Film

Kisses

Name: Kisses
Genre: Drama
Released: 2008
Cast: Kelly O'Neill, Shane Curry, Paul Roe, Roy Dempsey, Aaron Courtney

Drama

Kisses is a Dublin street film about two children running away on Christmas, a night that spirals from playful adventure into something darker and more real. Shot in grainy handheld style, it's a small, quiet film that trusts its young leads to carry genuine vulnerability. It's for anyone who remembers what it felt like to be a kid with nowhere to go, or who wants to see Dublin rendered as something both magical and threatening.

TMDb rating

3.6

Should you watch it?

Watch it if you love small, unshowy films that trust a night on the streets to carry a story, where the wonder and the danger sit side by side and neither gets the last word.

Skip it if you need a plot that keeps escalating, since this one moves at a wandering, observational pace and leans on mood and two young leads more than on incident.

What it asks of you: Seventy-two minutes of patient watching, with long stretches of quiet walking and talking, and a tone that stays close to the ground rather than reaching for big emotional peaks.

Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.

If you liked this

This Is England2007

Shane Meadows' story of a boy finding belonging in a skinhead gang has the same gritty realism and generational ache. It doesn't look away from how hard things actually are for young people on the margins.

But The violence is sudden and brutal. It's not a comfortable watch, and the second half darkens considerably.

The Florida Project2017

Sean Baker follows children living in motels, capturing that particular heartbreak of kids finding joy in circumstances adults would call desperate. You'll recognize the same emotional honesty.

But It moves very slowly and the plot is deliberately thin. If you need a clear narrative arc, this will frustrate you.

A Prophet2009

Jacques Audiard's film about a young man surviving prison has the same unflinching eye for how the world actually works for people with no safety net. It's visually stunning and morally complex.

But It's French prison cinema—brutal, long, and requires you to hold uncomfortable truths about your protagonist.

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from Kisses

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Girlhood2014

Both films center young people in confined urban spaces, capturing the textures of friendship and survival while never sentimentalizing poverty. Same eye for how kids actually talk and move.

Céline Sciamma's film about a Black girl in the Paris suburbs is urgent, visceral, shot in intense close-up. It captures adolescent friendship and rage with a lyric intensity Kisses only gestures toward. Same street-level perspective, far more explosive energy.

But It's in French with subtitles. The sound design is deliberately harsh and the film doesn't offer much plot—it's pure mood and specificity.

Kes1970

Ken Loach's masterpiece about a boy and his hawk, filmed in Yorkshire pit country, is the spiritual ancestor of everything Kisses does. A child finding freedom and dignity where none should exist.

But It's nearly 60 years old and moves at a different pace. The ending is devastating in ways that don't resolve neatly.

Aftersun2022

Charlotte Wells' film about a father and daughter on holiday is suffused with the same ache—childhood wonder shadowed by the knowledge that nothing lasts. Technically gorgeous and emotionally raw.

But It's elliptical and doesn't explain itself. Much is left unsaid, which some find profound and others find frustrating.

Dancer in the Dark2000

Lars von Trier's film about a woman losing everything has that same unflinching commitment to following vulnerable people into dark places. Björk's performance is transcendent and terrible.

But It is relentlessly bleak and concludes with genuine tragedy. Not cathartic—just true and painful.

Caché2005

Haneke's film about menace creeping into the everyday uses that same grainy naturalism to make the ordinary world feel unsafe. It trusts viewers to sit with moral ambiguity.

But The plot is opaque on purpose. If you like mysteries that wrap up clearly, this will feel incomplete.

We Need to Talk About Kevin2011

Lynne Ramsay's film about a mother and her monstrous child is shot with the same visual intensity and emotional precision. It refuses easy answers about parenthood and love.

But It's deliberately obscure and fragmentary. The non-linear structure requires patience and rewards attention unequally.

The Road2009

John Hillcoat adapts McCarthy's novel about a father and son surviving post-apocalypsia—bleak, tender, and visually stunning. It understands how children carry hope even in desolation.

But It's depressing in a way that some find punishing rather than cathartic. Not exactly fun.

Come and See1985

Both track a child's night moving through danger, but Klimov uses that structure to examine how the world breaks children. Same moral seriousness, vastly higher stakes—wildcard precisely because it shows what Kisses' visual language can do when pushed to its limit.

Elem Klimov's film about a boy caught in the Soviet invasion of Belarus is the most harrowing film ever made, and it matters here because it proves cinema can document what it means for innocence to be destroyed. It's transcendent in its refusal to look away.

But It's a war film depicting atrocities. The final thirty minutes are difficult to watch. It's a commitment, not entertainment.

Moonlight2016

Both films trust long silences and physical presence over dialogue. Same commitment to making the interior lives of young people visible through camera work alone.

Barry Jenkins fragments his film about a Black boy becoming a man across three periods, all shot in that same grainy, handheld, sensory style. It's about vulnerability and touch and what it means to be seen. Quietly devastating.

But It's deliberately slow and impressionistic. Conventional plot is not the point. The middle section is particularly sparse in incident.