User Reviews

It was shockingly awful.

Anna Kendrick plays a character that has literally no good qualities about her. I'd say it's a nod to how well Kendrick can play an unlikable character, but it's just so infuriating to watch this movie.

The irony in the title is really obvious, given this movie is depressing and it pertains to Christmas for about 15 seconds before the movie ends.

It's just a movie that shouldn't have been made. No one learns anything, nothing is gained or lost in the end, it's just the story of a horrible person being horrible to the last person that can tolerate her.....and then it ends.

1/10, will unplug the TV if it means saving someone from watching this awful awful movie.

Not since Drinking Buddies have I seen an Anna Kendrick film and this saddens me in such a way. For, while she may not have the profile of some of her contemporaries like Emma Stone or Jennifer Lawrence, just she has carved herself a nice niche in the film industry. Mostly with her being in quality indie films, or just films which come out of nowhere like Pitch Perfect. Leading to the question if this film is another one of those under the radar films worth watching?

Characters & Story

Somewhere in Chicago lives a well-adjusted family comprised of Jeff (Joe Swanberg), Kelly (Melanie Lynskey), and baby Jude (Jude Swanberg). Jeff is some sort of film maker, and Kelly is a homemaker who has a book published. But as she watches Jeff go outside the home and work, and she has but Jude and the house to tend to, there rises this almost envy of needing to get dressed and go somewhere on a daily basis. So when Jeff's little sister Jenny (Anna Kendrick) needs somewhere to stay after breaking up with her boyfriend, she seems like a god send. However, with Jenny not mature enough to really take on the load Kelly would like her to, it does bring to question what can she bring to the table? Something Jenny struggles with as she tries to find her place in what already seems to be a tight-knit little family.

Praise

When it comes to this film, it is more certain scenes than the film as a whole which deserve praise. Such as a conversation Jenny, Kelly, and Carson (Lena Dunham) have in which Kelly speaks on her issues with being a stay at home mom and how complicated her feelings are about the job. And also there is another good scene which deals with Jenny and Carson helping Kelly write her next book.

Criticism

But, as a whole, this movie keeps things relatively low key which makes the film really boring. For one, nobody is that interesting of a character. Albeit Jeff has this sort of Marshal, from How I Met Your Mother, type persona, but with no one getting any sort of back-story to liven them up, it becomes far too set in realism to be appealing. Then, on top of the characters being dull, the story itself doesn't invigorate things. For not only does nothing seriously happen, but even in the few prized moments which help push you toward finishing the movie there aren't any performances which truly liven up either the characters or the movie.

And really, it is sad how only two scenes actually get your attention in a film a little over an hour. Making it seem so strange that the same person who made this film directed and wrote Drinking Buddies. For while Drinking Buddies was so good it should have been a pilot to a series, this feels like an indie short which somehow got the funding to be extended until a full-length movie. One which probably only die-hard fans of those involved will know about for this film highlights why Video on Demand exists. Because the names maybe recognizable, and usually trust worthy, but theaters know they won't make any real money off this.

Overall: Skip It

With this film, there aren't a lot of redeeming values to it. For while I liked the conversation Kelly has with Jenny and Carson about the issues she sometimes has with being a stay at home mother, as well as a conversation about writing erotica sans the words penis and pussy, the film as a whole just doesn't have a selling point besides Kendrick and Dunham's name. Hence why this is being labeled as a "Skip It" for it really does feel like Swanberg probably used bits of his life to create a movie which maybe could have worked as a short, but instead became a full length motion picture extended past the capabilities of its premise.

Crappy movie but great drinking game = drink every time Anna Kendrick says "LIKE"!!! "I was like..." "She was like...." "He was like...." "We were like..." Totally horrible dialogue in a boring movie. It's like viewing other people's boring life but it just happens to be during Christmas. She's irresponsible and the brother's an enabler. That's the movie. I'm not sure why some critics liked this movie? Maybe they had seen too many good movies and this was different just because it was bad. I'm not anti Anna Kendrick, I just think she played a part in a bad movie. So to some degree, she is responsible for this flick. There are a ton of better Christmas movies to spend your time watching so disregard this on.

Joe Swanberg directs "Happy Christmas". Like most of his previous features, the film is heavily improvised and only loosely scripted.

The plot? Anna Kendrick plays Jenny, a cute but irresponsible young woman who spends a few days hanging out with Kelly (Melanie Lynskey), the wife of her older brother. Kelly's a serious, pragmatic and focused woman, whose life has been forged by the responsibilities of being a wife, mother and writer. Jenny, in contrast, is lackadaisical and directionless. The duo's contrasting personalities lead to several low-key clashes.

"Happy Christmas" climaxes with Jenny helping Kelly write an erotic-novel. Here, female sexuality, fantasy and the possibility of transgression, "liberate" Kelly from her perceived obligations. By the film's end, the soft-spoken Kelly and the reckless Jenny reach a point of mutual appreciation. Enlivening this straightforward narrative arc is some fine, raw, naturalistic acting. The film co-stars Lena Dunham. Swanberg's own three-year-old son steals the show, though; one of the best "baby acting" roles of all time, he out-cutes a cast full of cuties.

7.9/10 - Worth one viewing.

*Warning minor Spoilers* Happy Christmas is a strange film that is a mix of good ideas that were just poorly executed in places. On the one hand, I applaud the idea of creating a more realistic look at Christmas and family drama. Also, you can never go wrong with Anna Kendrick (However, they wasted her potential). But the problem is this film never fully establishes itself. For example, we learn that Jenny (Anna Kendrick) is moving in with Kevin and Kelly because she and her boyfriend broke up. Now, this is an interesting enough back story, but the film doesn't explore it or how it affected Jenny. As a result, we never get an understanding of her character's motivation or why she acts the way she does. When Jenny starts making poor choices, it just makes her look completely self-centered when, in reality, there could be a lot going on there. Also, I feel that the chemistry between Jenny and Kelly wasn't as strong as it should have been. I mean, the movie is centered around these two women's forced relationship, and they barely even talk to each other in the first half of the film. This leads me to my next point, which is it was a mistake not to make Jenny the lead character. For one, Jenny is the more interesting character as she is in this strange place between college and life outside of school. Second, the film feels fractured in a way as it bounces from focusing on Kelly and Jenny. In fact, the film is framed like it is Kelly's story, but it never fully commits to that view, and I think that is a mistake. Finally, since Anna Kendrick is by far the best actor in this film, she should have been the lead. Her performance is so much better than all of the other actors. It's like watching Lebron James play a bunch of high school kids. This also could be due to the fact that there wasn't much of a script for the actors to go off of. I say this because a lot of the scenes are just people talking, and I wondered if they were just improvising. Nevertheless, the acting wasn't great, and I didn't like a lot of the side characters. For instance, the husband didn't add anything to the movie even though he was how the two main characters were related. I hated the guy Jenny kept hooking up with, and I would have taken that part of the story out completely. Also, I didn't like the film's climax as the whole fire alarm thing didn't really seem like a big deal. It was just lazy writing and an excuse to get the family mad at Jenny.

However, I don't want to be too negative because there were some scenes I genuinely loved. For example, I loved the scenes where they were planning Kelly's books and Anna playing with the baby. Also, Make sure you WATCH THE MID/POST-CREDIT SCENE! It was my favorite part and the only part I really laughed at.

Overall, I do like this movie. I just feel like it could have been so much better. However, I liked the movie's main message, which is at the end of the day, Christmas happens, people make mistakes, families figure out how to make it work, and life goes on. As far as indie films go, there are a lot worse. So if you are an Anna Kendrick fan, give this one a watch.