Happiness Reviews

• Sick, twisted, disturbing - but you can't stop watching it

  
  By AESY8NCX6VS6O on 2004-10-26
  There have been few times that I've sat for more than two hours, intently watching a film, screaming "I hate this movie!" as the credits begin to roll, but then realize that I don't hate it at all. In fact, I don't know if that has ever happened before, but last night, after the final, revolting line of Todd Solondz's 1998 shocker Happiness, I did just that, and probably because I couldn't bring myself to admit I liked it. It's a movie that deals with wildly perverse subject matter, contains not a truly likeable character in the whole bunch, and doesn't even bother to show the consequences of the horrible actions for any of its transgressors. If there is a poster-child movie for complete and total amorality, Happiness is the one. But I liked it, and that scares me.
  
  Joy (Jane Adams) has absolutely nothing in common with her name; her sister Helen (Lara Flynn Boyle) is a sultry, narcissistic author who wants the experience of being raped to make her writing authentic; other sister Trish (Cynthia Stevenson) is married to Dr. Bill Maplewood (Dylan Baker) and has three kids. Dr. Bill is a pedophile who pleasures himself to teen magazines in the backseat of his car and has dreams of murdering strangers in a park; Dr. Bill's strangest patient, Allen (Phillip Seymour Hoffman), makes obscene phone calls and has an inventive way of pasting postcards to the wall; Allen's neighbor, Kristina (Camryn Manheim), is in love with him but has her own disgusting little story to hide. Nearly every character has a dark side, the only truly 'good' one (Joy) seems to get everything wrong, and the one romance that blooms during the movie has a twinge of wrongness to it. The movie is a strung-together mosaic of perpetual sadness, the search for the remedy, and the stomach-churning causes of it all; and yet, between my gasps of shock and uneasiness, I can't say there's a boring moment in the film.
  
  The most difficult character in the movie to even look at is, obviously, Dr. Maplewood. Dylan Baker has that glaring gaze that could boil cheese, and it takes on an especially creepy tone when he's gazing longingly at his son's baseball teammate at a little league game. But, believe it or not, Solondz injects comedy even into something as despicable as the Maplewood situation. The film's most controversial scene, involving drugged chocolate sundaes and a tuna salad sandwich, is god-awfully wrong...but had me thinking about that great moment in Psycho when Marion Crane's car stops as it's sinking into the swamp and Norman Bates panics for a moment. And laughing, too. This element of the plot angered many people in 1998 and is still something to wrestle to this day; why make Maplewood a three-dimensional man with real emotions when all he is is a predatory pederast? Because it wouldn't be interesting, it wouldn't be watchable, if he wasn't. Take a climactic scene in the film, that must deal with the truths of Maplewood's actions: Solondz creates a scene that is brutally honest and deeply disturbing, but still grounded in the poignancy of a father-son discussion.
  
  I found myself alternating between pure puzzlement and a desire to turn the movie off in its first, love-it-or-leave-it act. But Solondz is in such control of his connecting plot strands that he makes the links quickly, moves in and out of them with ease, and even allows for unexpectedly moving moments to occur. The great subplot of the film is with Phillip Seymour Hoffman and Camryn Manheim. In some ways, it sums up the entire theme of the film, while having all of Happiness' strengths and weaknesses. Solondz gives us a great scene where the two come together, dancing to a pop song in a bar, and it's a brief moment of euphoria and sweetness despite the depravity that surrounds and underscores it. Of course, for some viewers, the hidden lives of even Allen and Kristina may be too strange to merit caring about. I struggled with it, too.
  
  Solondz made a very good film a few years ago, Storytelling (rent it), that contains similarly risque subject matter but ends up being too facile in the resolutions of the two vignettes that comprise the film. His breakthrough movie, Welcome to the Dollhouse, came before Happiness, and takes a similarly piercing look at real life but is bogged down too much in its deadpan humor and relentless punishment of its protagonist. Happiness straddles the shortcomings of both of those films, neither offering a simple resolution to its problems or being too strange to the point where unrealism sets in. It is real, it is complex, and it's also deeply disturbing and maybe morally offensive. I'm also known for not really caring about the morality of a movie, so maybe that's why I was never bored or too offended at any time.
  
  The best line in Happiness comes toward the very end, when the sisters and their parents are sitting around talking about a grisly New Jersey murder, involving dismemberment and plastic baggies, that occurred in the apartment building of Flynn Boyle's Helen. "Everyone uses baggies; that's why we can relate to this crime," she says. Happiness is one of those twisted American suburbia flicks that contains things that happen every day, probably closer to us than we expect. That's why I could relate to this movie. I don't expect you to; in fact, I don't blame you if you hate it with a passion or don't get past the first ten minutes. Things will happen that will disgust you, revolt you, and disturb you. There is no reason why anyone should like this movie or why it should 'work.' But I was entertained in some sick and twisted way, even while my jaw stayed glued to the floor. Don't say I didn't warn you, and extensively...but I dare you to see it. A-
  
  
  

• Great Movie - Awful DVD

  
  By A3RB00R6GOWEK2 on 1999-11-19
  Nothing more needs to be said about how excellent this film is. HOWEVER, if you get the DVD, it is one of the worst quality transfers ever...there is so much pixelization and artifacting that people's heads actually pulsate and change in some of the close-ups. Unwatchable. TRIMARK should be ashamed to release such a travesty. Are all of their DVD's so cheaply made? Buy the VHS instead.
  
