Happiest Season
Dec. 6th, 2020 10:30 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rsadelleI watched Happiest Season last weekend, and then I read this Autostraddle roundtable about it, which I recommend. The movie is very much not what the trailer makes it look like.
The essential structural problem with the movie is that it sets up Abby as the main character, but the movie isn't about her; it's about Harper's family. Abby doesn't have a character arc or development, but she doesn't need it. There's nothing wrong with her. It's Harper's family who needs to change.
We know from the trailer that the basic plot of the movie is that Harper tells Abby in the car on the way to visit Harper's family for Christmas that she's not out to her family, and therefore her family doesn't know that Abby is her partner. What we don't see in the trailer is that this is even worse than springing that on a partner at the last minute: Harper told Abby months ago that she came out to her family and it went fine. This is a great big, huge lie to tell your partner. And she maintained it for months! Unfortunately, this is not an isolated event. This lying to try to earn and keep someone's love is at the very heart of the movie.
We kind of start to see that Harper's family is not okay when Harper and Abby arrive at the house. Harper's parents continually order Jane, one of Harper's sisters, around. When Abby is shown to Jane's old room, it's in the basement and Harper's mother explains that they put Jane there because she disturbed everyone else's sleep and there's no lock on the door because Jane was always afraid that they would lock her in. This is not a great family dynamic, but it's a movie that's sold as a comedy, so it's somewhat understandable as a potential for hijinks.
They all go out to dinner and discover that Harper's mother has invited Harper's high school boyfriend along. At this point, her family starts to completely ignore and sideline Abby. Then Harper and Abby take a bathroom break to get a moment alone, and in the hallway they run into Riley, Harper's high school ex-girlfriend. This is all awkward, but could also be a good setup for wacky hijinks.
The next morning, Harper's sister Sloane and her family arrive. Harper and Sloane have this really harsh competing with and sniping at each other exchange. This is the point where I realized, oh, this isn't just about Harper being out; this whole family is messed up. This is emphasized by Abby saying something to Harper about how that was a little intense, and Harper has no idea what she means.
There's a big fundraising event for Harper's dad, who is running for mayor, and he drags Harper off to talk to the important potential donor. Harper writes for a respectable newspaper, which makes her the current family golden child since Sloane gave up her law career to raise her children and now makes fancy gift baskets with her husband. Given that Harper's family has at this point completely disregarded Abby, Abby ends up hanging out with Riley. They continue to get to know each other over the time Abby and Harper are there, and Riley eventually tells her what happened in high school: she and Harper used to leave each other love notes in their lockers. Then one of Harper's friends saw one of the ones Riley left for Harper, and Harper told everyone that Riley was a lesbian who was obsessed with her.
Abby tells Harper in the middle of the climactic party that they're done, and Harper follows her down to Jane's old room in the basement to talk to her. Sloane catches Abby and Harper kissing, and then Sloane and Harper have a physical fight ranging through the house that in a comedy should have been funnier. In the process, they open a closet door to see Sloane's husband kissing Carolyn, Harper's dad's campaign manager, and Sloane says they were supposed to wait to tell anyone until after the holidays. They end up, of course, in the middle of the fancy party, where Sloane tells everyone that Harper is a lesbian and Abby isn't just her roommate. Harper completely denies it and says Sloane is lying. In other words, she does the exact same thing to Abby now that she did to Riley in high school.
Abby's friend John has come to the party, and he and Abby take a walk where he gives the speech everyone loves about how everyone's coming out experience ends up differently and that if Harper isn't ready to come out now, or ever, that's about her and not about Abby. This leads to the one point of character development for Abby in that she says she doesn't want to be with someone who's not ready to be out. That was so good! It was exactly the kind of thing you read in advice columns: it's okay for that kind of thing to be a dealbreaker for you, and while it makes you incompatible with some people, it doesn't make you a terrible person. This is also completely heartbreaking. Abby is our main character, and this breakup made me cry because of how much it hurt her.
When Abby and John come back in and Abby says she's just going to get her things, Harper now tells the truth. She tells her family she's a lesbian, and tells Abby that she loves her. Sloane comes to stand with her and tells the family that she and her husband are separated and getting a divorce. Jane comes to stand with them and says that she doesn't have any secrets, but she supports them. Their dad turns away and goes to his office. Abby tells Harper it's too late and gets her things and leaves with John.
