What year is this? Watching Happiness For Beginners one could be forgiven for thinking we'd been transported back to sometime pre-1970s. You know - when it was just fine to make gays, asians or fat people the butt of every joke. This less-than-delightful throwback to those days combines all three in the character of Hugh, a whiny, weak Asian queen who, wouldn't you know it, is the one who nearly ruins the hiking trip by doing something stupid. Interestingly, this offensive trope is the work of a production that is written, directed and just-about-everything-elsed by women, but whose notions of positive representation are clearly pretty limited. Offensive stereotypes aside (and the pudgy gay asian isn't the only one), this is a seriously bland rom-com. Despite a reasonably solid set-up - a mismatched group on a hiking trip - it fails to deliver much in the way of either character comedy or good-old-fashioned stuck-in-the-woods slapstick. As scene after scene played itself out to minimal effect I couldn't help wonder what those responsible for the classic Goldie Hawn comedies of the 70s might have done with such a premise. Ellie Kemper is at best passable as the lovelorn lead. She's likeable, but doesn't get a lot to do. Opposite her, Luke Grimes - also fatally ill-served by the half-cooked script - displays little of the charisma and depth he does in Yellowstone. All in all: a terrible waste.
Review of Happiness for Beginners