  

• Represents everything good about indepent film

  
  By A2P5PU6SLX3OVE on 1999-06-02
  Definitely one of the best movies of the decade, and one of the best independent films of all time. I saw this movie in the theater because i was already of fan of the director, Todd Solondz, after seeing and loving his first film, Welcome to the Dollhouse. This film goes where no film has dared even think about going in the past, completely redefing the term "black comedy". The movie intertwines several loosely related plotlines(a la Pulp Fiction), all involving outwardly banal suburban characters whose private lives are actually teeming with depravity and tragedy, ineptitude and self-loathing. The film is at its most audacious when following the trials and tribulations of an average suburban psychologist who also just happens to be a homosexual pedophile. In this particular storyline, Solondz takes this repellent figure, this Grendel of modern society, and exposes his life in such tragically comic and crushingly depressing tones as to make you reevaluate your initial preconceived notions of the John Wayne Gaycie's of the world. This film has the singular distinction of containing the only scene in which i felt the urge to laugh, vomit, and cry simultaneously. If you are a prude or a moralizing, close-minded fundamentalist of one type or another, you will probably find this movie "filthy" and "morally bankrupt". If so, then you, of course, are the type of person who needs to see this movie most of all. Anyone else with an open mind and a taste for shocking, thought provoking media of any kind will enjoy this unsentimental look at the by-products of America's Suburban Utopia.
  
  

• Definitely not for the squeamish....

  
  By A2OTX4X3895YXT on 2001-08-14
  Very vivid/memorable film for those who enjoy challenging cinema (i.e., Erin Brockovich is NOT challenging cinema).

  No, we don't need this film banned and all involved blacklisted (as one US reviewer stated)...Nor do we need to consider reviews by people who could only make it half-way through this film (one reviewer left the movie after the openning scene and had the NERVE to leave a scathing review!).

  Enough ranting...this is one film you will NOT forget. Funny, shocking, sad--it's all here. You will find yourself cringing at several points throughout the film. A lot of ugly imagery and a lot of ugly characters populate this movie, but such is life!

  This made a lot of critics' "best of" for 1998, although I'm not sure I agree (although maybe I do...1998 was a long time ago).

  Anyway, one of the criticisms raised is that the pedophile in the movie is portrayed "sympathetically"....well, ya know what, folks, not all child molesters look/act like one-eyed ogres.

  The film touches on a lot of things that many of us have been through (late-life divorce, dreams of adventure outside our boring lives, teenage sexual confusion, etc.). I think this may be why so many people are horrified by this film.

  I've read more than one review that stated that the children in this film were abused in the process of making it...perhaps they were watching The Exorcist and not Happiness. I can think of no other explanation for that conclusion.

  If you can handle a film that seems uneven in its mood (shock, then humor, then empathy, etc.), and you have a taste for unusual cinema (again, Erin Brockovish is NOT unusual), this might be one of your favorites. Just brace yourself for an unflinching look into some of the darkest corners of humanity.
  
  

• The Cinema of Revenge

  
  By A1ASCECH3KOZ3P on 2004-02-24
  "Happiness" is like an American Peter Greenaway film without stunning visual images, witty dialogue, intellectual game-playing indugences. What do get when you strip those signature items away from a Greenaway film? Pure misanthropy and contempt for the audience. After watching this film, I got the distinct feeling that writer/director Todd Solondz was taking revenge on us all for harms visited upon him in middle and high school. He wants us all to suffer so he can have the last laugh and possibly feel a little better about himself. Sure, we humans all have secrets that evoke shame. We can do stupid, shocking and repulsive things. We tell people we think we can trust. Some people can cope with them, some can't. But if you're going to make a movie about such things, you damn well better have something to say about it instead of just presenting tableaux of cruelty. So we're left here with an undoubtedly talented cast in service of a script that seems to be an exercise in moral relativism, but on closer inspection there's less there than meets the eye.

  What can I say about this piece of garbage? The characters depicted are pretty much unredeemable--because redemption simply is not possible in Solondz's little universe. In order to depict a world as bleak as this one (and for the characters' unhappy states to truly mean something) one needs to balance it with wit and, you know, the occasional happy person. Solondz does no such thing, of course; that would be to compromise with "Them"--the people in the real world for whom happiness or finding beauty in life is possible--the kind of people who will see through his films for the solipsistic messes they are. It's one thing to depict deeply sick characters in order to deepen our understanding of how terrible acts occur (see Martin Scorsese's "Taxi Driver" for example) or to illuminate transpersonal forces at work, and another thing altogether to show moral sickness simply for the sake of a contest of whose wounds are deeper, or some sophomoric existential statement. "Happiness" does nothing of the former, and is, bereft of that, a reprehensible film.
  
  

• Tasteless, valueless, shock-fare garbage.
  By A1AGGTLW74MEUW on 2004-03-27
  This movie has nothing to offer but shock, and I mean nothing. The acting is decent, but other than that there is no point to this film other than to expose the viewer to the darkest elements of the human psyche for shock value.

  The characters are a woman who fantasizes about being raped, a man who drugs and rapes 11-year-old boys, another man who makes obscene phone calls to women while masturbating, an overweight woman who kills the man who raped her and dismembers his body, a Russian immigrant who takes advantage of vulnerable women, an oversensitive, mousy waif who cries at the drop of a hat, a senior couple who separate and try to date other people, and an 11-year-old boy who's obsessed with having his first orgasm. At the end of the movie you will probably either hate or at least dislike ALL of the characters.