Abby and John are stopped at a gas station when Harper pulls up. She gives Abby this speech about how she's sorry and she loves her and wants to build a life with her. The building a life together bit echoes what Abby said early in the movie when she was explaining to John why she wanted to marry Harper. And then Abby goes with her back to her family. This is a terrible ending! Harper says she's sorry, but at no point does she do anything to make up for it and rebuild Abby's trust. We learn so much about her bad behavior, and so little about what Abby might see in her, that it's hard to understand why Abby accepts that apology. From the audience perspective, she's learned a lot about her partner's really terrible behavior and approach to relationships, and those aren't things that are easily fixed. From what we know, she should be deeply worried about how that would continue to manifest itself in the future and be really hurt by Harper's lying, and this is even worse given that what Abby has learned about Harper in this time is that she has a pattern of saying and doing whatever it is that will let her get and keep love from other people.
Many, many people have already said this, but Abby should have ended up with Riley. They got along. They have this really great scene at a drag show that is absolutely the kind of setup for a relationship that you see in romantic comedies. I know some people have said that that couldn't happen because of the genre, but there is definite precedent for going home for Christmas with a partner and ending up with someone else. That's exactly what happens in The Family Stone.
The Autostraddle roundtable has a section where they talk about having brought someone home or been the someone brought home for the holidays. That was super interesting, mostly in contrast. No one in that group had a particularly positive story about that (the best it gets is "fine"), which made me (a) wonder how that compares to straight people in similar situations and (b) think about the dynamics of my own family. There was a time when I was still spending time with an extended family group where a cousin asked if I was dating anyone because she wondered if I was but wasn't bringing them to family dinner. I remember thinking at the time that I wouldn't date anyone I couldn't bring to family dinner. I actually no longer spend time with the extended family on that side, but my sexuality has nothing to do with it, and I wouldn't have had any problem introducing a girl to my extended family if I'd been in a relationship then or my immediate family if I were in a relationship now. I will also acknowledge here that I live in the same town as my family, so there wouldn't be travel or extended stays involved. But also: my family would never treat someone, friend or partner, the way Harper's family treats Abby. (And I have the experience of having seen my family interact with friends and partners who joined us for birthdays, holidays, and other events over the years.) Their treatment of Abby isn't just getting caught up in each other and forgetting that they have a guest who doesn't share their history of family jokes and references. They ignore and sideline her so definitively. They don't ask about her. They don't invite her into conversation. They don't make sure she's comfortable in a situation full of strangers. It was so incredibly rude. I can't imagine treating a guest like that. And I really can't imagine treating a guest like that when as the person who brought them along.
I hope someone has turned the Janet giving Michael cacti photoset from The Good Place into a meme about this movie, where Michael is labeled as the queer community saying, "You're sure this is a cheesy Christmas movie and not another coming out drama," Janet labeled as Hollywood saying yes, and then the cactus labeled as another coming out drama. Something that came up in the Autostraddle piece and its comments is that coming out stories are still relevant to many people, so possibly part of what's going on with the response to this movie is a thing I've been thinking about a lot for the past few years around the purpose of storytelling. In her review of Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, Emily Nussbaum said that she sees the rise of sexual assault storylines on TV as a natural consequence of a shift in TV: "when women’s lives are taken seriously, sexual violence is going to be part of the drama." I agree with her, and my counterexample is that part of what made watching Pitch so relaxing and enjoyable is that Ginny never got rape or death threats. Sometimes it's great to see your life as it is reflected in stories, particularly mainstream Hollywood stories. And sometimes it's great to see the possibilities of how your life could be in a better world. I think one of the biggest problems with Happiest Season is that it's marketed as a cheesy Christmas rom-com, which makes the serious coming out story, which might have value to some people, a real disappointment to those of us who were looking for a better world version of the story.
There is also a bigger piece here about the whole idea of rom-coms. It seems like that gets applied to any romance with a happy ending and not super tragically dramatic circumstances, and ignores the "comedy" half of the term - or at least uses it in a way that means "ends with a wedding" instead of "is funny." So many recent so-called "rom-coms" aren't funny, at least to me. Shana Naomi tweeted an interesting perspective that rom-coms aren't a model for life because they're usually based on lies. I've been thinking about the context of the lies. In Happiest Season, Harper tells a really huge lie to her partner. That, to me, is on a whole different level than other kinds of rom-com starting lies. I've been thinking about the rom-com style movies I love that start with a lie, and they generally focus on two specific kinds of lies: fake dating and asked out on false pretenses (bets, paid by a third party) but developed feelings. In both of those, the happy endings aren't based on outright lies and really awful behavior by one half of the couple toward the other. In fake dating, the couple is in the lie together. And in in the case of those false pretenses movies (like She's All That and 10 Things I Hate About You), the person who started with false pretenses can't just say they're sorry, they have to do something to make it up to the other person. Harper flat out lies to the person she's supposed to have the most intimate relationship with, and never does anything to make up for her bad behavior. I found that deeply disappointing.
