Happiness
User Score
6.9 out of 10

Generally favorable reviews- based on 32 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 23 out of 32
  2. Mixed: 3 out of 32
  3. Negative: 6 out of 32

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  1. Nesbitt10
    Dec 29, 2012
    9
    Easily the most disturbing and hilarious film simultaneously ever made; the ultimate of dark humor movies. Happiness is an ensemble drama that skips around between multiple storylines. Three sisters; a young women socially isolated seeking relationships, another happily married with a psychiatrist husband and three kids. Unfortunately, her husband develops an unnatural fascination for his 11 year old son's male classmate, fantasizes about mass killing in a park, and masturbates to teen magazines. One of his patients, Allen (Seymour Hoffman) has a fascination for the third sister who desperately wants to be raped. Meanwhile, the apparently stable 40 year marriage of the sister's parents suddenly unravels when he decides he has had enough and wants to be alone. The lives of these people are all connected by the desire for happiness, often from immoral, dark sources. The only situation that seems out of place is the conversation in a diner where a lady admits to Allen about murdering someone. Clearly this is a film not for everyone due to the disturbing subject matters, it's the zenith of the darkest of dark humor. Fantastic all around performances by a formidable cast, especially Dylan Baker and Seymour Hoffman… Expand
  2. JonathanH.
    Apr 3, 2004
    10
    A wonderful film, one that i can understand that a lot of people are going to hate, but i was amazed throughout.
  3. Oh,God,It'sGilbertMulroneycakesAgain
    Dec 6, 2003
    10
    Yes, it's me again, and yes, Yoon Min Cho, I'm talking to you again - sorry about that - but I would like to know the REASON that certain truths are best handled discreetly. I thought everything was fair game for artistic commentary, provided it was handled sensitively - which is not the same as discreetly - and which Solondz, I feel does properly in Happiness. Over to you, then.
  4. JenniferH.
    May 3, 2005
    10
    Beautiful.
  5. WilliamM.
    Apr 18, 2002
    10
    Never before have I been to a theatre in which the manager gets up before the movie starts to "warn" the audience about the general content of the film. Yes, it deals with pedophilia, but why warn the damned audience? Ridiculous. The guy then told everyone that if they wanted to talk about it afterwards, he would be available near the popcorn machine. Scary thought.
  6. JoshC
    Nov 20, 2006
    10
    Masterfull! Todd Solondz for president.
  7. Jared
    Mar 11, 2006
    10
    An absurdist comedy who's concequences are all too real. Each character bleeds emotion, yet we find ourselves compelled to laugh at their comically tragic situations. It satirizes everything yet remains incredibly poignant. All in all it is a starkly human movie, with the depravity we so often enjoy, yet so often regret.
  8. MichaelS.
    Apr 29, 2002
    10
    Refreshing...black comedy...irreverent, dark...and BOLD...great cast.
  9. GilbertMulroneycakesAtTheLondonPalladium
    Jul 16, 2003
    10
    Elliot M. raises a good point - about how there is no feeling for the characters - but forgets one thing: the Your Mileage My Vary? clause. I didn't feel it lacked substance, quite the opposite: it found it brilliant, disturbing filmmaking, if terribly hard to watch at times (I made the mistake of eating while watching it. It took me forty minutes to finish the one sandwich. I pity the people who saw it at the cinema, walking out with untouched cartons of popcorn). I don't think that it forgot how to be a movie in its search for this appetite-sucking effect, though: Solondz knows how to make a film, and he knows that the best way to shock people is to put the shocks into a good film. Otherwise it would just have been "David Lynch's Slackers". But it may not work so well for everyone. It is a horrible film. But a good one. In fact, a bloody good one. Though it isn't often very funny, except a few horror-humour hybrid moments. Of course, I was concentrating on swallowing the sandwich, and may have missed a few belly-laughs. But I doubt it.… Expand

Critic Reviews

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Metascore
81 out of 100

Universal acclaim - based on 30 Critics

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 26 out of 30
  2. Mixed: 4 out of 30
  3. Negative: 0 out of 30
  1. Chicago Reader
    Reviewed by: Jonathan Rosenbaum
    60
    Everyone who likes this movie calls it "disturbing," but what disturbs me most is the self-loathing laughter it provokes, similar to what one often hears at Woody Allen and Michael Moore comedies.
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  2. The Globe and Mail (Toronto)
    Reviewed by: Rick Groen
    50
    It's not the subject matter itself that's offensive -- pedophilia is as worthy a topic of investigation as any other. Instead, it's the subject's non-treatment -- we don't learn a thing that rings true.
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  3. The A.V. Club
    Reviewed by: Keith Phipps
    90
    Thoroughly realized characters and relationships and Solondz's masterful ability to switch the tone from comic to tragic within the same scene help make Happiness a better film than it might have been otherwise. Much better, in fact.
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