Happiest Season (DVD) – Movie Review
Follow Genre: Comedy, Drama, Romance
Director: Clea DuVall
Distributor: Sony Pictures Home Entertainment
Duration: 102 minutes

Happiest Season (DVD) – Movie Review

Site Score
7.2
Good: Soppy, Relatable, Just relaxing
Bad: A bit shallow at times
User Score
8.0
(3 votes)
Click to vote
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Rating: 8.0/10 (3 votes cast)

Watching a mushy comedy during the holiday season is what wins over the hearts of many. While the Happiest Season was already released on a VOD format last December, the physical edition has now also been released. We get to experience a love story between two lovely ladies, where one is still struggling to come out of the proverbial closet when going back home for the holidays. Her girlfriend can also come, albeit under the guise of ‘just a friend’.

Happiest Season’s plot is actually quite simple. We get to see Abby (Kristen Stewart) and Harper (Mackenzie Davis) prepare for their first Christmas together. The couple has been happy for a while, and Harper is now about to head home to celebrate with her family. Abby is not into the entire Christmas thing but is very much willing to go with Harper and show her face for the first time. When the trip is almost there, Harper lets Abby know that her parents do not know she is dating another girl and wants to present Abby as just a friend. She promises things will still be nice, and that in due time she will tell her parents the truth. While initially, things seemed doable, the two grow further and further apart, putting the relationship at risk.

The flow is what you’d expect from movies such as this. You’ll first start off with a near picture-perfect situation to then devolve into a problematic situation, all in preparation for a soppy happy end. While this may be a spoiler, we think if you’re the actual target audience for this type of film, you’re expecting a happy end. This is a typical feel-good formula, and we personally enjoyed it. You’ll get enough information about the characters that matter, forming a sort of bond or attachment to them. There is nothing truly remarkable about the build-up, and that’s perfectly okay.

We very much enjoyed the acting performances of Happiest Season. Kristen Stewart and Mackenzie Davis play very nice compatible opposites, making them a believable couple. We see a few big names pass the revue during this film. We’ll have two mastodons in the industry, namely Victor Garber and Mary Steenburgen, who play Harper’s parents. They do so quite believably as a somewhat conservative family. Harper’s sisters are played by Alison Brie and Mary Holland. One perfectly hits the persona of being an overly confident snob, while the other has the ability to create an awkward atmosphere in the room. The latter was well taken care of by Holland, who managed to make even the viewers feel awkward at times. Dan Levy is hard to take seriously in this movie, and we think that is also on purpose. He acts like the overly eager social justice warrior, making it just simply hilarious at times.

The DVD version of Happiest Season does not have that much to offer in terms of extras. We just get to watch a short gag reel and three deleted scenes. In total there will be around five minutes of special content. While not much, a light-hearted comedy such as this does not need any additional information to explore the film any further.

Conclusion

Happiest Season is a cute coming-out movie that ticks all the right boxes. While we don’t expect this movie to top the charts any time soon, it’s one of those movies that is ideal to (re)watch when it’s cold or rainy outside, and have a lovely evening doing so. We were actually quite surprised by this one, and if you’re into rom-coms, we suggest looking this one up.

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Rating: 8.0/10 (3 votes cast)
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Rating: -1 (from 1 vote)
Happiest Season (DVD) - Movie Review, 8.0 out of 10 based on 3 ratings
Ibuki


Aspiring ninja.

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