  Not only are the characters despicable, but this movie is BORING and POINTLESS. The very last scene where this 11-year old kid masturbates on a balcony while spying on a sunbathing neighbor then marches into the dining room and announces to his entire extended family that he "came" is a perfect example of the kind of pointless shock-fare garbage that this film is. It has no value whatsoever.
  
  

• Get Out Your Addressbook and See for Yourself
  By A2YD10HUU2IBHR on 2000-09-25
  Happiness tells the terrible truth about our blank lives. No guns, no catchphrases, no handy resolution. This is us. Reviewers who claim that it's too negative should try a simple experiment: get out your addressbook and go through ten randomly-chosen names. Then ask yourself whether Happiness is really an exaggeration of the terrible loneliness of cubicle-life in the American middle class.

  Hate this film if you like, but at least tell the truth about why you hate it: because it shows the simple, bland, unbearable truth.
  
  

• Awful
  By A1PN3R8DXRQ1C3 on 2002-06-18
  This film is a must-see for anyone seeking an illustration of Alfred Hitchcock's observation that actors are cattle. You just sit there for two hours agog, wondering what in the world talented performers are doing in a film such as this. You ask yourself Is there no line an actor will draw when offered a role? It really is as though the entire cast have been conditioned not to detect obscenity before walking onto the set.

  I am really loath to lower myself to Todd Solonz's level by discussing the (literally) masturbatory visuals and dialogue, but suffice to say that the movie is indeed explicit to the point of repulsion, and therefore, by modern American artistic standards, must be profound and thought-provoking. You find the sight of a man using his own natural glue to stick postcards to his bedroom wall repulsive? Well, you musn't be thinking hard enough about the deep message of the movie. You're turned off by the sight of a father abusing himself in the back seat of a car while flicking through a children's comic? Well then you musn't be letting the movie challenge your assumptions about yada yada yada ...

  It needs to be said plainly. American taste is rapidly descending into a quagmire where the intellectual knee-jerk reaction to obscenity is to immediately, unthinkingly mistake it for profundity. Champions of freedom of expression have sought to make this freedom boundless, such that even what is universally acknowledged to be appalling is given voice, that the demon of censorship may never get a toe-hold. But by now the very act of pushing the envelope of bad taste has itself become a mark of artistic merit, and works that are self-evidently repulsive are considered great for no other reason than that they supposedly reaffirm the sheer breadth of America's freedom of expression.

  The point made by almost every advocate of freedom of speech, from Jefferson to Mill, is that suppression of that freedom may exclude us from coming into contact with important ideas. Thus even bad ideas should be given a forum. This is true enough. But that does not mean that the broader the leeway for expression, the more we should jettison our taste and judgement. In fact, the opposite is true: when there is no external quality control, then our own taste and discernment needs to be at its sharpest, to winnow the wheat from the chaff. Happiness clearly crosses a threshold of taste, and when movies such as this are well-received, we are in trouble. But that must just be the repressed prude in me talking. You know - that bad person who doesn't sit back and pensively stroke his chin at the sight of someone masturbating.

  When Monsters from the Moon, one of the worst sci-fi B-movies of the 50s was released, one reviewer commented: `Everyone involved with this film deserves censure.' Likewise, I think any normal person would be embarrassed to have even made the coffee on the set of a film like Happiness.
  
  

• The Terrible Truth
  By AD0J5KK4WQXNS on 2004-01-10
  You will not like it. There is nothing to like about this film. It deals with topics that are indescribable without having this review purged. The film comes with warnings all over the cover. People got up and left the cinema. People tried to boycott it and wanted to see it banned. It is an assault on morals. It is the darkest of dramas. It is only funny because a smile is all you can do to deal with what you are witnessing. It is nauseating. It is completely taboo. You do not want to tell people you saw this. You do not want to watch it with your girlfriend. You do not want to recommend it. You would feel excruciatingly embarrassed to watch this with your parents. You can not comprehend why anyone would want to make it. You feel that the actors have gone too far. You never want to see anything like it again. However, inside, deep down, you know that what you have seen is nothing short of the horrific truth about some people. You know that your parents could very well be like this. You know that your girlfriend or boyfriend may have some secrets like this. You know that your friends could well be involved in some of the topics conveyed in this film. You know all too well that the media reports on it 24/7. You know that PEOPLE DO THESE THINGS! But it is taboo, taboo and it is not you! Never you! How could you ever do such a thing or even think such things.... But there in the darkness of your soul is something that is not a hundred miles away from the topics that this darkest of film expounds on. The human condition and its western syndrome are all too capable of what is on display here.

  The fact remains that millions of people have experienced first-hand much of themes that this film covers. It is not something that does not happen. It does and they do. The media talk about non-stop. Any tabloid magazine is full of it. The telephone services have to deal with it - so do the police and social services. People even make money out of these things. It is terrible, awful, disgusting - but real.

