For the
sake of not having to write the same intro a million
different ways throughout the rest of time, just know that
this column avoids the overly long and sometimes dull
process of full film reviews and instead opts to break
things down based on what I thought going in, what happened
while I was there and what I learned at the end of it all.
Thanks for reading!
The
Breakdown - happythankyoumoreplease
The Impression:
happythankyoumoreplease garnered a ton of praise on
the major festival circuit this last year, and though I
found the initial trailers to be cloying and reminiscent of
an earnest type of filmmaking I’d hoped slushed away long,
for some reason I felt general excitement towards the film.
The Reality:
happythankyoumoreplease should’ve been made in the
early 90s. It should’ve considered films like Singles
and Reality Bites as its brethren. It should have
existed in a time where the thick sheen of emotional excess
that it resonates with would have seemed more appropriate.
Unfortunately, it comes out this Friday, all of its
sentimental goo dripping from its well worn sleeve. The
story of Sam Wexler and his tight knit group of friends and
the young child who gets dragged in to all of it, attempts
to shine with the sort of low-rent quirkiness films of the
early indie movement succeeded on. Placed in the context of
its time though, it seems overly unabashed in terms of its
expression. The dialogue sounds forced, the plot situations
just too on the nose. Sam Wexler (Josh Radnor, as my
girlfriend described "like Jimmy Fallon, also not funny") is
a struggling writer surrounded by attractive friends who
struggle in equal ways to define themselves as they creep in
to their thirties. When he finds a kid (Michael Algieri) on
the subway, and decides to keep him, his life, and
shockingly, the lives of those around him change
drastically. There are ideas in the film (the "three-night
stand" seemed particularly interesting) that resonated with
me, dialogue that clicked, and performances that work
(Arrested Development’s Tony Hale shines) but overall,
happythankyoumoreplease bottoms out on the coral reefs
of subtlety.
The Lesson:
Trust your gut, the trailer for this was a stinker, and the
film followed suit.
- Noah Sanders
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