The essential structural problem with the movie is that it sets up Abby as the main character, but the movie isn't about her; it's about Harper's family. Abby doesn't have a character arc or development, but she doesn't need it. There's nothing wrong with her. It's Harper's family who needs to change.
We know from the trailer that the basic plot of the movie is that Harper tells Abby in the car on the way to visit Harper's family for Christmas that she's not out to her family, and therefore her family doesn't know that Abby is her partner. What we don't see in the trailer is that this is even worse than springing that on a partner at the last minute: Harper told Abby months ago that she came out to her family and it went fine. This is a great big, huge lie to tell your partner. And she maintained it for months! Unfortunately, this is not an isolated event. This lying to try to earn and keep someone's love is at the very heart of the movie.
We kind of start to see that Harper's family is not okay when Harper and Abby arrive at the house. Harper's parents continually order Jane, one of Harper's sisters, around. When Abby is shown to Jane's old room, it's in the basement and Harper's mother explains that they put Jane there because she disturbed everyone else's sleep and there's no lock on the door because Jane was always afraid that they would lock her in. This is not a great family dynamic, but it's a movie that's sold as a comedy, so it's somewhat understandable as a potential for hijinks.
They all go out to dinner and discover that Harper's mother has invited Harper's high school boyfriend along. At this point, her family starts to completely ignore and sideline Abby. Then Harper and Abby take a bathroom break to get a moment alone, and in the hallway they run into Riley, Harper's high school ex-girlfriend. This is all awkward, but could also be a good setup for wacky hijinks.
The next morning, Harper's sister Sloane and her family arrive. Harper and Sloane have this really harsh competing with and sniping at each other exchange. This is the point where I realized, oh, this isn't just about Harper being out; this whole family is messed up. This is emphasized by Abby saying something to Harper about how that was a little intense, and Harper has no idea what she means.
There's a big fundraising event for Harper's dad, who is running for mayor, and he drags Harper off to talk to the important potential donor. Harper writes for a respectable newspaper, which makes her the current family golden child since Sloane gave up her law career to raise her children and now makes fancy gift baskets with her husband. Given that Harper's family has at this point completely disregarded Abby, Abby ends up hanging out with Riley. They continue to get to know each other over the time Abby and Harper are there, and Riley eventually tells her what happened in high school: she and Harper used to leave each other love notes in their lockers. Then one of Harper's friends saw one of the ones Riley left for Harper, and Harper told everyone that Riley was a lesbian who was obsessed with her.
Abby tells Harper in the middle of the climactic party that they're done, and Harper follows her down to Jane's old room in the basement to talk to her. Sloane catches Abby and Harper kissing, and then Sloane and Harper have a physical fight ranging through the house that in a comedy should have been funnier. In the process, they open a closet door to see Sloane's husband kissing Carolyn, Harper's dad's campaign manager, and Sloane says they were supposed to wait to tell anyone until after the holidays. They end up, of course, in the middle of the fancy party, where Sloane tells everyone that Harper is a lesbian and Abby isn't just her roommate. Harper completely denies it and says Sloane is lying. In other words, she does the exact same thing to Abby now that she did to Riley in high school.
Abby's friend John has come to the party, and he and Abby take a walk where he gives the speech everyone loves about how everyone's coming out experience ends up differently and that if Harper isn't ready to come out now, or ever, that's about her and not about Abby. This leads to the one point of character development for Abby in that she says she doesn't want to be with someone who's not ready to be out. That was so good! It was exactly the kind of thing you read in advice columns: it's okay for that kind of thing to be a dealbreaker for you, and while it makes you incompatible with some people, it doesn't make you a terrible person. This is also completely heartbreaking. Abby is our main character, and this breakup made me cry because of how much it hurt her.
When Abby and John come back in and Abby says she's just going to get her things, Harper now tells the truth. She tells her family she's a lesbian, and tells Abby that she loves her. Sloane comes to stand with her and tells the family that she and her husband are separated and getting a divorce. Jane comes to stand with them and says that she doesn't have any secrets, but she supports them. Their dad turns away and goes to his office. Abby tells Harper it's too late and gets her things and leaves with John.