  What most people fail to realize is that this film is all about the mentally ill who have very deep-seeded psychological problems that they can not cope with, without some help. These people can be found in any walk of life. As on display in "Happiness" those who suffer from these diseases of the mind are in fact everyday Joe-soaps and some with important jobs or are even authority figures. It is this angle that makes it all the more real and upsetting. It is this upper-class take on the whole problem that shows that no matter who you are, you too can suffer from these problems. Too long has this material been only played out in the hands of the seedy "villains" or underground freaks. Too long has cinema devoted these themes to prisoners and baddies and the elements of society who most of us never engage in. Here we see our friends, family, employers, employees, doctors and teachers all doing what they should not be doing! This is why this film deserves the acclaim that it got. It did the right thing. It did it the right way. It did it to balance out this topic that has always been dealt with unjustly.

  Honesty deserves praise and praise is what this film deserves. Say "thank you" to Todd Solondz for "keeping it real".
  
  

• This film is NOT honest.
  By AQOWRBCNYM3Y7 on 2004-06-11
  "If you can't handle the realism, it's your problem; this movie isn't afraid to be honest; blah blah blah." On the contrary, Solondz goes to ludicrous extremes of contrivance to convince us that the world is horrible, people are monsters, and there's not a damn thing anyone can do about it. Every single character in this film is depressed, insane, a pervert, or a liar, and every character is unhappy. That's neither realistic nor, in my opinion, "honest" on any deeper level. Solondz does his utmost to deny the existence of any chance for redemption. The worldview this movie conveys seems to be that of a deeply troubled person desperately trying to tell us that everyone else is as miserable as he is. I'm not saying some of the things he depicts don't happen in the real world (albeit in less contrived ways). But to focus on them, to the exclusion of anything else, to make a point about the impossibility of obtaining happiness, seems dishonest, manipulative, and downright irresponsible.

  I really wanted to like this movie. It was well made and well acted. I even gave it the chance to sink in, since many of my favorite movies become my favorites only after a while of thinking about them. But the more I think about this one, the angrier I get. Why would anyone want to use art in this way?
  
  

• The Indescreet Charm of the Bourjoisie
  By A1NPNGWBVD9AK3 on 2003-06-25
  This smacks a bit of a director (Solondz)out to make something of a splash for himself. An attention-getting, semaphore-waving, "hey looky here how cutting edge, mod, hip, shoot from the hip, auteur I can be!" On the other hand, it's a pretty darned well directed movie, with many carefully-crafted, dramatic and dark comic vignettes, that don't quite add up to a great sum total.

  Without going into the lurid details of what makes this movie so controversial (read any other review to get the idea), Solondz' main strength would appear to be his allowing his excellent ensemble cast the latitude to fully investigate their roles. Even Jon Lovitz, not exactly what one would usually think of when the word "method acting" comes up, delivers a delightfully unrestrained, semi-monologue at the beginning of the film that serves as the keynote address in the convention of the mad that is to follow. Perfect delivery. Perfect timing. Nice payoff.

  Self-indulgent or not, the film will definitely hold your interest (even when you wish it wouldn't) and have you believing in the characters and the storyline. Don't watch with Grandma and the kids, unless you have an even more bizarre and dysfunctional family than the one depicted here.

  BEK
  
  

• The Banality of Perversion & Dysfunction, middle-America style
  By A3C6CZC2JP67VK on 2007-12-10
  This film is indeed marvelous. Todd Solondz combines really absurd situations and embarrassing moments -some of which most of us do encounter in daily life and some we hopefully won't- with serious issues. Thus, this film provides not only a very high degree of entertainment -Solondz' sense for irony is exceptional-, it gives you a critical view on society without judging or condemning or forcing you to think one way or the other. I am genuinely impressed by Happiness and its cast full of great actors.
  
  It is littered with an assortment of characters that seem to have sexual fetishes and perversions of some sort. Solondz explores some dark subjects and you would think this would make the film harsh and difficult to watch, but it holds your attention throughout mainly because of the excellent performances on show, especially from Dylan Baker as a respected doctor who holds a terrible secret, and Philip Seymour Hoffman as an obscene phone-caller. He is so incredibly versatile - he successfully made my skin crawl here. Before I even go further the very first scene is probably the best work John Lovitz has ever done. This movie looks dead on at some of the most awkward and horrific things in American culture, but never ever ever tells you or suggests to you what you should think or feel, the way most films do. John's Speech will blow you away. Jane Adams, who has a calamitous love life and plays the social reject of three dysfunctional sisters, does a wonderful job in role her facial expressions will get you going. My personal favorite was Cynthia Stevenson as one of those typical housewives with 2.5 kids and a carpool. Her character was so obnoxious, superficial and condescending - she clearly did a wonderful job. I was also a huge fan of Camryn Manheim (what a twist!), Lara Flynn Boyle (she gives new meaning to the role of the phony snob), Elizabeth Ashley, and Molly Shannon's cameo which was HYSTERICAL. And the child actors...simply brilliant and such difficult material. The film's most powerful and emotional scene is towards the end when Baker's character has a trying conversation with his son.
  
  I think it is fair to say that anyone watching this film can identify with at LEAST one of the so-called 'sicknesses' of the characters, therefore, it is the look in to the dark recesses of their own minds that makes them so uncomfortable. The world is a messed up place, and we all contribute to that in our own fashion, some more than others, but nevertheless, we all do, because our lives all clash with one another at some point. The best we can do is to face it and deal with it, not act as though we are separate from it! I suppose what I am trying to say is that this work is an important, unflinching look at the REAL reality in this world and, like it or not, it does affect you in one way or another, so you might as well face up to it by identifying with this film!
  
