SLIFF 2016 Review – THE HAPPYS

THE HAPPYS screens Saturday, Nov. 12 at 7:00pm and Sunday, Nov. 13 at 3:30pm. Both screenings at at The Hi-Pointe Backlot.  Director John Serpe, actress Amanda Bauer, and actor/producer Will Bethencourt will all be in attendance. Ticket information for the Nov. 12th show can be found HERE. Ticket information for the Nov. 13th show can be found HERE. 

When 21-year-old Tracy (Amanda Bauer) walks in on boyfriend Mark (Jack DePew), a newly minted movie star, having sex with a man, she immediately decides to leave him. But after assessing her limited options, Tracy returns with a deal: If he agrees to marry her, she’ll forget the incident ever happened. Mark accepts her terms, but neither of them fully understands the sacrifices that both will have to make. As their relationship deteriorates, Tracy manages to compensate for the troubles in her marriage by befriending the quirky residents of her Los Feliz neighborhood: Sebastian (Rhys Ward), a troubled recluse; Luann (Janeane Garofalo), a former child star and true free spirit; Krista (“The Walking Dead’s” Melissa McBride), Mark’s hard-charging talent manager; Jonathan (Stepen Guarino), a gay magazine reporter; and Ricky (Arturo del Puerto), a hot Mexican with a failing food truck. Discovering her true sense of self — and a passion for cooking — Tracy ends up serving as a catalyst that forces them all to grow and to connect in unforeseen ways. “The Happys” features an original score by Wilco multi-instrumentalist Patrick Sansone.

Review of THE HAPPYS by Stephen Tronicek

Another name for Tom Gould and John Serpe’s THE HAPPYS would be “A Comedy of Errors for the American Dream,” in that what makes it funny is the fact that it continually has people making mistakes in the interest of gaining their own proposed American Dream. The main character, Tracy (Amanda Bauer) wants to live a happy life with her boyfriend (Jack DePew), even after catching him in bed with a man. The boyfriend, Mark, wants to live the life of a gay movie star, even if the movies he’s starring in seems to lack competence in many ways, and his orientation could ruin his career. Sebastian is attempting to live a quiet life inside of having food delivered to him and tanning in the backyard, a life of loneliness, yet affluence. In fact, the title seems to suggest an irony. The Happys isn’t about happy people. It’s about people in the desperate struggle of being what they think is happy.

That’s where the true dynamic of THE HAPPYS becomes special. At first glance, the film seems like a typical L.A. young people comedy, fueled by situations that slowly grow into a thinly veiled narrative laced together on jokes, but THE HAPPYS opts to add a spectacular layer of irony to everything in the implications of all the characters actions.This makes it instantly funny when characters having received what they think is happiness start to act against their own interest to simply sustain this and forces the hand of the directors and actors to take a more “show don’t tell” route that seems oddly absent from many comedies. Through their actions, Tracy and the others reveal an incredible amount about who they are just by acting, which keeps the narrative surprising and the emotional journey everyone goes through honest. This isn’t a film that wraps everything up nicely, but it does so with a sense of hope that its characters will find happiness.

THE HAPPYS is a very simple film. As much depth is present, this is a film of effortlessness, easily going through its runtime. The deeper material never bogs down the jokes as they blend into the one ironically fun film about what it means to be happy.