Happiest Season (2020) Review

As the 12 days of Christmas draw to a close, I thought I'd review a Christmas film while there's still time. As a lesbian who loves terrible cheesy Christmas films I feel like I was the exact target audience for Happiest Season so I had high hopes. See those smiling faces above? That's how I expected and wanted it to make me feel. In reality, my reaction was more like this:

I'd seen reviews suggesting it was a bit of a bummer but it had a stellar cast so when I won one of those GooglePlay £5 credits for finding a pin on a map (still a little confused by how easy that was), I was excited to rent it.

Sure enough it started with a silly scene involving a Christmas lights tour and Kristen Stewart's Abby hanging from a roof. Harper and Abby seemed very sweet together, Harper invited Abby to Christmas with her family and Abby was preparing to propose on Christmas Day, it was all very sweet and fluffy and I was invested.

The film hits its first speed bump early on. The morning after inviting Abby to Christmas, Harper seems to give her an out and isn't as sure. Turns out, this is because Harper isn't out to her family. I was very lucky when I came out because all I got was acceptance by those who mattered but I think everyone who is LGBTQ+ knows of at least one person who was rejected by their family, so a character who is afraid to come out makes sense. My issue though is that Harper tells Abby she's going to have to come as her room-mate when they're almost there. Harper's driven them there so Abby doesn't really have a choice. You know how almost all problems in rom coms could be solved if they communicated properly? This is that, but it leaves a really bad taste in my mouth as it's so manipulative, particularly as Harper claims she'll come out after the holidays.

Once they get there, Abby goes along with everything Harper wants, and how does Harper behave? She leaves Abby alone a lot, stays out with her friends until 2am after Abby leaves, and is suspicious when she sees Abby hanging out with her ex-girlfriend Riley.

Now I've mentioned her, let's discuss Riley. Played by a surprisingly low-key Aubrey Plaza, she sees straight through Harper & Abby's ruse because Harper did the same thing to her, telling their school friends Riley was gay and wouldn't leave her alone when romantic letters were found. She's more supportive to Abby in a few scenes than Harper is in most of the film, and they have fun together. Abby deserves better, Abby deserves Riley.

When everything reaches its conclusion, there is a horrible forced outing scene. I assume this is why other reviews said it was a bummer. It's rough to watch, and it's worse when Harper looks straight at Abby and denies it. You can see Abby's heart break. She leaves with John, played by a criminally under-used Daniel Levy, who she's called to rescue her. In my opinion, this should be where the tale of Abby & Harper ends. In the ideal movie in my head, Abby heals for an appropriate amount of time before getting her happily ever after with Riley. Of course that's not how it ends. Harper follows Abby and apologises and they return to her family for Christmas Day. In less than five minutes of screen time, the family accept them, and her parents realise they put too many expectations on their three daughters.

Over the credits we get an "ambiguously upbeat pop song that has nothing to do with the plot! They put in at the end to try to convince you that you had a great time at this shitty movie" to quote Justin Timberlake in Friends with Benefits. We see that Jane, the nicest character, has had her book published and it's very successful and we see the big happy family going to Pride and hanging out constantly. I'd rather have seen Jane getting what she deserved during the film but at least she got it. It's a happy ending but also rushed, so you don't think too much about its flaws.

Since I started writing this review, I read an interview with Clea DuVall saying that she wanted Abby and Harper to end up together because relationships aren't perfect and demand forgiveness. I see where she's coming from but I don't think Harper was shown to have enough redeeming qualities for that to be a satisfying explanation. The fact that she even had to say that proves that enough people agree with me that Riley & Abby were the real match.

I would give it 4/10 stars, mostly for the awesome cast.