  
  
• A challenging masterwork of pure genius
  By A2N9OENVXDF643 on 2001-03-10
  Happiness is not a film for everyone; no doubt there are countless people who will find the subject matter in this movie offensive, so much so that they refuse to watch it. To them, I say that the material is SUPPOSED to be offensive, and to dismiss this film on those grounds is to deny yourself of one of the greatest films ever committed to celluloid. Happiness tells the interweaving tales of miserable people in miserable lives, failing miserably in their attempts to live out their dreams of happiness. Some of the characters are shallow, others deluded, and still others inhuman sociopaths. But what is remarkable about Solondz's writing and direction is that even the most reprehensible characters are painted with warm tones of humanity. A compulsive pedophile is also a loving father. An aggressive obscene phone caller is just a frail man who wants to be loved, but doesn't know how to reach out to others. It is this discordant duality that drives this film, providing laughs in the face of misfortune, and sympathy when there should be disgust. The result is a disturbing and profoundly affecting film that stays in your memory for weeks to come. Happiness is truly a landmark film.
  
  
• Un-Happiness after watching this movie
  By A1KT1GWCW8F80 on 2004-08-08
  I loved and own Todd Solondz's previous movie "Welcome to the Dollhouse", and after having read many glowing reviews decided to give "Happiness" a try. This movie reportedly is a very dark comedy, but I did not even smile one time. Not once.
  
  I am not easily shocked, or conservative, but much of the movie seemed to be there only so that those responsible could say "look, our movie talks about or shows this or that" - in this case we get semen shooting on to a wall in one scene, then later, semen shooting onto a balcony railing to be licked off by a dog. Wonderful.
  
  Maybe the humor was in the sex-ed Q&A between the 11-year old son and father, where words of wisdom included the fact that it's not the length that is important, but the width (so says the dad), and that "come" can be a verb as well as a noun. Insightful!
  
  I can't find a way to get any humor out of anally raping young boys - and I'm afraid Happiness couldn't find it either - unless it was the father's line to his 11-year old son that he would only jerk off instead of raping him. Witty.
  
  OK, OK, I did find the one bit of humor. It was at the restaurant when Camryn Mannheim's character orders a hot fudge sundae after talking about murdering the doorman who helped carry her groceries to her apartment and asked for some ice before raping her.
  
  Every character was hopelessly uninteresting and one-dimensional. Who cares? But seriously, it could have gotten an oscar for best special effect - creating an animatronic character looking exactly like Lara Flynn Boyle. On the back cover is a picture of her looking flat and unmoving. That represents her action sequence. The rest of the characters? Look at the front cover. All of them are frowning and looking pretty grim - just like me after watching this movie.
  
  Zero
  
  
  
  
• Daring and original perspective
  By A34D4KCP94ACJZ on 2002-06-26
  How can a film that contains essentially very little nudity(if any that I can recall) and no outstanding violence still be rated NC-17? The answer to that question was unimaginable until I saw this very interesting approach. Todd Solondz goes overboard with shock in this lengthy and twisted comedy-drama. If you find yourself laughing at this film and then you feel guilty about it you are not alone.

  I stayed up one night until 2:30am attached to this film. It is horribly depressing and none of the characters are remotely likable but you relate to them nonetheless and eventually they manage to win you over. This film sticks in your head and is NC-17 for a reason. It takes a pedophile and a sexually harassing office worker (played brilliantly by Philip Seymour Hoffman) and it allows you to see a side of them that is just like yourself. You will find yourself relating to characters you hate and then you will find yourself feeling sorry for them. This film does something to the subconscious that can only be explained as disturbing. Solondz is one of my new favorite filmmakers.
  
  

• Independent Films - Why This One Works
  By AWPODHOB4GFWL on 2003-02-27
  Most independent films are not sponsored by major film studios because there is 'no market (money)' for them. Few of these break out. However, that's even more to reason investigate films that push the limit and Todd Solondz's "Happiness" not only does that, it pushes your buttons. Heaped with plenty of characters with dubious or questionable morals (great actors ensemble), viewers have found pieces of this story either hilarious or repellent, but outrageous in every respect. "Happiness" presents characters of middle America at their rawest and sometimes bleakest moments, making decisions that almost always bring them another difficult hurdle to overcome.

  I personally saw this film as hilarious and unbelievably inventive. Every character is woven in a twisted plot of selfishness or self-awareness. Sex appears as the main motif and it isn't always pretty. In fact, Solodnz seems to use it as a tool to both disgust and delight the audience simultaneously. There's the rub - the viewer never knows quite how to appropriately react - just like most of the characters in the film. Maybe we see too much of ourselves in this film to make us feel comfortable, but if you can approach it as a black comedy, you may find yourself a little surprised at how humor can sometimes be portrayed.
  
  

• Most offensive movie. Ever.
  By A283R078YFV95D on 2005-02-17
  There is nothing funny about molesting children. If you think this movie is "cute", "funny" or provocative, then you either don't have children...
  
  Or shouldn't.
  
  This film is hideous, offensive, and insulting to human beings. The director, actors and fans should be ashamed.
  
  
• It's an intriguing movie...
  By AUBKTL25KPSBE on 2002-01-01
  I find it interesting that if you make a movie with people getting their heads blown off and their guts spread all over the ground most people don't even bat an eye. But, make a movie about a pederast and people want to form a lynch mob.