Abby and John are stopped at a gas station when Harper pulls up. She gives Abby this speech about how she's sorry and she loves her and wants to build a life with her. The building a life together bit echoes what Abby said early in the movie when she was explaining to John why she wanted to marry Harper. And then Abby goes with her back to her family. This is a terrible ending! Harper says she's sorry, but at no point does she do anything to make up for it and rebuild Abby's trust. We learn so much about her bad behavior, and so little about what Abby might see in her, that it's hard to understand why Abby accepts that apology. From the audience perspective, she's learned a lot about her partner's really terrible behavior and approach to relationships, and those aren't things that are easily fixed. From what we know, she should be deeply worried about how that would continue to manifest itself in the future and be really hurt by Harper's lying, and this is even worse given that what Abby has learned about Harper in this time is that she has a pattern of saying and doing whatever it is that will let her get and keep love from other people.
Many, many people have already said this, but Abby should have ended up with Riley. They got along. They have this really great scene at a drag show that is absolutely the kind of setup for a relationship that you see in romantic comedies. I know some people have said that that couldn't happen because of the genre, but there is definite precedent for going home for Christmas with a partner and ending up with someone else. That's exactly what happens in The Family Stone.
The Autostraddle roundtable has a section where they talk about having brought someone home or been the someone brought home for the holidays. That was super interesting, mostly in contrast. No one in that group had a particularly positive story about that (the best it gets is "fine"), which made me (a) wonder how that compares to straight people in similar situations and (b) think about the dynamics of my own family. There was a time when I was still spending time with an extended family group where a cousin asked if I was dating anyone because she wondered if I was but wasn't bringing them to family dinner. I remember thinking at the time that I wouldn't date anyone I couldn't bring to family dinner. I actually no longer spend time with the extended family on that side, but my sexuality has nothing to do with it, and I wouldn't have had any problem introducing a girl to my extended family if I'd been in a relationship then or my immediate family if I were in a relationship now. I will also acknowledge here that I live in the same town as my family, so there wouldn't be travel or extended stays involved. But also: my family would never treat someone, friend or partner, the way Harper's family treats Abby. (And I have the experience of having seen my family interact with friends and partners who joined us for birthdays, holidays, and other events over the years.) Their treatment of Abby isn't just getting caught up in each other and forgetting that they have a guest who doesn't share their history of family jokes and references. They ignore and sideline her so definitively. They don't ask about her. They don't invite her into conversation. They don't make sure she's comfortable in a situation full of strangers. It was so incredibly rude. I can't imagine treating a guest like that. And I really can't imagine treating a guest like that when as the person who brought them along.
I hope someone has turned the Janet giving Michael cacti photoset from The Good Place into a meme about this movie, where Michael is labeled as the queer community saying, "You're sure this is a cheesy Christmas movie and not another coming out drama," Janet labeled as Hollywood saying yes, and then the cactus labeled as another coming out drama. Something that came up in the Autostraddle piece and its comments is that coming out stories are still relevant to many people, so possibly part of what's going on with the response to this movie is a thing I've been thinking about a lot for the past few years around the purpose of storytelling. In her review of Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, Emily Nussbaum said that she sees the rise of sexual assault storylines on TV as a natural consequence of a shift in TV: "when women’s lives are taken seriously, sexual violence is going to be part of the drama." I agree with her, and my counterexample is that part of what made watching Pitch so relaxing and enjoyable is that Ginny never got rape or death threats. Sometimes it's great to see your life as it is reflected in stories, particularly mainstream Hollywood stories. And sometimes it's great to see the possibilities of how your life could be in a better world. I think one of the biggest problems with Happiest Season is that it's marketed as a cheesy Christmas rom-com, which makes the serious coming out story, which might have value to some people, a real disappointment to those of us who were looking for a better world version of the story.
There is also a bigger piece here about the whole idea of rom-coms. It seems like that gets applied to any romance with a happy ending and not super tragically dramatic circumstances, and ignores the "comedy" half of the term - or at least uses it in a way that means "ends with a wedding" instead of "is funny." So many recent so-called "rom-coms" aren't funny, at least to me. Shana Naomi tweeted an interesting perspective that rom-coms aren't a model for life because they're usually based on lies. I've been thinking about the context of the lies. In Happiest Season, Harper tells a really huge lie to her partner. That, to me, is on a whole different level than other kinds of rom-com starting lies. I've been thinking about the rom-com style movies I love that start with a lie, and they generally focus on two specific kinds of lies: fake dating and asked out on false pretenses (bets, paid by a third party) but developed feelings. In both of those, the happy endings aren't based on outright lies and really awful behavior by one half of the couple toward the other. In fake dating, the couple is in the lie together. And in in the case of those false pretenses movies (like She's All That and 10 Things I Hate About You), the person who started with false pretenses can't just say they're sorry, they have to do something to make it up to the other person. Harper flat out lies to the person she's supposed to have the most intimate relationship with, and never does anything to make up for her bad behavior. I found that deeply disappointing.