Royalteen Parent Guide

Lena (Ines Hoysaeter Asserson) has just moved to Oslo from a small town. Thanks to traumatic incidents at her previous school, she’s nervous about starting another secondary school year. There’s also an extra layer of worry: she’s in the same class as the Crown Prince Kalle (Mathias Storhoi) and his twin sister, Princess Margrethe (Elli Muller Osborne). As Lena and Kalle are drawn together, Lena’s past threatens to keep them apart.

“Teen girl falling in love with a prince” is well trodden territory in the YA genre, in all mediums. Where Royalteen differs from its predecessors is uses the familiar premise to tell a mature and authentic story, rather than taking the campy comedy angle. The teens are realistic in their interactions and problems, and the lack of privacy inherent in royal life is omnipresent. Lena’s past mistakes are big, but also not outside the realm of possibility. The deft writing is paired with a brilliant and vulnerable performance from Asserson, who portrays her character’s conflicts with a subtlety that grounds the film.

Although I enjoyed the movie for what it accomplishes from a writing and acting standpoint, it contains too much negative content for me to recommend it for teens. Substance use, profanity, and sexual content are all present to a relatively large degree. From my perspective, I found the sexual content to be handled well, with discussions of condoms and consequences, but the drinking and vaping are completely normalized, with consequences meted out only for the excessive drinking. To be fair, this is a Norwegian production, and it is likely that their drinking culture varies greatly from North America’s, so perhaps the teen drinking was another level of authenticity.

For fans of romance and royals, Royalteen is a well-made, thoughtful exploration of teenage love and problems. For viewers who are sensitive to sexual content, teen substance use, and profanity, this is one to sit out. At the very least, the English dubs are well done, which is more than I’ve been able to say about a lot of Netflix productions.