(Don't know if this review has spoilers or not - but if it doesn't I came close.) This is the first comment in 2 years on this movie and it very well may be the last, given its very slight distribution. Jake (Jason Behr), unfortunately does too well in the lead role as a negative slacker drunk. Supposedly he went to pieces after his parents died 8 years earlier. Given what is implied by the plot (he majored in a bunch of different things but never graduated), this occurred when he was in college, i.e. the guy has spent approximately a third of his life in the tank. The romantic comedy problem here is that such a loser would only appeal to another loser or someone with a rescue codependency problem. - Not that emotional reality was ever a prerequisite in the romantic comedy genre. That said, Happily Even After has a written on the fly feel to it. The movie opens with a ridiculous scene in a cafe/ laudromat, where, for unknown reasons, patrons are not supposed to keep using a washing machine even though they have put money in. Later on, Katie (Jason's love interest) is putting on a play and has to write the third act ... but when we get to the play, somehow, somewhere the third act has been written - and we have no idea why it was ever mentioned that the play was incomplete. Likewise the play within the movie is sort of like the plot of the movie, but not really. The point of the parallels between the movie plot and the play plot is unclear. Finally (and this probably is a spoiler) Katie announces herself to be a true fairy godmother and the movie implies that she is --- even though in the opening scene she demonstrates that she is no fairy godmother.
Review of Happily Even After
