DVD Review: ‘Another Happy Day’ Plunges Headfirst Into Familial Hellhole

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CHICAGO – “Another Happy Day” is essentially the inverse of “Rachel Getting Married.” Instead of an unstable, self-pitying girl wreaking havoc on an otherwise pleasant wedding, we have a sensitive, otherwise pleasant woman driven mad by her unstable, self-pitying family…at a wedding, no less. I’ve seen war enemies with less animosity than this group of miserable basket cases.

Of course, weddings have routinely been a hotbed of family dysfunction typified by Robert Altman’s flawed yet woefully underrated 1978 satire, “A Wedding.” “Happy Day” is closer in spirit to Noah Baumbach’s caustic and somewhat repellant 2007 effort, “Margot at the Wedding,” albeit without the handheld photography. There’s a lot of talent on display that’s worth admiring, but the film is more depressing and drab than it is funny or insightful.

HollywoodChicago.com DVD Rating: 2.5/5.0
DVD Rating: 2.5/5.0

It’s the directorial debut of Sam Levinson (son of Barry), and it’s clear that he’s inherited his father’s gift for directing actors. This is a promising first film, but like most rookie directors, Levinson is eager to bite off more than he can chew. Though his screenplay won an award at Sundance, it could’ve benefited from a few more rewrites. Extraneous subplots are cluttered throughout the film that add very little to the main dramatic arc. There are also an abundance of awkwardly cut scenes ending on a would-be punch line that falls flat. Yet perhaps the biggest problem here is the instant familiarity of the clichéd characters. Audiences have become all too accustomed to sardonic drug addicts, embittered matriarchs and precocious kids with a mild case of Asperger’s. Yet it’s to the credit of Levinson’s script that the Asperger’s-inflicted Ben (well-played by Daniel Yelsky) does not talk chiefly in sitcom stereotypes or tiresome exposition, unlike Thomas Horn in Stephen Daldry’s awful “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close.” He’s also the most well-adjusted and sane person in the ensemble, which is a good thing since his mother, Lynn (Ellen Barkin), needs all the sanity she can get.

Another Happy Day was released on DVD on Jan. 24, 2012.
Another Happy Day was released on DVD on Jan. 24, 2012.
Photo credit: Phase 4 Films

In order to celebrate the marriage of her eldest son, Dylan (Michael Nardelli), Lynn must face her contemptuous vixen of a mother, Doris (Ellen Burstyn), an abusive ex-husband, Paul (Thomas Hayden Church), and a swarm of gossiping, cheerfully heartless siblings. One of them is a vulgar loudmouth played by the gifted comic actress Siobhan Fallon, whose performance I would’ve singled out for being over-the-top if I hadn’t met people exactly like her character. Lynn is so terrified of her family that she has forced her sons to submit to her pattern of lies. Instead of breaking the news that her troubled son, Elliott (Ezra Miller), was in rehab, she spreads the story that he recently returned from a trip to Sweden. The added stress caused by this blatant deceit leads Elliott to quickly relapse, and it’s not long before he snags a box of Fentanyl from his ailing Grandpa Joe (George Kennedy). Miller is a mesmerizing actor with brooding features that have led him to become typecast as a budding sociopath, and there are numerous moments when the acid-tongued Elliott appears as if he’s about to snap. He also scores with throwaway quips, such as his impeccably timed response to his mother when she calls him a “son of a b—ch” (“You just insulted yourself”).

Film buffs may spot parallels between Lynn and Joyce, the self-doubting and misguided mother Barkin played in Todd Solondz’s equally dark satire, “Palindromes.” In both roles, Barkin perfects the choked voice and painful vulnerability of a woman at the end of her rope. But while Joyce was a deeply flawed character in her own right, Lynn is more of a victim than anything else. She left Dylan as a child after Paul punched her in the face, and yet she’s still blamed for abandoning him. When Paul finally admits the abuse to Lynn’s parents, they remain absolutely silent until Joe warmly replies, “Must feel good to get that off your chest.”

One nagging question that remains unanswered is why Doris refused to support Lynn during her messy divorce. Burstyn brilliantly delivers a wrenching Bergmanesque monologue about her husband’s deteriorating condition, but there isn’t a moment in the picture that deepens our understanding of Doris’s antagonistic relationship with her own daughter. Unfortunately, Levinson is more interested in staging shrill cat fights that would be more at home on a Jerry Springer episode, while repeatedly allowing characters to burst through doors at inappropriate moments (don’t any of these doors have locks?). The least convincing cliché of all occurs at the very end, when a tragic occurrence threatens to bring the wretched family together at last. I’d argue that the only way this film could possibly end on a credible happy note is if it had borrowed the ending from “We Need to Talk About Kevin.” If you’re going this far into the scathing waters of jet-black comedy, you might as well go the whole way.

“Another Happy Day” is presented in its 1.78:1 aspect ratio and contains no extras aside from two trailers.

‘Another Happy Day’ is released by Phase 4 Films and stars Ellen Barkin, Ezra Miller, Daniel Yelsky, Ellen Burstyn, Kate Bosworth, Thomas Hayden Church, Demi Moore and George Kennedy. It was written and directed by Sam Levinson. It was released on Jan. 24, 2012. It is rated R.

HollywoodChicago.com staff writer Matt Fagerholm

By MATT FAGERHOLM
Staff Writer
HollywoodChicago.com
matt@hollywoodchicago.com

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