Review of Happy Christmas (2014) by Spangle — 18 Apr 2016

I quite enjoyed Happy Christmas. A nice and enjoyable slice of life film, it is a captivating character study of a self-destructive, immature young man who desperately needs to grow up. Anna Kendrick perfectly emulates this type of person here, while Joe Swanberg and Melanie Lynskey also turn in good performances.

The writing and direction here are solid and the film has good pacing with an interesting story to tell. I love slice of life films and this is no exception, though it does feel a touch incomplete. It needed to be longer than 82 minutes, just to give these characters more depth and more time to do things.

Unfortunately, that is not the case and I would point to that as the film's main weakness. Otherwise, however, it is an enjoyable dramedy with good acting and compelling characters.