  Yes, horrible things happen in this movie. Guess what? Horrible things happen in real life. I think the whole point of this movie was to show some people trying to be happy, but going about it in all the wrong ways. I think another thing that bothers most people about this movie is that most of the characters are presented (initially) as "normal" people, but we end up seeing them for "horrible, depraved sickos" that they are. The problem lies in the "fact" that depraved sickos aren't allowed to be "normal." We're "normal." Depraved sickos wear hockey masks and do horrible things like in those other movies. They don't hold down jobs and have families, etc.

  I'm not sure why I'm even writing this "review" except to say that I think this is a great, challenging movie. The acting is awesome, the plot is interesting, and the problems are real.

  I also wanted to comment on another reviewer's statement that the scene with the boy and his father at the end of the film was pointless. I felt that was one of the most crucial, and moving, scenes of the entire film. Here we have a man who does, what we would consider incorrigible things, but he could never consider doing those things to his own son because he loves him so much. I'll be .....! A pedophile with a heart? Nah...
  
  

• REAL LIFE
  By A84UFSF2SZS2W on 2002-02-19
  I had no idea what to expect of this film and was frankly a bit shocked by it. I had heard so much about its more controversial elements, but I had no idea it would be quite so hateful. This said, I did not hate the movie as a viewer at all. At times I was shocked by some of its more unsavoury storylines, but I was captivated by how the darker elements of human nature are so pervasive. We just do not always notice them in reality. This film examines those darker parts of humanity by exacerbating them and looking past the veneer of "pretty and perfect" nuclear families. Many people who watch this film WILL hate it. Many will be highly offended. Some will be perplexed and moved to thought. All the actors here give outstanding performances as people who lead seemingly normal lives but who have secrets and edges to their personalities which make them more... human. Sometimes these flaws and faults make them positively disgusting people. Philip Seymour Hoffman is excellent as a prank-phone-calling pervert with a whiny but monotone voice. He lusts after his neighbour, played with an icy touch by a self-absorbed Lara Flynn Boyle (the role does not seem much of a stretch for her). When Hoffman begins phoning Boyle, she insists they have to meet so he can do all the obscene things to her that he talks about doing in his prank phone calls. When they do, she immediately says, "This isn't working." Another tenant in their building, played manically well by Boyle's The Practice co-star Camryn Mannheim, lusts after Hoffman and comes to his door nightly to report minutiae about various other tenants in the building. Hoffman is blind to her feelings and rejects her. Until finally she confesses nonchalantly to having murdered their doorman. The film, with characters and scenes like these, can be at once horrifying and also heartbreaking. Meanwhile, Boyle's character has two sisters, one (played well by Jane Adams, whom we have seen in Frasier and in Wonder Boys) an aimless sort who cannot keep a job and cannot fall in love and even when she thinks she does, one bad things after another happens. The other sister is played by Cynthia Stevenson, who might best be remembered for playing a similar role in tv's short-lived Hope and Gloria (she was the irrepressible and always positive Hope). Her character believes she has the perfect, stable life with a psychologist husband, a wonderful son, and a nice house. Little does she know, and this is how depraved the characters in the film are, her husband is a pedophile, and he drugs one of his son's friends in order to molest him. By the end of the film, of course, all of these illusions fall apart. But the characters' lives go on, just like life does.
  
  
• bad writing, bad movie
  By A1O815VMP5GGEK on 2000-03-05
  If you are easily offended by disturbing images, don't see this movie. But more importantly if you are easily offended by bad writing, don't see this movie. Character development is the key to any great film. A sick and twisted character can still be interesting if he or she is developed properly throughout the picture. Unfortunately this was not the case in "Happiness" and the viewer is left with a handfull of characters with no substance. Another problem I have with this movie is how it has been seen by many as a knock-you-out drama. Hard-hitting, intense, movies are hard-hitting and intense because throughout the picture, the viewer discovers something about themselves they never knew before. This film doesn't give the viewer a chance to do this. One can't find something hidden in themselves if he or she can not see these feelings within the characters. Simply put, "Happiness" is a bundle of undeveloped characters that relies on it's misused shock value to carry the picture.
  
  
• Take a good, long look at your neighbors...
  By A1XTLPXADYVJ68 on 2000-07-14
  A great deal of criticism has been directed towards this film. For those people who find this film too dark, I have one word - DISNEY. Now, for the rest of us, this is a film to be respected - not liked. This movie is not entertainment. It's sole purpose is to make you think. An unflinching look at what goes on behind closed doors. An amazing "white knuckle ride". People have compared this movie to American Beauty, but that's like comparing The Return of the Secaucus Seven to The Big Chill. American Beauty isn't a bad film, but it's Hollywood's idea of a family on the fast track to destruction. Happiness shows us the worst case scenario of family life. After seeing this film, you'll see the family in American Beauty as the Cleavers. Yes, this movie is shocking, but it's OK to be shocking as long as you have a good reason. Todd Solondz has the best reason to shock us - he won't to wake us up. Buy this movie, watch it, and then take a good, long look at your neighbors - and yourself.
  
  
• Finally, reality on-screen
  By AT6CZDCP4TRGA on 1999-12-12
  This was the most breathtakingly REAL film I've seen in years: a true slice of life from the REAL America, which Hollywood usually tries so hard to whitewash over. There is no lazy, comfortingly formulaic outcomes or cheap moralizing here---just beautifully brutal and brutally beautiful honesty. The humor is jet-black, subtle and brilliant.

