Directing: B
Acting: B+
Writing: B+
Cinematography: B
Editing: B+

Listen, Happiest Season won me over in a way that I truly never expected, even after about a third of the way into the movie. But let’s get the truly negative out of the way first, because we have to talk about that absolute turd of a title. It bears repeating, because I literally keep forgetting it: Happiest Season? What kind of generic-holiday randomized generator title is that? I hate it. It sounds like a spit balled title place holder that no one bothered to replace.

For much of the first half of this movie, I found myself thinking about how great it is to be getting a Christmas romantic comedy that features a gay couple, and how great it would be to have such a movie that is special enough to be rewatchable every Christmas, and . . . this movie is not it. Except, maybe it is? It pains me to say: probably not. But not because it’s not worthy. It’s because the title sucks. It sounds like the title of the holiday episode of a third-tier network sitcom.

So, please. Please, please, please! Forget about the title. Or wait, strike that. Write the title down! HAPPIEST SEASON. Put it somewhere you can reference it easily, lest you fall victim to how forgettable a title it is. Because this film is absolutely worth watching.

Directed and co-written b Clea DuVall, in her sophomore feature film effort, I’m still not convinced directing is her calling. This was my biggest issue with the film early on, that its direction was adequate at best. Sometimes, however, a script can make up for a lot, and the writing here absolutely does that. Granted, I have a specific bias here: as a gay viewer, I can not only relate to the issues related to coming out to one’s family, but in the end, I was deeply moved by this story. As such, I can see a pretty widely varied response among audiences, depending on their own personal experiences. To be sure, anyone with the slightest capability of empathy, this movie will work. But this movie will also really speak to some people in a way it just can’t to others. And I am definitely among those some people.

Luckily, Happiest Season also has a great cast. The gay couple at the center of it are Abby and Harper, played respectively by Kristen Stewart and Mackenzie Davis. They make a believable couple, although I found Davis’s height occasionally distracting. Abbey’s sisters Sloane and Jane are respectively played by an uptight Alison Brie and a rather funny Mary Holland; stepping into the role of the sisters’ parents are Victor Garber and Mary Steenburgen. We even get Aubrey Plaza as one of Abby’s exes, and best of all, Daniel Levy as Harper’s close friend. This movie would not have suffered without a gay male character to throw a bone to the gay men in its audience, but I sure was delighted to see him, and he provides a good amount of the comedy, without ever quite overdoing it.

In fact, Levy’s character John is essentially the heart of the movie, being the caring friend that every decent person deserves. Abby could use a friend of the same caliber, and does not seem to have one; she’s far too preoccupied with keeping up appearances for the sake of her dad’s campaign for mayor of his town. And this is another thing I love about Happiest Season (ugh, that title!): it breezily sidesteps gay clichés from start to finish: no melodramatic histrionics, and no reducing family members to small-minded caricatures. They aren’t even presented as especially conservative, and when it comes to how scary it can be for a person to come out, this is a key point: the family doesn’t have to be conservative for it to be a frighteningly uncertain prospect.

DuVall, to her credit, offers a great deal of empathy for Abby, even as she basically makes by far the shittiest choices, often to the detriment of her partner. But the broader point is that a person must be ready for such a huge step, and this actually fits perfectly with movies about the spirit of Christmas: the spirit of giving and of goodwill. Considering this is a romantic comedy—albeit one that made me cry much more than expected—it’s no spoiler to say that things work out in the end. The predictability here is immaterial; the very real struggle before such inevitably happy endings is what we are meant to understand. And we are still reminded that not every story is so happy, as told by Harper’s friend John. This isn’t his story though; it’s Abby and Harper’s, and Christmas movies must end with uplift. Happiest Season delivers on that front, in more ways than one.

Just be sure to write that title down so you know what to look for when you go looking for it on Hulu.

*You’ll be happy you watched it this season.*

Overall: B+