Hollywood has blessed us with some great queer rom-coms in recent years – Fire Island, The Thing About Harry, Booksmart, and even Bros.
However, a certain subset of this genre – queer Christmas rom-coms – has surged forth in relevance, blessing us with beautiful baubles such as Single All the Way, Christmas on Cherry Lane, and The Christmas Setup. Perhaps the best of those, though, is Happiest Season, which stars a queer fever dream of a lineup that includes Kristen Stewart, Aubrey Plaza, Dan Levy, and even Victor Garber.
For a Christmas rom-com, Happiest Season tackles some heavy subjects. On the surface, it seems to have a standard Christmasy plot: Harper (Mackenzie Davis) is bringing her girlfriend Abby (Stewart) to meet her parents for the first time. However, the catch is that Harper is still deeply closeted and thus must introduce Abby as her “orphaned friend.” This leads to several nuanced, realistic scenes about the toxicity of the Closet and the repercussions of self denial. But it also leads to refreshing hijinks, artisanal Aubrey Plaza sultriness, and divine Dan Levy sassiness. A Christmas miracle.
Though flocked with several Christmas clichés (as it should be), Happiest Season manages to seamlessly weave queer themes throughout its time-tested holiday rom-com formula. It even does this without feeling too corny. This in itself is groundbreaking. And yet, Happiest Season goes the extra mile by actually being funny. This is partly due to the dexterous dialogue, which was co-written by Clea DuVall, the director of the movie and herself a lesbian icon. However, it’s also partly due to Dan Levy’s snappy delivery in his role as a brassy literary agent.
Meanwhile, Stewart’s touching performance opposite Davis is further proof that she deserved her Oscar nomination for Spencer, and Aubrey Plaza is delightfully mordant, as always, in her role as the ex-girlfriend, sent by the screenwriting gods to sow chaos.
Perhaps what truly makes the movie entertaining, though, is its deep understanding of queer trauma and the complexity of the coming out process. But as DuVall herself said, Happiest Season is semi-autobiographical, so it makes sense that it would be nuanced and well-rounded. On the other hand, Harper will anger you many, many times due to her complete lack of self-awareness. Still, these subplots resolve themselves in the coziest of manners, and Happiest Season is ultimately a celebration of queer joy. Cheers!