  A lot of people are not going to like this film's refusal to give them what they're used to seeing or what they would like to see of themselves and the world they inhabit. A lot of little universes are bound to be disturbed by this film---and justly so, if not long overdue.
  
  

• Sadness
  By A30I1EABSSCYU1 on 2000-07-04
  Happiness is certainly not a movie for everybody. Since I like movies like "Leaving Las Vegas", I thought "Happiness" dealt with the same explicit matter. I was wrong. Happiness is a immature, disgusting, coward piece of movie. We are introduced to a man that has strong feelings for little boys. There's a guy who makes random explicit phone calls to women while he pleases himself. There's a woman who tries hard to make herself happy. But she always picks the wrong road. I ask myself, is this entertainment? Or is it drama? Should we feel sorry for them? These is the kind of people I dread to meet. You never know who they are until you know them. This movie is complete junk.
  
  
• Disturbingly funny
  By A1BZKRDRPLAA90 on 2002-10-08
  This film is certainly not for the weak hearted or weak minded. I tried to rent this after a few students suggested "You'd Like it" and had no luck finding it anywhere, BlockBuster carries it in Canada but not the US. That's a good sign that I won't have to sit through some Sleepless in seatle, jerry Maguire, Titanic sort of torture. Well I was finally able to find small DVD rental store that had it. It is as others have said, "F'd up", but that doesn't mean its bad. It contains one of the best cinematic lines I've ever heard in a movie, a short conversation at the end of the movie between the father and son, that I can't say here because Amazon would censor me. The whole series of private conversations between father and son are amazing, amazingly disturbing and/or funny depending on your view.

  This movie isn't for people who take titles literally, If you thought Bambi was a disturbing movie, DONT RENT/BUY this. If you like quality alternative flicks and can stomach the topic of Pedophilia(there is nothing graphic in the movie) give this movie a chance. The NC-17 rating is a joke.
  
  

• Excruciatingly boring
  By on 2004-03-05
  The people in this movie are creepy, all right, but unfortunately there's little if anything interesting about any of them. This is one of those movies in which you're sure something is going to happen any minute now, but nothing ever does.

  In reaction to the reviewers who are making a fuss about "child abuse" in this movie - well, it's not there. A little suggestion or two, but hardly anything to work up a sweat over.

  In fact, there's nothing at all in this movie to get worked up over, or even to wake up for. This movie might be good to put on the TV if you have unwelcome houseguests to get rid of; otherwise, NOT recommended.
  
  

• More Depressing Than The 6:00 News..
  By A2ZSC81MXLBELX on 2004-07-31
  This review refers to the Lions Gate Signature Series DVD edition of "Happiness"...
  
  Did you ever watch Fear Factor?....You don't REALLY want to see people eating maggots, drinking bile and then puking all over the place...you don't REALLY want to see someone buried in a coffin with 10,000 hissing cockroaches, but yet there is something about it that, once your there, you have to see if they can do it. But once is usually enough..and that is how it is with this film.
  
  There wasn't anything shocking about this film, it was all stuff that's on the news daily, the stuff I want to get away from for a couple of hours when I view a film. The story, which revolves around 3 sisters, each with their own inner longings and secrets, is filled with the most depressing, vile, dysfunctional, and taxing array of characters. And...that goes double for the subject matter, which includes a big dose of child molestation, among other disturbing scenes.
  
  The two stars I give for this film is for the extraoridnary cast, who portrayed these characters intensly and realistically. It was their performances that kept me until the end. The cast includes Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Jane Adams,Jared Harris, Elizabeth Ashley, Dylan Baker,Jon Lovitz Lara Flynn Boyle, Cynthia Stevenson,Louise Lasser and a welcome appearance by Ben Gazzara.
  
  The DVD is presented in Widescreen, DD2.0 Surround, has subtitles in Spanish, English and French, and has some very informative cast and crew bios.
  
  This is one I would strongly suggest renting first, and only to those who like that envelope pushed right over the edge. For another side of Hoffman check out:Love Liza, about a man dealing with grief, one that I did enjoy and would recommend....Laurie
  
  
  
• Diverting (and deviant) but overrated.
  By A6FIAB28IS79 on 2005-06-13
  Eventually I had to see this controversial, cultish film, which I had been told by various parties was distasteful, full of hilarity, socially relevant. Indeed, it's all three--a dark comedy that occupies a midway place between "Deliverance" and "Something About Mary." Unfortunately, the shocking scenes don't have sufficient justification to illuminate life and the comedy doesn't entertain sufficiently to justify the frequently deviant subject matter. (I laughed heartily at the opening scene with Jon Lovitz, but thereafter the film provokes primarily the kind of nervous laughter that serves as a defense against embarrassment).
  
  The narrative is engaging but in a way that lacks, on the one hand, the verisimilitude of a Robert Altman movie and, on the other, the depth of Woody Allen (in his Ingmar Bergman mode). And if the intent is to do a parody of soap opera, "Guiding Light" is way beyond "Happiness" both in its intricate, multiple plotting and its resonant, complex characterizations. By comparison, "Happiness" is shallow, juvenile, and cynical--a film that, whatever its intentions, is without much insight or heart. I found myself responding to some of its questionable choices (masturbation and pedophiliac scenes) as I did to Kenneth Starr's obsession with throwing in our faces each and every lurid detail of Clinton's affair with Monica. Who needs it?
  
