Kristen Stewart

Mackenzie Davis

Mary Steenburgen

Victor Garber

Alison Brie

Mary Holland

Dan Levy

Burl Moseley

Aubrey Plaza

Sarayu Blue

Jake McDorman

Ana Gasteyer

Caroline Harris

Jenny Gulley

Dominique Allen Lawson

Michelle Buteau

Carla Gallo

Timothy Simons

Lauren Lapkus

Jinkx Monsoon

BenDeLaCreme

Anis N'Dobe

Asiyih N'Dobe

Sean Michael Weber

Sarab Kamoo

Chelsea Banglesdorf

Liron Blumenthal

Daryn Kahn

Matt Newell

Dave Maulbeck

Donald J. Hewitt Jr.

Christopher Jon Gombos

Daina Griffith

Daniel Krell

Dominique Briggs

Jonathan Berry

Gina Jun

Daniel Johnson

Eric Rasmussen

Kim H. Winther

Laurel Thomson

Adam Richards

Clea DuVall

Marty Bowen

Isaac Klausner

Jonathan McCoy

Wyck Godfrey

Ashley Pynn

Emmanuel Savary

Richard E. Chapla Jr.

Kelly Richardson

Ian Mclaughlin

Rob Fiks

Armando Ballesteros

Keith Seymour

Taylor Flick

Jason Jouver

Jacob Hays

Eric Dilucente

Billy Cole

Giela Fredman

Kate Dougherty

Adam Shahen

Kamari Somers

Paul Hammond

Season Kent

Michael W. Craven

Doug Cronin

John Finnell

Mark Gazica

Stephanie Tolksdorf

Doug Coleman

Anthony Mecca

Darcie Buterbaugh

Bethany Dilucente

Darin Rivetti

Nathaniel Peters

Erin Rose Kelly

Frank Conforti

Terence Mahoney

Cynthia E. Thornton

Stefan Fraticelli

Ellie Cumming

Natalie Goldstein

Dan Sotak

Stacey Panepinto

Kimberly Amacker

Jon D. Morrison

Matthew McCloskey

Lacey Terrell

Nathaniel Fitzgerald

Jim Kateluzos

Shalini Vijayan

Luke Ewing

Yev Shrayber

Tom Morrison

Jason Kirker

Fabiana Arrastia

Liz Flush

H Haden Hammond

April Schuller

Don Yockey

Doug Stanczak

Kailee Greb

Damon Tedesco

Heidi Germaine Schnappauf

Jaclyn Huntling Swatt

Sooze Buliavac

Tori Musial

Chris Ruppenthal

James Croal Jackson

Jake Salcudean

Ginny Minuto

Mark Perzely

Dylan Martin

Frédéric Dubois

Dakota Hadix

George Simpson

Alexis Owen-Guenther

Miranda Wodzinski

Deb Adair

Erica Weis

Amie Doherty

Natasha Leonnet

Cabernet Murray

Justin Pellisero

Angela Donatelli

Rachael M. Roth

Bálint Oltvai

Kathryn Madsen

Alyssa Batchelor

Amber Robson

Buster Pile

James Pastorius

Helena Barrett

Romance

Comedy

Happiest Season

Temple Hill Entertainment

United States of America

Kamurai

Great watch, would watch again, and do recommend.

There is a huge advantage in knowing as little as possible about a movie before watching it: mostly it removes expectations, and allows little surprises to delight you through the movie.

I watched it because it was a Kristen Stewart movie, but was happily surprised to see Clea Duvall involved, and continually delighted to see familiar faces appear: Mary Holland, Alison Brie, and Aubrey Plaza especially.

I'm honestly not familiar with "a lot" of "coming out of the closet, but not quite yet" stories, but I have seen a lot of "secrets for the holidays", and "don't tell my family x", and this is very interesting that it uses that concept to knock the wind out of the sails of the story so early.

While the majority of the story is basically abuse humor, it's delivered in a way that manages to both garner sympathy for Abbie and be charmingly amusing.

If the movie has a real downside, then it's that it tries to do (almost) too many things, but manages to pull it off.  Yeah, I pretty much hate Harper, but that's by design, and she's a victim as much as a villain.  The shift in stories as things all start to resolve is the "worst" part of it, but ultimately makes for a satisfying ending.

Peter McGinn

I was surprised by how much I liked this Hulu Christmas offering, since you can get jaded at the number of holiday romantic movies the various sources  crank out every year. The movie seems to combine several sub genres here, the familiar gay coming out, dysfunctional holiday family, even bordering in romantic triangle territory.

Martin Levy’s son does him proud, as Dan Levy was a real scene stealer here. I quickly decided the more of him, the better. The chemistry between the two leads wasn’t quite evident to me and I am not sure why. I saw more chemistry between Harper and Abby’s ex-girlfriend Riley, actually. Also, I think an opportunity was lost in the perpetually frowning two kids. They should have been allowed a bit more personality I think. (And what is up with all the gender neutral names for many of the female characters here? Harper, Tipper, Sloan, Riley, Harry, Kelly and Ashley. Weird. 

Mary Steenburgen does her usual competent job playing the wife and matriarch, though I felt they let her fade a little into the background until she asserts herself near the end. 

So while this movie won’t enter my cycle of Christmas movies to watch annually, I enjoyed it just fine (tinged with the shadow of regret that it wouldn’t have taken much more to be very good). The writers do not have many film credits, so I hope they continue to write and improve. I won’t change the channel if I run across it in the future.

I usually avoid Christmas movies but some of those names grabbed me - Mack Davis, Aubrey Plaza, Dan Levy, and more. All put in a great performance, the story made sense, the plot was well done, and it was a nice little town - all good.

English

Happiest Season Christmas Day Q+A with the Cast and Director

Happiest Season: Makeup Tutorial with Jinkx Monsoon and Ben DeLaCreme • A Hulu Original

Happiest Season: Creating A Holiday Rom-Com (Featurette) • A Hulu Original

Happiest Season: Holiday Yule Log Scenic • A Hulu Original

Happiest Season: Tegan And Sara "Make You Mine This Season" (Lyric Video) • A Hulu Original

Rapid Fire Questions: Mackenzie Davis & Kristen Stewart • Happiest Season • A Hulu Original