate it. The effect is intimate without becoming overly polished.

The Guardian, the Los Angeles Times and RogerEbert.com have all helped place the film within the wider conversation around queer cinema and coming-of-age storytelling. Its particular strength is that it doesn't treat sexuality as a neat plot device. Instead, it shows how desire, fear and uncertainty can occupy the same moment.

A film made with sapphic audiences in mind

Male characters sit at the edge of the story, while the emotional centre belongs firmly to the girls. That shift in perspective gives the film a different texture from many mainstream teen romances, where queer characters are too often asked to explain themselves to everyone else.

Here, the audience is invited to stay close to Coley's experience. Her fascination with Sonya feels dreamy, embarrassing and exhilarating all at once. Even the painful scenes carry recognition, particularly when affection is misunderstood or dismissed.

That shared recognition can transform a screening. A line that might seem ordinary on the page can prompt a whole room to groan, laugh or fall silent together. For queer viewers, that communal response may be one of the film's most valuable features.

First love, awkwardness and the fear of rejection

The film doesn't skip the difficult parts. Coley's feelings bring excitement, but they also create anxiety and vulnerability. The familiar fear of misreading a friendship hangs over the story, making every confession and confrontation feel precarious.

That emotional balance is one reason the film should appeal to viewers looking for queer coming-of-age films about first love, rather than a romance stripped of complications. It recognises that a happy story doesn't need to pretend the painful parts never happened.

The supporting relationship between Coley and her father adds another layer of warmth. His care offers a vision of acceptance that isn't loud or theatrical; it's expressed through reassurance, patience and the promise that Coley will eventually find the person who is right for her.

A hopeful ending that earns its optimism

Many queer coming-of-age stories have historically been shaped by loss, punishment or avoidance. Girls Like Girls acknowledges that history, but it chooses not to leave its characters there.

The film's hopeful conclusion, reinforced after the credits, gives the story a sense of release. It doesn't erase the confusion and shame Coley has experienced, but it suggests those emotions don't have to define her future. That may sound simple, yet in queer cinema, straightforward happiness can still feel quietly radical.

For longtime fans of the music video, the feature also offers a chance to revisit an earlier moment of queer culture through a more expansive lens. For newcomers, it works as a gentle, emotional introduction to a story about growing into yourself.

Girls Like Girls is a tender, visually intimate and openly hopeful choice for anyone seeking a queer coming-of-age film about first love.

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