  Stolondz obviously (far "too" obviously) wants to make a case for empathy and compassion for society's outcasts. He fails to make that case. Fritz Lang's brilliant "M" (1930) is far more successful both in exposing the common dominator of "original sin" and in eliciting compassion for a serial child killer who, like Dr. Maplewood, "can't help himself." By contrast "Happiness," in its climactic father-son talk, offers little more than masturbation as a metaphor for the redirection of antisocial impulses.
  
  What "saves" the film, if anything, is the acting. Each of the three sisters is sharply individualized, thanks less to the script than absolutely "on key" performances that somehow transcend the caricaturist dialogue. There's Lara Flynn (as a worldly prima-donna writer), Cynthia Stevenson (as a "necessarily" happy married yuppie who "has it all") and, above all, Jane Adams (as the youngest, relentlessly victimized sister). Also, Dylan Baker, as the psychiatrist-pedophile, strikes just the right balance between a serenely successful professional and a neurotic and clumsy, middle-aged ritard. Finally, it's always rewarding to see Ben Gazarra back on the screen. His appearance alone generally insures that something of value can be salvaged from an otherwise questionable if not time-wasting scenario.
  
  (Postscript: I'll have to admit that a "dramatic" film that manages to hit home with many young people and that provokes good writing such as that in the "Spotlight Review," may have more going for it than I'm able or willing to see. I certainly don't mean to dismiss the film because of the subject matter, however repellant. Unflinching artists--from Sophocles to Nabakov to Hubert Selby--amply testify to the importance of taking on conventional "taboos," both to get our attention and to get us to see beyond the morally myopic. "Happiness" may be an off-center movie that aspires to be art. If so, it's not so much a mediocre film as a pretentious one.)
  
  
• A brilliant, audacious masterpiece.....
  By A1HUBEP5DJ6W51 on 2000-04-27
  Taking risks that most filmmakers would never dream of, Todd Solondz has mangaged a rare feat in American film -- pushing the envelope of good taste without resorting to sophomoric shock humor while simultaneously creating realistic, complex characters. The film will no doubt offend many, but unlike the overwrought preachiness of many in Hollywood, Solondz respects the intelligence of the audience to come to their own conclusions. Because Americans tend to lean in the direction of self-righteousness and moral absolutism, we are left aghast when we witness a film that refrains from judgment. In addition, Solondz has created a film of unprecedented power and black humor, where loneliness and desperation are treated with the proper level of seriousness that so many films avoid. To be sure, there are big laughs in this film, but they come from our collective recognition rather than the belief that we are superior to the people on the screen. Every scene works perfectly; every performance contains the precise mixture of dignity and absurdity; and all is presented with the understanding that easy answers and forced closure are not parts of life, therefore they should remain absent from film. As a viewer, ask yourself one question: Given that all human beings are united in the desire to love, be loved, and express affection for another, what are those not "blessed" with socially acceptable traits (wealth, beauty, strength, even sanity) supposed to do? How do they capture that essential part of life? This film dares to ask that question and in many ways, provide disturbing answers.
  
  
• Shocking but Insightful
  By AZTFTPFCR42M0 on 2000-02-19
  It is one of the best movies that i've ever seen. Its not a movie to watch while eating popcorn or if you want to pass the time easily. This movie contains something to think about. It brings into light some dark spots in our life, in our society. Spots that we usually ignore or categorize without really analyzing them. The Serial rapist can actually be the charming shrink and not necessarily a twisted mind weirdo, a brutal murderer can be the fat poor lady and not necessarily a cold minded killer, a phone-sex harasser can be a computer insecure nerd, and they all can be neighbores or somehow relate to eachother. The movie also deals with the relations of 3 sisters, a happy houswife-the shrink's wife, a novelist that her main problem that she has too many admirers, and little joy who has anything in life but joy - on the surface everybody pretends to be supportive but down beneath they are actually phony. The talented screenwriter which happens to be also the director, Todd Solondz, makes out of some really pathetic situations something to laugh about. The first and last scene is something that should not be missed! If you would concentrate in the message and not on the bodily fluids, I promise you'll know to appreciate this movie.
  
  
• What is the big fuss here??
  By on 1999-09-14
  Shocking? Yes, maybe. But why is this one so much more shocking to so many people (pro's and cons) than, let's say for instance, Scream?? That one is shocking and violent and totally unrealistic. This one is shocking and violent and portrays the world we live in in a very realistic way! Maybe without knowing or realising it THAT is what people find so shocking about it. One reviewer wrote: "I actually felt violated watching this movie. Completely unentertaining. Made me feel very uneasy watching it. It seemed to have no point." Well, fellow viewer: THAT might be the point exACTly! As director Solondz already proved with his wonderful and almost equally uncomfortable DOLLHOUSE film he has a very sharp eye wor what is happening around him and his memories and observations of his life and the world he spends it in are not obscured by pink clouds. A lot of people portrayed in HAPPINESS are resembling many people I know in real life. This is what we made of the world, people, weather you like it or not! Those who don't like the film or don't see the point in this film are probably those who it is about. I myself found it very comforting to see that there is at least ONE person in the world who actually sees the things I see: that the real world and the real life are definitely not what everyone tries to make it look like in everyday talks, magazines and tv-soaps. Brilliant. Kept me glued to my seat for the full 130 minutes.
  
  

• Welcome to the Dollhouse
• Storytelling
• Palindromes
• Gummo
• Kids