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Happy Endings (2005)
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:101
Fresh:57
Rotten:44
Average Rating:6/10
Consensus: Despite strong individual performances, the overlong, disjointed plot of Happy Endings self-indulgently rambles.
Runtime: 2 hrs 10 mins
Genre: Dramas
US Box Office: $1,172,987
Synopsis: Mamie is being blackmailed. This filmmaker named Nick claims to know Mamie’s son – the one she gave up for adoption – but Nick won’t introduce her to him unless he can film the reunion. Enter... Mamie is being blackmailed. This filmmaker named Nick claims to know Mamie’s son – the one she gave up for adoption – but Nick won’t introduce her to him unless he can film the reunion. Enter Javier, Mamie’s massage therapist boyfriend, who convinces Nick to film him instead. Now they’re all making a movie about massage. And ‘happy endings’… Charley has a longtime boyfriend named Gil. Their best friends, Pam and Diane, once tried using Gil as a sperm donor. They said his sperm didn’t take, but Charley thinks those selfish, control-freak lesbians are lying. Pam and Diane’s two-year-old son looks exactly like Gil. And it’s time to set the record straight… Jude is pissed. Not at anyone in particular. Just in general. When her cousin kicks her out of the house, Jude shacks up with Otis, who’s still trying to convince his father, Frank, that he’s straight. Frank’s a widower. And he’s rich. So Jude decides to sleep with him, too. Really. The last thing she expected was to fall in love… Just when you thought you knew everything about love and dysfunction, along comes HAPPY ENDINGS, Lions Gate Films’ hilarious and heartfelt new comedy by writer/director Don Roos (The Opposite of Sex, Bounce). Featuring a talented ensemble cast that includes Tom Arnold, Jesse Bradford, Bobby Cannavale, Sarah Clarke, Steve Coogan, Laura Dern, Lisa Kudrow, Jason Ritter, David Sutcliffe and Maggie Gyllenhaal,, HAPPY ENDINGS deftly weaves together multiple stories to create a sharp, witty look at love, family and the sheer unpredictability of life itself. A feast of buried secrets, missed opportunities and welcome second chances, this wildly original comedy proves that the happiest ending of all is the one you least expect. [More]
Starring: Maggie Gyllenhaal, Tom Arnold, Jason Ritter, Laura Dern
Starring: Maggie Gyllenhaal, Tom Arnold, Jason Ritter, Laura Dern, Lisa Kudrow, David Sutcliffe, Steve Coogan, Bobby Cannavale, Jesse Bradford
Director: Don Roos
Director: Don Roos
Screenwriter: Don Roos
Producer: Holly Wiersma, Michael Paseornek
Studio: Lions Gate Films
Reviews for Happy Endings
The narrative sprawls without achieving depth and carries the additional burden of featuring only two or three interesting characters out of 10 candidates.
The film isn't engaging enough to hold the average viewer's attention for its full two-plus hour running length.
Roos creates a slate of interesting characters who find themselves in unexpected situations that lead to realistic -- and in their own way, happy -- endings.
Director Roos has way too many balls in the air here. The film is long and the multiple plots distracting.
Contrived and complicated - yet compelling - it's all about the search for contentment as lonely souls connect.
Roos' long and uneven adult comedy happily offers another captivating performance by Gyllenhaal, who purrs as a kittenish vixen.
It's a shallow, cruddy-looking film that these fine actors have granted a depth it frankly doesn't deserve.
The surface smoothness can't make up for the deeper flaws...fails signally in establishing any solid emotional connection with most of the people it portrays.
Worthwhile for the three leads (Kudrow, Gyllenhaal, and Coogan) and for Roos's unique perspectives as a storyteller, close captioned for cognitively impaired.
Writer/director Don Roos has fashioned a funny though sometimes bleak and cynical black comedy, with multiple storylines that sometimes connect in jarring fashion.
Although all actors are plausible in their respective roles, Gyllenhaal's Jude is the only one that is provided with enough dimensionality to keep things interesting.
Happy Endings, like its characters, is an ambitious, if flawed, work, but there is also a touching soulful quality that cannot be denied and cannot be faked.
Latest News for Happy Endings
November 17, 2005:
Oh It's Already Been Broughten (Part 3)
A fresh press release from Universal informs us that there will soon be a "Bring It On 3" to enjoy, but also reminds us that, hey yeah, there WAS a direct-to-video... More...
March 09, 2005:
The director arranged to have a physical obstacle—a countertop, a couch—between Tom Arnold and his gay son in every scene until they reconcile. ![]()
More...
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